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128: Noha Serageldin: An Introduction to Egyptian Cuisine and Beyond

June 22, 2016 by Gabriel Leave a Comment

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Matters of the Belly

Noha was born and raised in Egypt where food was such a huge deal that it felt like a member of their family. She moved to Australia with her husband in 2013 and is where she currently lives. On her blog Matters of the Belly is where Noha shares with us the food she likes to cook and eat, and the memories that they evoke, hoping to inspire us to put on our aprons and to pick up our wooden spoons.

I’m so excited to have Noha Serageldin of Matters of the Belly joining me on the show.

(*All photos below are Noha’s.)

On Growing Up in Egypt:

I come from quite a big family. And to us, in Egypt, food is so central to everything we do — all the events, all the birthdays, all the special occasions — everything is centered around food, and so it’s been a massive part of my life growing up. Every social gathering, every holiday, everything has a special food for it, and we always looked forward to that and my parents were very big on making things themselves rather than buying.

My sisters and I learned to cook and to make things and to get excited about food from a very young age, especially my younger sister and I. My older sister was not as interested. Food has always been wonderful and a big part of growing up for us.

The norm is that food is a big deal, but it’s not necessarily made from scratch, if that makes sense. Lots of people rely on bringing food in, buying food, not really making it, and our family was very much interested in gathering around making it, so making an event out of making the food and spending time together in the kitchen, and planning it, basically, and doing it all together. So that’s where ours was, I think, a bit special.

On Egyptian Cuisine:

It’s not very widespread, not like, for example, Lebanese food which you can find almost anywhere. Egyptian food is very similar to Lebanese and other foods of the area where it’s very simple food. It’s very highly reliant on vegetables and beans and things like that because they’re staples and they’re very cheap. Most normal families in Egypt would be on the poorer side and they’d want something to sustain them and keep them going through the day that doesn’t cost that much.

Most of our most famous national dishes are actually vegan or vegetarian without even…not on purpose, but it just happened to be that way.

Lots of big flavors, quite a bit of spices. Our meats are very simply prepared, nothing fancy, when we do have meat, but yeah, that’s pretty much it, sums it up.

When I think of Egypt, the spice that comes to mind instantly is cumin, instantly. So cumin and coriander are very, very widely used in Egyptian dishes, as well as cinnamon, I would say.

Cumin and coriander always go together. Cinnamon, it’s separate, it goes by itself, more like maybe some nutmeg and things like that, more warming dishes. It’s often added to desserts as well. Lots of desserts are flavored with cinnamon.

On What a Typical Egyptian Meal Looks Like:

The typical Egyptian meal, that if you walk into any Egyptian home, you’ll see has to be a massive plate of rice on the table at all times, and there’s probably bread too. Our Egyptian pita bread is really, really special. It’s a bit different to the types of pita bread that you see that are nice and smooth and white. It’s more whole grain and it’s very rustic, and it has the bran of the wheat covering it, all of it, so it’s a very special bread.

These are always there, and you’ll find some sort of stewed vegetable always, with tomato sauce stewed slowly, like green beans or okra or even peas. And if it’s a day where the family is having meat, then there’d probably be fried chicken or maybe grilled kofta meats, like beef kofta or maybe even lamb. Lamb is quite popular as well. That’s your typical Egyptian meal.

On Must-Have Dishes for Visitors to Egypt:

I’d say there are three dishes that cannot be missed for anyone visiting Egypt, and they’re quite easy to get because they’re widely available on the street. Most Egyptian food, you’d need to go into an Egyptian house, in a home, to eat them but these three… The first one is koshari, which is, pretty much, I would consider it the fast food of Egypt because it’s what people eat during work for lunch and typically have on their working day. It’s made up of, again, rice and lentils, cooked lentils, cooked chickpeas, a spicy tomato sauce, and fried onions on top. People usually even have it in a big plastic bowl or even a bag. I think that’s popular in Asia, as well, where you can get drinks and food in plastic bags. That happens a lot. So koshari is a must, must have. It’s a very spicy and very filling dish while being a vegan one as well.

The other two that usually go together are ta’amiya which are Egyptian falafel. They’re very similar to most of the falafel you know, but they’re made with fava beans rather than chickpeas, and they’re very, very green inside. So you’d take a bite and they’d be bright, bright green inside from all the herbs. And these are often eaten with ful which is, I would say, the number one national dish of Egypt, which are very slow-cooked fava beans. It’s a stew. It’s dark brown, and it’s very often flavored with cumin and coriander and olive oil, and maybe chopped tomatoes and cucumber and eaten with the pita bread. So these are the must, must haves.

The Pressure Cooker:

Which food shows or cooking shows do you watch?

I’m hooked on MasterChef and I’m never going to stop.

What are some food blogs or food websites we have to know about?

Well, food websites that I go to back and back again are Food52, The Kitchn, and Bon Appetit. I always go there if I need a basic recipe. As for food bloggers, they are endless. I’ve discovered so many talented food blogs and food bloggers around. I’m going to say a couple of the Australian ones that I’ve discovered here.

I love Cook Republic by Sneh Roy. She’s just wonderful and her recipes are never failing. I love, for desserts, I really like Thalia Ho from Butter and Brioche. I love, what else, My Darling Lemon Thyme of course.

Who do you follow on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook or Snapchat that make you happy?

I’m not big on Snapchat yet. I’m still trying to figure out how to work, how that works, but I’ve started following a few people and I do enjoy following very little video stories. I love following Local is Lovely, which is a wonderful local blogger here called Sophie Hansen that lives in regional New South Wales. Their stories and photos and events always make me so happy and make me actually want to move to the countryside, because she just focuses on the local growers and the local farmers and everything that this beautiful land has to offer, which always really, really makes me happy and makes me want to explore more of what Australia has to offer.

What is the most unusual or treasured item in your kitchen?

Actually, this is a funny story, but when I first came here for the first year, I started trying to collect all the things that I need in my kitchen from around Australia, and there were two things that I could not find anywhere that I was used to use back home. So when I went back to visit, I carried them back with me in my luggage, which is one, my rice washer. It’s just a bowl with slits down the side that you can easily wash rice in without it falling through. So it’s very thin slits and it’s a very simple thing, but it just saves me so much time washing my rice, and rice is such a big thing in Egyptian cooking. So that was something I had to bring back. And the other thing was the tool we use to hollow out vegetables for stuffing. It’s a really thin, long tool, and I couldn’t find it anywhere. So these two things are, they’re very precious and I guard them all the time and make sure I pack them first whenever we move.

Name one ingredient you used to dislike but now you love.

So many, because my mother used to always try to feed us all the wonderful Egyptian food, and we’d just say, “Oh, I don’t like eggplant,” or I don’t like one other very popular dish in Egypt is called Molokhia which is… I mean looking at it, you’d probably think it’s gross because it’s basically a green, slimy soup, and it’s not very appetizing, but I cannot have enough from it now. And I go specially, I trek out to the western suburbs, to the Middle Eastern grocers to buy it specially frozen so I can have it often. I used to make fun of my mom because she could have it every day, and I was just very grossed out by it, but now, I’m just completely addicted to it. I love it.

What are a few cookbooks that make your life better?

Definitely Ottolenghi cookbooks. I use them like a resource. It’s just like an encyclopedia for how to cook vegetables well. He knows his vegetables. He’s tested every sort of method there is and he always gives you the final verdict. So that, for sure, and I do have the Cairo Kitchen cookbook with me from back home, which is written by an Egyptian who opened a restaurant by the same name. So that has lots of classic and slightly modernized versions of our classic Egyptian dishes. I love having that whenever I need a quick tip on how to make something that I miss, I go for that.

What song or album just makes you want to cook?

The soundtrack for Amelie, the movie. It always makes me want to cook.

On Keeping Posted with Noha:

Definitely Instagram, I’m quite active on there and use it to also do micro posts because I don’t always have time to do full blog posts anymore, but I try to keep every other day, at least, on Instagram with a bit of an update, a bit of a story, anything like that.

108: Emily Stoffel: How Cooking Changes with Parenthood

February 3, 2016 by Gabriel Leave a Comment

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The Pig & Quill

Emily started The Pig & Quill in 2012, and most recipes on her blog are heavy on the plants and low on refined sugars and starches though she is a firm believer in moderation. She is also a new mom.

I am so happy to have Emily Stoffel of The Pig & Quill joining me here on the show today.

(*All photos below are Emily’s.)

On Cooking as a New Parent:

It’s definitely driven a little bit more by convenience. I used to just cook whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted, and now, a lot of what we are doing in the house is meals, particularly dinners, where you can prep a lot of things in advance a little bit here and there throughout the day. I can prep a little bit during the first nap. I can prep a little bit during the second nap. And then by the time she goes to sleep, and we’re having dinner at night, there’s very little that’s required to bring it together, and we can still eat at a reasonable hour.

A lot of that is relying on things like a slow cooker, or, I use my rice cooker for everything. I’m cooking a lot of things in the broiler. I didn’t used to do that a bunch, but it’s such a fast way to cook protein. So that’s changed my game a little.

And my husband’s a great sport about the fact that we eat the same three or four meals in rotation, which we did not used to do. It used to be something different every night. We just have go-to’s that we know we can pull off in a moment’s notice. So there’s a lot of that, but still trying to keep things interesting.

I wasn’t such a really big proponent of the slow cooker actually before I had Lana. I know a lot of people are super hardcore slow cooker fans. I guess I just didn’t really give it a chance. I thought, “Oh, it’s for everything. Let it go…Whatever. I can do the same thing on my stove,” but it is really nice to be able to start something in the morning and then be able to leave the house and run errands or whatever and come back. I use my rice cooker for oatmeal which makes breakfast a no-brainer. So one of us can get up in the morning and start the oatmeal.

When we first had Lana, when she was a newborn, one of us would sneak out of bed before she would wake up in the morning, because she sleeps in our room, and put out all the oatmeal toppings and the ingredients and everything and set it. And then by the time she was up, it was ready to go. So we wouldn’t have to worry about making breakfast for ourselves. So yeah, I use that. I even hard-boil eggs in my rice cooker.

It’s pretty incredible. If you have a steamer insert, you just throw the eggs on top while you cook the rice. The time the rice is done, your eggs are done, and it’s perfect. If you want soft-boiled eggs, you can do it when you cook your white rice. And if you want hardboiled eggs, you do it when you cook your brown rice.

On Putting a Meal Together Quickly:

I mentioned that I like to use the broiler a lot. So I marinate a protein throughout the day. And then I can just pop it in the broiler when Lana’s napping or goes down for the night. And it usually just takes ten minutes to cook a protein that way.

I have a couple recipes on my blog. One is the shoyu chicken, and that’s super easy. It’s just chicken thighs that you marinate, and broil, and serve it with white rice or whatever side you want. And then the other one is a pumpkin curry which takes a little bit longer to do, but again, it’s something where I can do different elements throughout the day. And then it’s topped with a crispy, spice crusted tofu, and that is done completely under the broiler.

And even if you just look at the recipe for the tofu element, we put that tofu on salads. Sometimes, I just have it in a bowl with roasted veggies. So even if you’re not into curry or you’re not doing the pumpkin curry part of it, the tofu is super clutch. We do that all the time.

On How to Make Cooking Fun:

This is a cop out, but when we had Lana at first, we did a lot of the grocery meal delivery kits that are popular right now. I know that there’s Sun Basket, and there’s HelloFresh. And I know a lot of different ones that folks do. Some are organic, some are not. And that’s something that I probably never would have considered doing before I had kids. But it’s fun because they have the instructions written out so clearly step-by-step with those meal kits that it’s super easy for two people to tag team a recipe. You can just say, “Here’s where I started,” or “I left off at this step.”

Unlike some recipes, traditional recipes, including the ones that I write, a lot of times, the items that you have to prepare are called out in a different color or something like that, so you can see exactly what you need to do to this fruit or to this vegetable before it goes to the cooking stage. And you can break up the responsibilities that way.

We found those actually really helpful because it was a fast way to still be cooking together in the kitchen, something that was homemade. But A, you don’t have to go to the grocery store and B, just the way that the recipe is written, it’s really easy to do it on your own. But if you’re moving around the kitchen with multiple folks or something like that, it’s easy to make that come together.

The other thing that’s fun is we don’t go out a lot for dinner anymore. So when we’re feeling not super inspired, we’ll invite people over to just have hors d’ oeuvres here or something like that. And that’s a good way to get engaged about cooking again. You don’t feel like, “Oh my gosh, I’m just making dinner for myself to get by.” You feel like you’re entertaining which is a refreshing way to feel when you don’t get a lot of fun evening time. So that’s something that’s invigorated my time in the kitchen.

On Her Food Heroes:

Well, aside from my family, so my mom first and foremost, I learned so much from her just growing up in the kitchen, and her dad like I mentioned, just having exposure to that at a young age, and my dad as well.

In terms of people that inspired me, I guess if you think about the Nigella’s or Ina Garten, those types of folks even before Food Network was anywhere near where it is today, those were the types of folks where I just really admire. They’re cooking super un-fussy food that’s just delicious. It just tastes good. They don’t necessarily have a hook or a theme. They just make food that’s accessible and super tasty. And they deliver it in such a seductive and enticing way without really trying.

And I know that now, they’re these big brands, and they’ve got marketing up the wahoo. But back in the day of Yan Can Cook or The Frugal Gourmet, I used to watch those folks on PBS, and those were just people that cooked food that they knew they would enjoy. There wasn’t really any big spin to it.

Those are the types of folks that I think I learned the most from, just seeing their passion and seeing how that can translate into something that’s educational and entertaining. I also had a really unabashed girl crush on Giada when I was in college to the point where I would have dreams that we were best friends hanging out in Santa Monica. It was super creepy.

On Her Blog:

I had sat down with one of my good friends, and we were doing this life mapping of everything that we wanted to do in the next several years. And I told her that starting a blog was something that I really wanted to do, and I started The Pig & Quill without doing a lot of research, without coming up with a big plan for a brand or an image or even an idea of how the site would look.

It was just like I told her, “This is what I want to do.” We brainstormed a bunch of names. I bought the domain name, and then I sat on it for six months. And then it was bugging me that I had spent $13 to register this domain name and hadn’t done anything with it.

So Labor Day weekend of 2012, we actually stayed home that weekend, it was a stay-cation, and I was like, “Okay, this is the weekend that I’m going to start the blog,” and I launched it without a lot of research or anything. The images were awful, but it was exactly what I wanted it to be. It was just me talking about the food that I liked but also talking about how food fit into my life and adding a personal storyline to each post.

So yeah, it wasn’t really like, “Oh my gosh. I have this vision that I’m going to be a food blogger.” It was just something that I did spontaneously, and I’ve had to learn the ropes as I’ve gone along. Fortunately, there’s a ton of inspiration out there these days to help me grow, but it’s a crazy space, food blogging, because there’s so much opportunity and so many different angles and approaches that you can take with your blog. And I went into it with, like I said, with a really unclear vision. I was just like, “I’m going to get this up today.” And hindsight being 20-20, I would have mapped out my look and my voice a little more before I started, but finding my way has been part of the fun.

The Pressure Cooker:

Which food shows or cooking shows do you watch?

I watch Master Chef Jr. When I’m over at my in-laws or my mom’s house, I watch Chopped. That’s always fun. Sometimes, we pause it and say what we would do with the ingredients if we were given the basket. I don’t watch a lot food TV anymore these days.

What are some food blogs or food websites we have to know about?

Oh, wow. There are a lot. I really love i am a food blog. Everything that Stephanie makes I want to eat it immediately. Two Red Bowls, the photography is ridiculous, Fix Feast Flair, Kale & Caramel. I’ve only been reading Kale & Caramel in the last, probably, six months, but her voice is…I feel like I just want to be friends with Lily in real life. She cracks me up, and she does a really good job of doing what I really like doing in food blogs, which is pairing a little bit more of personal anecdotes with recipes. She does a lot of that.

Bev Cooks was one of the first food blogs that I read back in the day. She is hilarious. And she has two kiddos. They’re twins, and they’re the most adorable people ever. Her Instagram is just ridiculous. Wit & Vinegar, Billy’s really funny. I think his aesthetic is really different from anything that anyone else is doing.

I really like reading Dessert for Two because Christina’s got a little one that is Lana’s age. So it’s been fun reading her blog and seeing her daughter at the same stage that Lana’s at. We were pregnant at the same time. We’re not BFF’s or anything, but I stalked her throughout our pregnancies, and that was really fun.

Chocolate and Marrow, I really like Chocolate and Marrow. Brooke just does crazy, creative stuff, really, really delicious things, really indulgent and just beautiful stuff.

Who do you follow on Pinterest, Instagram, or Facebook or Snapchat that make you happy?

Snapchat, I just haven’t really gotten into yet. I would say of those things, I probably use Instagram the most. Violet Tinder, she’s really great. She has just a super rainbow-hued, really fun Instagram. And she does a lot of candy-colored things and water colors, and everything is just super poppy, neon bright. Miss New Foodie is really funny. She has some pretty funny captions for all of her indulgent eats.

What is the most unusual or treasured item in your kitchen?

The thing that’s most treasured in my current kitchen is not even mine because I rent, but it’s our stove. We have a vintage Wedgewood stove in this kitchen that’s incredible. It’s really petite. The oven portion is really petite, but it heats up super-fast and evenly. It’s got a legit broiler which I mentioned earlier that really gets the job done.

In terms of an appliance, I have a garlic press, the same garlic press that I mentioned earlier where I think it’s called the Garlic Twist. It’s like this big piece of acrylic. And rather than crushing garlic through it, you put the garlic in, and you twist it. And because it’s one piece of plastic, it rinses out super easily. I use it probably every day. It’s not like the garlic presses where there’s all the little holes that you have to get all the stuff out of.

Name one ingredient you used to dislike but now you love.

I don’t really love mustard or I didn’t really love mustard, particularly yellow mustard, but I didn’t really use any mustard. And now, maybe because my husband is a huge mustard aficionado, I’ve come around on mustard. I actually really like hot horseradish-y mustards more so than a yellow mustard. But I used to really not be a fan of yellow mustard. I can at least tolerate it now.

What are a few cookbooks that make your life better?

I’m an awful baker, so I have to rely on cookbooks for baking or at least for measurements that I can gain inspiration from, so The Williams-Sonoma baking cookbook is really great. It’s got tons of cool recipes. But it’s also just good for if I need a jumping off point for an idea that I have.

I mentioned i am a food blog earlier, and her book Easy Gourmet is great. I’ve given it to a bunch of people because it’s just exactly what it says, easy gourmet. It’s really accessible. Anything by America’s Test Kitchen is good for the same reason as the Williams-Sonoma baking book. You just know that everything is really thoroughly tested, and it’s a good jumping off point. I still have a subscription to Bon Appétit and Gourmet. I know that that’s not a book, but those are good for keeping me aware of food trends and things like that.

What song or album just makes you want to cook?

Well, I always have this vision that if I ever quit my day job and I got to just spend all day cooking in my kitchen, that I would do it listening to Carole King or Adele on the record player. So I guess I’d say both of those ladies. Then for something maybe a little more poppy, I’ll dance in the kitchen to Britney Spears or Nelly Furtado, early 2000’s Nelly Furtado. The Who, it’s really fun.

On Keeping Posted with Emily:

I’m probably the most active on Instagram, and that is @thepigandquill or Facebook, and then Pinterest. I love Pinterest.

085: Lauren Grier: Teaching Herself and Others How to Cook

October 14, 2015 by Gabriel 4 Comments

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Climbing Grier Mountain

Lauren is a foodie, recipe developer, adventure seeker, photography lover, and world traveler. She started her blog, Climbing Grier Mountain, in 2010 to stay connected with family and since then, it has become her passion. It’s where she shares her shenanigans and most authentic self.

I am so excited to have Lauren Grier of Climbing Grier Mountain joining me here on the show today.

(*All images below are Lauren’s.)

On Being Such an Open Book:

Starting off, I grew up in a small town in Kansas. My husband and I met in college and we graduated and went right to the big city of Chicago. So I think that’s where my adventurous side was born. Chicago is… they throw you right in and you just have to start swimming and figure it out. From there, I just really opened up and figured out, you know what? There’s more to me than I think. I started writing my own story, just really being curious about why are things the way they are when it comes to cooking or travel or whatever it is.

It was definitely a cultural awakening, coming from a small town in Kansas to me just being around people that were challenging you every day in terms of growth. It was a great experience. I miss that city. I don’t miss the weather but it was definitely a great city to start my adventure.

On Starting Her Blog in 2010:

In general, there were no manuals for blogging. Today, you’ll see ‘how to start a blog 101’. Back then, it was like the Wild West in terms of like you’re still using Blogger as a platform and it was just a very quiet space. People were trying to figure out photography and just how to share in general on the Internet because all these platforms were starting to pop up. So that was the biggest challenge. I had to do a lot more research, a lot more trial and errors. I feel like today, it’s a lot easier for bloggers to start up because there is a manual out there. There is ‘how to improve your photography’, ‘how to write recipes’ and those kind of things, and how to really actually start the blog from the ground up. Whereas, I feel like in 2010, it was not the case at all.

I mean, most people never say they dreamed about making money back in the day, but now, people literally start blogging to make money and it’s amazing to me. I think it’s fantastic, it’s just a different perspective now. I think this industry is growing and changing constantly. So it’ll be interesting to see where it’s at in two years.

On Her Interest Around Food:

I hated cooking and when I got married, I didn’t even know how to boil water. It was that bad. I took on the concept and when we moved from Chicago to Denver, I was working in the financial industry. I still am today but at the time, when the market crashed, I lost my job and between looking for jobs and interviews, I watched the Food Network during the day and I was like, “You know what, I’m a newlywed. I probably should learn how to brown meat or do something functional so we can eat and not eat out all the time.” So from there, I just literally, with the blog, I was like, “You know what? If I can teach myself how to cook, maybe I can teach others,” and it slowly progressed. So no, my love for cooking didn’t form probably until about 10 years ago. So it’s kind of funny.

It was actually kind of a funny story. So, it was a Giada recipe and it was for a swordfish bake sandwich with some arugula and lemon aioli, which was basically like Mandarin to me at the time because I had no idea what aioli was. I remember going to the store and getting all of the ingredients and I came home and you know, I put some oil in a pan. Well, I threw a solid chunk of swordfish into a frying pan. Can you imagine this? This is literally almost burning down the house. My husband walks in. He’s like, “What are you doing?” I’m like, “What? This is normal, right? You just throw in a frozen solid piece of fish into a hot skillet.” And he’s like, “No, you don’t.” I’m like, “Oh my God.” So it was a huge learning curve right there but we ended up saving the fish and it actually ended up being a really, really good sandwich and it was fantastic and I’ve been obsessed with lemon aioli and arugula and swordfish ever since.

It’s a funny story now. At the time, it was a little close to call in terms of almost burning down the house but yeah.

On Her Go-To Sources for Inspiration:

I have a couple. I mean, you have your standards like Food & Wine and Bon Appétit, they’re kind of always my go-to to make sure I’m staying with the industry and what’s going on and what’s relevant. I do look for other bloggers as inspiration. Jessica from How Sweet It Is is great. Joy the Baker is a nice kind of contrast because I’m not a baker so it’s nice to get like, “Oh, that’s what people do when they bake.” But I’m also inspired a lot by Heidi from FoodieCrush. She’s probably one of my favorite blogs to look at for inspiration because she does things so simple but they’re also creative as well.

On Deciding on What to Make for Dinner or Her Blog:

It’s interesting. I feel like it’s a simple process but it’s also like an easy process in terms of my cooking during the week is your basic chicken, potatoes, broccoli, rice. I just keep it simple because, to me, when I do stuff for the blog, it’s more adventurous. When I decide what I want to do for the blog, I always look at those simple meals that I make during the week and then I’m like, “How can we tweak this? How can we take a simple meal and then just take it to another level, like take a Middle Eastern twist on it or an Asian twist on it?” I think people get stuck in a rut, like I do, too. Just take the extra couple of minutes to figure out where else you can go with it.

On the Difference in Food Culture Between Denver and Chicago:

Denver is geared towards healthy lifestyle. Everything is outdoors, versus Chicago, I mean, Chicago is healthy, it’s just it’s more like heartier foods. So to me, when I moved here, my palette definitely changed. I still kind of keep things more towards a lighter side in cooking, whether it’s more fresh ingredients, local, those kinds of things just because Colorado has such a different dynamic. Like I was talking earlier, Colorado’s very centered around brunch. If you don’t have a good brunch at a restaurant, you can kiss your tuckus goodbye because you’re not going to be around. Or happy hour, those things. So my food is definitely geared around kind of those…you can eat it for breakfast, lunch and dinner types of food versus like your three standard meals like in Chicago.

The Pressure Cooker:

Which food shows or cooking shows do you watch?

I watch Restaurant Impossible. I love Robert, probably because we own restaurants and so when people go in there, I’m like, “Oh my God, they have no idea.”

I love Top Chef. I mean, I watch that. Quickfire Challenge, you name it, I would love to do it.

I probably would cry crocodile tears while I’m doing it but it would be the most fun ever. Plus I would love to meet Tom Colicchio.

What are some food blogs or food websites we have to know about?

Definitely Real Food by Dad. Matt is amazing. He kind of is similar to the way I cook. His recipes are simple but also you’re like, “Damn, that is such a great idea.” And also, My Name is Yeh. She’s addicting. She has the best smile. Her recipes are just so fun. And also, Heidi at FoodieCrush. She’s a mentor. She’s good at what she does. She has a great editorial background and I think people could really learn a lot from her.

Who do you follow on Pinterest, Instagram, or Facebook or Snapchat that make you happy?

Instagram is probably my most go-to as most people probably say. Ashlae from Oh, Ladycakes, her Instagram is this beautiful portfolio. She travels and creates beautiful food and to me, she makes it just look effortless. So to me, I appreciate that even though I know there’s some background to it. She’s just a really nice person in general too.

What is the most unusual or treasured item in your kitchen?

My onion goggles, no joke. I hate cutting onions and my husband got a gag gift one year, like someone gave him a pair of onion goggles. I was like, “This is ridiculous.” I tried them on. I’m telling you, they are lifesavers and no more tears. I look like a total dork but I swear, they’re my most treasured thing in the kitchen.

Name one ingredient you used to dislike but now you love.

Tabasco, which is funny because I literally just this past week, I did a whole week series with Tabasco. My husband loves Tabasco and so till I married him, I learned to love Tabasco. I love it now more than anything. It’s the best condiment ever.

What are a few cookbooks that make your life better?

I always keep Jacques Pepin’s Essentials cookbook. The man is a genius and he’s been around forever and he knows so I pull that constantly just to remember how to make an aioli from scratch. To me, it’s a brilliant cookbook in terms of like, he’ll give you recipes but he’ll also break down what you need to know in a very simplified manner. It’s not over the top. It’s straightforward. I can’t recommend that book enough. It literally is a lifesaver.

What song or album just makes you want to cook?

Like I mentioned earlier, Jason Isbell, his album, Southeastern. Me and my husband actually saw him in New York City live. He is probably one of the best artists to listen to because he’s a great storyteller and I feel like that is a basic way of when you’re cooking and you’re photographing and sharing this, it’s the perfect way just to set the tone of what you’re doing. He’s extremely talented and a wonderful singer and I highly recommend you check him out. He’s great.

On Keeping Posted with Lauren:

Definitely Instagram, Snapchat, and just checking out the blog because I am out there and constantly just trying to create recipes. I’m always there if you need me. So always check out the blog.

066: Andrea Bemis: Farming and Preparing Fresh Meals

August 10, 2015 by Gabriel 4 Comments

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Dishing Up the Dirt

Andrea and her husband are the proud owners of a six-acre organic vegetable farm called Tumbleweed Farm in Oregon. Her blog Dishing Up the Dirt is a way for her to document the meals made with the produce they’re growing and to inspire us to prepare fresh meals for ourselves and loved ones.

I am so happy to have Andrea Bemis of Dishing Up the Dirt here on the show today.

(*All images below are Andrea’s.)

On What Drew Her to Farming:

My husband grew up on a organic farm back East in Massachusetts. I did not have desires to work on a farm growing up so it happened organically. About six years ago, we decided to quit our day jobs. We were just working pay check to pay check, not doing anything that we felt was very important and decided to roll up our sleeves and go work on this organic farm back East in Massachusetts. And dove right in, head first, which was awful and great at the same time.

I did not realize how much work went into producing food and I didn’t grow up cooking or eating the types of vegetables that we grow. And now, it’s gone full circle and I absolutely love it. We’re going through a heat wave right now so I don’t love it but it’s gone full circle. I’m really proud of what we do.

I had this vision that it would be really romantic and it would be slow paced and we’d just pluck vegetables from the ground and it would be really lovely and it’s not. It’s go, go, go but it doesn’t matter if it’s 90 degrees out or 20 degrees out. Things need to get done. So that was an eye-opener.

On Their Farm:

The one thing that is different is it does not rain in Oregon in the summer which is ironic because Oregon is such a rainy state, but from June until October, we have to irrigate like crazy. Back East, almost every afternoon, we got a rain shower which is great. But aside from that, growing-wise, we can grow pretty much the same vegetables as we did back there. Our seasons are a little bit shorter here because in Parkdale, Oregon, we’ve got a little bit of elevation.

It’s a little different everyday but I guess I could start out with this morning which started at 5:00 a.m. running out with the toothbrush still in my mouth to yell at a couple of deer that were eating our strawberries. We’re on deer patrol all the time. The days typically start around 5:00, have coffee and go over a list of what needs to get done.

Tomorrow is the CSA day so today we’re prepping, trying to stay up with irrigation, planting, weeding. We do succession planting so we’re always planting all the time for 20-something days, so we’ll be planting.

We continue to plant but tomorrow is our big day, we harvest starting at 4:00 in the morning because we take our crop up to Portland. So Tuesdays are always a really long day. It depends on the day. We’re just at the farm if we don’t have restaurant deliveries or CSA deliveries. Then we try and stay on top of farm chores and keeping things happy and healthy and a lot of irrigating and weeding.

When you’re away from the farm, it’s scary because you’re away and anything can happen and so you have to make up for the hours that you’re gone when you’re back.

On What They Grow on Their Farm:

We do a combination of 50 different varieties of vegetables. We do all the really common and uncommon spring vegetables. We do basically anything that we know is going to do well and that we know people are going to be pumped to receive. So we don’t grow anything too crazy but we grow things that we know we can sell easily, and people want, and that they’re going to do well for us.

We’ll always grow kale. It does really well. It’s a pretty easy crop to grow. If there’s a really hot trendy food out there we might try a small little plot of it. But for the most part, we keep to the same vegetables year to year unless we have a huge crop failure and some things don’t seem like they’re going to ever work for us, then we won’t grow that. We stick to pretty much the same vegetables year in and year out.

On Growing Produce for Beginners:

My first piece of advice is to grow things that you would want to eat. I have friends who end up growing a bunch of bok choy. And they’re like, “I don’t know what to do with this. I don’t even think I like it.” I’m like, “Well, okay.” I would say pick a few things that you like to eat so if you want to have a lot of salads, lettuce is pretty simple.

My folks have done this. Letting things sit for too long. Things can turn bad pretty quickly especially in the heat. So even if something didn’t totally size up, I would grab it. I think people sometimes will let things go too long. Pay attention and think of the farm as your baby. I don’t know what people’s situation is but it’s like if something looks like maybe it needs water. If you already watered and it’s wet, don’t water again. You can over water, you can underwater. So pay close attention to your garden.

Crop rotation is pretty important just because each crop takes different nutrients from the soil so it’s good to move things around. But it’s not the end of the world. We typically have a map of our farm. We try and rotate things on a 5-year rotation. That’s ideal.

And diseases can spread a little more easily if you’re planting the same place over and over.

On a Resource for Those Wanting to Learn More:

My favorite book for beginner farmers or gardeners is The New Organic Grower by Eliot Coleman. We still reference that. It’s an easy read but it’s also informative and I recommend that to anyone that’s trying to grow vegetables for the first time.

On Writing Her Blog:

Our CSA, we have a 50-member CSA and 90% of these people are members because of the blog. We don’t know them but the blog, it’s turned into like a job.

I want people to be pumped with their vegetables. Even if they’re not supporting us personally I want to inspire people to go to their local farmers market and cook up vegetables that really are in season because I’m a big supporter of small farmers. I think that they are making a big difference and it’s really hard to make a living. So if more and more people support farmers then the world would be a better place.

The cooking and the recipes can be challenging at times if the day has been super busy but I typically come in about an hour before my husband does to cook something, take a few photos, and depending on what it is, I’ll either keep it warm somewhere and go back and finish evening chores, or get a salad or something. We’ll eat it a little bit later.

I’ve been doing this for five years. We’ve nailed this system. And then at night, I’ll just do a little blog post, they’re pretty simple, not too crazy. I don’t know why people are really surprised that I just create the time for it, it actually is a nice little break from the fields.

The Pressure Cooker:

Which food shows or cooking shows do you watch?

I don’t watch any right now.

What are some food blogs or food websites we have to know about?

I like reading Naturally Ella. She’s got some really beautiful photos and great recipes and they’re really simple too. I think her goal is pretty quick, easy, no fuss recipes.

I like My New Roots a lot. Her recipes definitely take a little more time but I think the photography is great.

Cookie and Kate is another good one that I like.

They’re all vegetarian food blogs but they’re pretty inspiring.

Who do you follow on Pinterest, Instagram, or Facebook that make you happy?

Instagram is the only one that I really use and I follow a lot of farms on Instagram but as far as food ones go, Dolly and Oatmeal. She’s got some really great photos. There’s a local girl and her blog is Local Haven and she’s got beautiful food photos.

What is the most unusual or treasured item in your kitchen?

A bottle opener. That and maybe my immersion blender. I use my immersion blender every single day for making sauces.

Name one ingredient you used to dislike but now you love.

Maybe mustard. I love mustard and I used to hate it.

I think it was too many bad hot dogs when I was a kid with mustard on. Now I love mustard.

What are a few cookbooks that make your life better?

I’m not reading a ton of cookbooks right now. But I subscribe to Food & Wine Magazine and Bon Appétit and it’s like Christmas every month for me. I get really inspired by both those magazines. And Real Simple magazine too so those are my go-tos and it’s nice to have subscriptions to them because they’re a highlight to the month.

What song or album just makes you want to cook?

For me, when I’m cooking, it’s more like a wind down time so it’s nothing too crazy. I guess right now I’ve got the Gillian Welch station on my computer and she’s just nice and mellow.

On Keeping Posted with Andrea:

Well, DishingUpTheDirt.com. I post there three times a week. And then otherwise, I’m on Instagram, that’s my only social media that I’m on quite a bit, I love it.

047: Kylie Antolini: Baking and Eating in Portland, Oregon

June 10, 2015 by Gabriel Leave a Comment

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The Baking Bird

Kylie started her blog in 2008 when she was experimenting with vegetarian and veganism, and through her journey, discovered her love of baking.

Apart from showcasing her baked goods on The Baking Bird, she also shares her favorite places and adventures around where she currently lives, the lively food city of Portland, Oregon.

I am so happy to have Kylie Antolini of The Baking Bird joining me here on the show today.

On Finding Her Passion for Baking:

When I was at home and I was a teenager, my parents were meat eaters. I just became vegetarian because it interested me. I thought it was a healthier lifestyle and I had to fend for myself. So I first started out with getting cookbooks. Maybe you’re familiar with them: How It All Vegan! and The Garden of Vegan by Sarah Kramer and Tanya Barnard. They were my main inspiration.

I first started making some of their savory recipes. And then I decided to experiment with some of their dessert recipes. I just really love the idea that you can bake awesome stuff without using traditional ingredients like butter and eggs, and you get similar results.

I love the process of experimenting like with flax egg replacer or applesauce and bananas. So that was really the thing that caught on to me, and I really just enjoyed experimenting. I felt like a scientist in the kitchen. And to this day, I don’t bake vegan really anymore but one of my favorite vegan baking hacks is putting apple cider vinegar and non-dairy milk and making a buttermilk with it because it curdles the milk, which is awesome because I don’t like going to buy buttermilk because it usually goes to waste. I only use like a cup of it. That’s one of my favorite things that I’ve carried into my regular baking style now.

That was how I found my passion for baking. I just really enjoyed it and I combined my love for photography and started taking picture of things I made and thought, “Oh, I started a blog.”

On No Longer Being Vegetarian:

To be honest, it wasn’t really by choice. I had gotten into running quite a bit around the time that I became a vegetarian, and my body just couldn’t keep up with the nutrition I was getting.

Unfortunately, there were some signs that showed up here and there. My doctor encouraged me to start eating meat. I also suffered from a lot anxiety and insomnia and I noticed the correlation from eating to vegetarian and running too much. So it took a lot of convincing and my parents were really adamant about it. They’re just trying to get me meat all the time, and I was like, “Uh!” But I ended up feeling a lot better once I did and I started sleeping a lot better. My anxiety really went down. So that was really basically it. I wanted to keep being vegetarian but it just wasn’t best for my life.

On Her Interest in Food:

I know that after I was going to being vegetarian, I really got an interest in collecting a lot of cookbooks. I became really obsessed with food because when you have to start combining certain ingredients to have the right nutrition, the right balance, you really have to look at a lot of different resources. So I became obsessed about collecting lots of cookbooks and reading recipes. That was what really got me into cooking.

And my mom was always a really avid cook when I was younger. She kept all the vintage Bon Appétit magazines and was really into that. And my grandmother on my dad’s side is also a great baker. And so I would bake with her.

She’d always have a homemade pie or something for dessert when we come over to eat. I guess they were my inspiration and I grew up in a family that really loved food, so that had a big part of it.

On the First Thing She Baked:

Well, I remember the first thing that I bragged about. It was this vegan chocolate peanut butter pie with bananas, and no-bake. It was so easy and so delicious. I think it was actually from La Dolce Vegan, the cookbook from Sarah Kramer.

Fabulous recipe but terrible photos if you go back and look in the blog. It’s the very first one but it’s delicious.

On Things Not Going as Planned in the Kitchen:

I can think of one or two instances. But fortunately, it doesn’t happen very often which is great. That’s why I think baking is more of my thing than cooking.

I was trying to make a vegan chocolate cake. I turned the pan upside down and it just completely disintegrated and crumbled into pieces. I was like, “Okay.” I think I baked two things that day and they both didn’t turn out. I was like, “This is just not my day.”

Sometimes you have the baking energy and sometimes you don’t. There’s just something in the air and it makes your work shatter. But for the most part, I’m pretty lucky.

It always depends on your oven too. I had to get used to my oven in my apartment. It runs a little bit warmer. So I found over the years that it’s best to play it safe and subtract a little bit of time from your baking time and check it so it’s not too done.

On The Food Culture in Portland, Oregon:

Portland is crazy with food. There are so many people here that love food and have a passion for it. It was the number one reason I actually decided to move here. Because when I first visited, I spent a week here and had a list of places I wanted to go. I was just amazed with how people love food here and get such a wide variety.

You can go to a specific shop just for cupcakes or just for pie. I think the food culture is very experimental and it’s very inspiring. Sometimes it can get a little predictable.

There’s a lot of repeat comfort food here. A lot of pork belly, I see that left and right. So people really love that kind of Southern style. I see that quite a bit. But it makes sense when it’s overcast a lot of the time and it’s raining. So people really enjoy that kind of food here.

There are a lot of donut places. I’m sure you’ve heard of Voodoo Doughnut.

I will drive by and the line can be an hour long. It’s pretty nuts. But there have been a few places that have popped up that you can get donuts now. Pip’s Doughnuts is really amazing if you’ve ever had a chance to check them out. And my personal favorite is Coco Donuts.

On Special Places to Eat in Portland:

I would have to say as far as dinner places, my favorite, favorite place is Tasty ‘N Sons. They’re at North Williams and they’ve opened another location Downtown.

And I really have been loving Ox. I went there for my birthday. I had a fabulous birthday meal.

LucLac has an amazing happy hour. You can get like a huge variety of different small plates for just $15. They make amazing cocktails too. So they are really awesome. Sweedeedee is my favorite brunch place that can get really crazy busy though. A lot of people have caught on that it’s amazing.

For really good vegetarian/ vegan food, Harlow is wonderful too. They make great smoothies.

Levant is also really nice. They have Mediterranean food and they just started doing a brunch. And Scott Snyder who’s the owner, he’s actually from Santa Cruz where I’m from. So we have some ties to that in some ways. He’s really great. His food is awesome.

The Pressure Cooker:

Which food shows or cooking shows do you watch?

Well, I don’t have a television, so I think that makes me the odd one out. But I did just finished watching the last season of Top Chef.

Two of the chefs on the show were from Portland and that was all over the Portland news. I had to watch it.

I actually had an opportunity to photograph Doug Adams who was on the show, one of my freelance jobs for the Portland Mercury. So that was really awesome. I got to meet him in person and that’s made me more interested in watching the show.

What are some food blogs or food websites we have to know about?

I definitely have a lot of favorite bloggers I follow on Pinterest and Instagram or what-not. My three favorites of late would be Half Baked Harvest. Perhaps you’re familiar with her. And my latest obsession, Twigg Studios. I think she’s from England or Australia. I forgot. Anyway, I contacted her because I just fell in love with her photography and wanted her to know that her stuff is amazing. So definitely check her out. Her photos for just her recipes are genius.

I also recently discovered Broma Bakery and I really like her recipes.

Who do you follow on Pinterest, Instagram, or Facebook that make you happy?

I would say Instagram, I really love following Izy of Top with Cinnamon. Her recipes and photos are amazing. I really love Call me Cupcake. She is lately @linda_lomelino. She is amazing too. And then also, the Twigg Studios gal with her blog.

As far as Pinterest, I don’t really always know who I’m following.

What is the most unusual or treasured item in your kitchen?

I wish I could say I had some really cool hand-me-down spoon from a great grandmother or something.

I would say my most treasured item, because I use it so frequently, two metal mixing bowls, my small and large. I bought them a few years ago when I started making macaroons. The recipe I was going off of said that it was best to have metal bowls just for keeping the coolness and protecting it from too much heat. And I love them.

I just use them for everything, so I couldn’t bake without them.

Name one ingredient you used to dislike but now you love.

Cardamom did not sit well with me at all. But now, I love it. I want to put cardamom in every single thing I bake. A lot of recipes on the blog have cardamom in them. I almost have to stop myself because people are going to get tired of using cardamom now. It’s really weird. I don’t know what it was. I don’t know if it was becoming vegetarian and experimenting with spices, but I love cardamom and also ginger. I used to hate ginger and I use it all the time now.

What are a few cookbooks that make your life better?

I think my number one favorite go-to resource book is The Flavor Bible. It’s pretty awesome.

If I want to tweak a recipe or I have an idea, I can go to that and it will list a bunch of ingredients that go really well with it. It’s pretty spot on.

They also recently released a Vegetarian Flavor Bible. I haven’t looked at it. But Flavor Bible is amazing.

I also really love the Cook’s Illustrated Baking Book because they have just the basic pie and cake recipes that you can make your own. They’ve been tested by the best of the best bakers and scientists. And that’s what they do all day long. So that’s a really great resource to have too.

What song or album just makes you want to cook?

I love music so much and I always try to put on a record when I bake. It’s really tough. I would have to say Bruce Springsteen, Born in the U.S.A.

On Keeping Posted with Kylie:

I think I’m most active on Instagram, The Baking Bird, and Pinterest. I’m also on it quite a bit. Yeah, Instagram and my blog.

039: Amelia Morris: Failure, Success and Fearlessness in the Kitchen

May 22, 2015 by Gabriel Leave a Comment

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Bon Appétempt

Amelia’s blog has evolved as her cooking and life has changed over the years, and her readers have been along for every step of the journey. An essay Amelia wrote about her kitchen visit with her grandma won Best Culinary Essay in Saveur’s 2011 Food Blog Awards. In 2012, Bon Appétempt won in Saveur’s Best Humor Blog category. Amelia recently released her book, Bon Appet é mpt: A Coming-of-Age Story (with Recipes!).

I am so excited to have Amelia Morris of Bon Appétempt here on the show today.

On How Her Blog Started:

It really started as an accident. I was house sitting for my friend, and they have a beautiful house, and I got the idea that I could have people over for Christmas day brunch, and I decided to make this cake from the cover of a Bon Appétit. I’d never made a cake from scratch before, and it was this towering chocolate peppermint cake. But I thought I could do it. I gave myself multiple days to do everything ahead of time, and I basically did do it except as I was putting the icing on the cake. The whole thing started to slide, and it fell over.

My husband and I had been taking pictures of the whole thing because we were so impressed that I was making this gigantic cake. So then we had pictures of the rise and fall.

Afterwards, I just kept looking at the pictures and I just kept thinking there needs to be a food blog where it’s like the home-cooked version versus the magazine version. I just thought I was the perfect candidate because I didn’t know how to cook and I thought, every time, each post would be a disaster. I know it will be really funny.

This was six years ago. At first, I really wanted to make fun of the perfection and food magazines and just how fake it was. My intention was to mix it up but it could be funny.

On Her Sense of Fearlessness in the Kitchen:

I’m afraid of a lot of things and there’s a lot of stuff I haven’t tried. I don’t know if I’m afraid, but I don’t want to maybe make such a giant mess.

When I first started the blog, I wasn’t afraid of making mistakes because, A: I thought it would be funnier if I made mistakes, and B: my self esteem wasn’t tied to the kitchen. If I messed up, it didn’t injure me in any way as opposed to my other endeavors where it hurt when I failed.

I did redo the original cake that started it all and made it successfully. It was beautiful, so that felt pretty good.

I tried to make a Martha Stewart bread wreath, and it’s basically bread in the shape of a wreath. And it was an epic failure. We have a video of it on the blog, and I broke a pan in the oven. Because when you bake it, you’re supposed to have a pan of water underneath.

That pan of water broke, and so the water started gushing out into the oven. And basically, the wreath still turned out; it was an edible piece of bread and everything.

I’m always surprised with Martha Stewart’s recipes like that where you just have pay such attention to detail to get it even close to what Martha Stewart has in her magazine.

On How Becoming a Parent Changed the Way She Cooks:

Oh my gosh. Well, I feel like this changes a lot; because at the beginning, you’re just getting used to everything. And I feel like even though they sleep a lot at the beginning, I just wasn’t in my normal routine.

I used to see recipes, be inspired, go to the store, come back, cook it that night. And I feel like at the beginning, that was not really an option. And now, he’s so mobile that he won’t even… If I’m in the kitchen, he’s running to the back of the house and I have to go see what he’s up to and all that stuff. So it’s changed a lot. I really do much more simple things and I do a lot of stuff I know by heart.

I try and do a lot of stuff while he’s eating dinner. He usually eats around five, so I’ll try and do chopping and any sort of prep work that I can do while he’s contained and he sits. And then he goes to bed around seven and then I finish cooking once he’s in bed.

There are so many good things you can make with not a lot of ingredients. I feel like that’s my go-to thing. I mean, we eat a lot of pasta around here and I do a lot of shortcuts, I guess, like I find myself recently buying mushrooms that are already sliced and cleaned, which I never used to do because I always think the person doing it isn’t doing a good job of cleaning it. And now, I’m just like, “Oh, well.”

My mum would always buy a rotisserie chicken and have it in the fridge, and I would never do that. I would just do it myself. And just this week, I bought a rotisserie chicken and I made a chicken pot pie, a version of chicken pot pie, and then I just pulled the meat off of it.

The answer to the question is I’m still figuring out how to have shortcuts; what shortcuts to come up with.

On Her Videos:

Basically, my husband went to film school and the book goes over our mutual struggles to find creative satisfaction.

He wanted to be a filmmaker, still wants to be a filmmaker, writer, and we both had day jobs not doing anything remotely creative. I think I just got really inspired to do a cooking show by watching cooking shows and just watching how staged they are.

I just don’t really understand why everything needs to be so perfect in cooking shows. They’re all in full makeup and no aprons. So I was really inspired to do a cooking show that was more real and where it would show me cleaning up and stuff like that, and Matt was excited to try shooting again which he hasn’t done since college.

On Her Book, Bon Appétempt: A Coming-of-Age Story (with Recipes!)

The book is basically my life’s story, but it’s pretty much about growing up and trying and failing. And the way it came about matters because I went to grad school for an MFA in Writing. And my thesis was a novel and I continued working on it after school.

So I sent a novel to a bunch of agents, and one of them got back to me and was like, “Yeah, I’ll read your novel,” but she’s on my bio about my food blog and she was like, “I’m really interested in Bon Appétempt.” A long story short, she really wanted me to work on a food memoir. I guess I never really thought of doing a food memoir up until that point.

So I was excited about it. I was totally excited about it even though she wasn’t interested in my novel. I was kind of excited at the prospect of my writing career finally getting off the ground a little bit. And so I just jumped on the opportunity and I was like, “Totally, I’ll do a food memoir,” and I started putting together a book proposal.

I love my blog for many reasons and it’s great. But I think that there is this pressure to post. And for a while, I had a schedule. I would post every Sunday night. And I just think that the quality of writing would often suffer because I was just like, “I’ve got to get the post up. I’ve got to get the post up.” And with the book, I could really take my time and I didn’t feel a sense of urgency. I felt like I could talk about things that I didn’t feel were appropriate for the blog. I could start at the very beginning of my life as opposed to what’s going on right now.

The Pressure Cooker:

Which food shows or cooking shows do you watch?

Top Chef. That’s it. Final answer.

What are some food blogs or food websites we have to know about?

Well, you probably already know about Lottie and Doof. It’s one of my faves. I really like The Yellow House.

Who do you follow on Pinterest, Instagram, or Facebook that make you happy?

On Twitter, I like Andy Borowitz, and of course, USA Gymnastics.

What is the most unusual or treasured item in your kitchen?

Well, I have this magenta-colored skull. It’s small. It’s a scary-looking skull. His eyes are red glitter.

Name one ingredient you used to dislike but now you love.

There was a point in my life where I said I didn’t like pasta, and now it’s something we eat three times a week.

I was a young woman constantly on a diet and I convinced myself that I didn’t like pasta.

I just wouldn’t let myself eat it.

What are a few cookbooks that make your life better?

Anything by Nigel Slater, but probably The Art of Simple Food by Alice Waters.

What song or album just makes you want to cook?

I love any sort of Van Morrison; that sort of realm of music.

On Keeping Posted on Amelia:

Probably Instagram, or I have a book, Bon Appétempt, and a Facebook page.

022: Alanna Taylor-Tobin: How to Build a Meal Around Vegetables First

April 6, 2015 by Gabriel Leave a Comment

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The Bojon Gourmet

Alanna is a self-proclaimed recovering pastry chef, and on her blog, she shares her amazing food photography and recipes, many of which are vegetarian or gluten-free.

I am so delighted to have Alanna Taylor-Tobin of the Bojon Gourmet here on the show today.

On Being a Recovering Pastry Chef:

Well, it’s a little bit tongue in cheek, but I worked as a pastry chef for several years here in San Francisco, and two and a half years ago, I left my job to work on my blog full-time.

I don’t know if you’ve worked in restaurants? But they’re kind of crazy. When I left I just felt like, “I’m so relieved that I’m not working in restaurants anymore.”

It was just hectic and kind of a challenging place to work.

On Moving from Pastry to Cooking Savory Foods:

I’ve always loved cooking. I’ve always loved making anything I possibly can in the kitchen, including cocktails and savory foods also.

The reason I became a pastry chef is because I’m really squeamish and I don’t like touching raw meat and having to handle it. My very first job in the food industry was as a pantry cook at a restaurant. And I hated having to cut up big slabs of bloody fish and meat and stuff. So then when I went to work in a bakery I was like, “Oh, this is great! I get to do all of the food making, but I don’t have to touch all the yucky meat and seafood and stuff.”

That was actually the main reason why I went to pastry school and became a pastry chef.

But I’ve always loved cooking. I just cook mostly vegetarian at home because of the squeamish factor. I tried to make a balance of sweet and savory recipes on my blog and I tried to alternate recipes, but it is a little bit challenging sometimes because I get stuck in dessert mode.

I have to tell myself to think about like, “Okay, we need to have something substantial to eat.” So sometimes I have to just force myself to just go for something savory just so we’re not inundated with sugar all the time.

On Her Passion for Food and Cooking:

My whole family is a very food-oriented family, and nobody actually works professionally in food. They’re all psychologists actually. My whole family are psychologists but they all really love food and as a kid my favorite times were going out to restaurants with my parents. Or, my mom would always have the Bon Appetit subscription. She always had a great cookbook collection.

I have an older brother and I think I was about nine and he was dating a woman who was a pastry chef. And that was the first time that I was like, “Oh my God! That’s a thing? You can just get paid to make desserts for a living forever? That’s so cool! I want to do that!” So I kind of had it in my head from a very early age that I wanted to be a pastry chef.

My parents are divorced and my mom lives in L.A. My dad lives in Oregon. And usually when they come visit we tend to take them out to restaurants because we live in San Francisco and it’s just an incredible restaurant culture here. But we do potlucks and stuff.

The only holiday that I really enjoy is Thanksgiving because we always do a big potluck at my brother’s house in Berkeley and I get to make as many pies as I want. That’s my very favorite thing.

On Vegetarian and Gluten-Free Cooking:

My sister has known that she is allergic to gluten for 20 years I think now. She was gluten-free before it was cool. I think that kind of runs in my family. For the last ten or so years I’ve been experimenting with less gluten and just more whole grains and stuff.

I grew up not eating a ton of meat. I didn’t have a super meat-centric family and my mom’s always been really interested in health and nutrition.

When I first moved out of the house, I just ate Kraft mac and cheese for every meal because I was like, “Yeah!”

That got old really fast.

So I just started cooking more and one of the first cookbooks I owned was by Deborah Madison who’s mostly vegetarian. She’s founded Greens, the vegetarian restaurant in San Francisco. Just her whole aesthetic really inspired me.

When I moved in with my partner, he had been vegetarian for many years. It was just sort of natural to cook vegetarian. He’s not vegetarian anymore but he still eats mostly that way as do I.

As for the vegan, it’s not really a huge concern for me. I do have friends who are vegan. Or who are lactose intolerant and such. It’s kind of nice to have those recipes in my repertoire so I don’t have to be like, “Oh my God! A vegan’s coming for dinner. What do I do?”

That kind of mindset, of the meat is where you start from, is just kind of backwards from how I think. Even when I go to restaurants, I always look at the side dish, even if I get a meat entree, it’s because it has these awesome potatoes or the greens or something like that. I tend to start more from the vegetable aspect of it and sort of build a meal from there.

I tend to look at what’s in season. Or, “Oh, I’m craving sweet potatoes.” So then I’ll make a dish around that, like enchiladas.

I don’t think so much in terms of I need protein. I’m going to substitute this out for the protein or something.

I do eat a ton of cheese. I just love cheese. It’s my very favorite thing in the whole world. I probably eat more cheese because I’m needing the protein.

I guess I would say if you’re looking for a protein substitute, well, dairy obviously, but you can’t do that if you’re a vegan. Mushrooms are a really good source of protein, beans and nuts and all that kind of stuff. I don’t tend to think like that.

I tend more to start with the vegetable or the grain.

On Turning Down a Cookbook Offer… Twice:

I had really mixed feelings about whether I should talk about it at all in a public way. It seems like cookbooks are kind of the equivalent of having a baby where you’re not allowed to tell anybody in the first few months until really you’re sure it’s going to happen.

I was nervous about talking about it. But I just felt like, I was personally so confused and lost having to try to figure out whether this was a good offer or not. I just wanted to put the information out there to help other people because I know publishers are reaching out to tons of bloggers now.

We don’t always know how the publishing world works and whether what we’re being offered is good or not. And we have to stick together, you know?

So I put that information out there and I was just shocked at all of the great responses that I got. From people saying, “Good job. Good job for turning that down.” And then there were also a few people who said, “Hey, I work in publishing and that wasn’t a bad deal.” That was a good perspective to hear also because I tried to make it really clear that my whole point was that I just didn’t know.

I wasn’t saying this was a crappy deal and I turned it down. I was saying I didn’t know if this was a good deal or not, and I need to explore that some more. So it was kind of good to hear both sides of that from commenters.

The Pressure Cooker:

Which food shows or cooking shows do you watch?

When I was in college I loved watching, The Naked Chef, Jamie Oliver. And I loved watching Iron Chef when it was all in, was it Japanese, I think?

What are some food blogs or websites that we have to know about?

Oh my gosh! I follow 200 blogs or something like that on Bloglovin‘.

There are so many fabulous blogs out there. It is so hard to choose, but I’ve recently become friends with a few bloggers. I’ve been more actively following their blogs.

One of them is Snixy Kitchen and Sarah Menanix is the author and her photos are just gorgeous. She’s got this beautiful light in her space, and she’s a really adventurous cook and baker. So she’ll just make anything. She just posted these gluten-free scallion pancakes and they’re just insanely good. So I highly recommend checking out her site.

And then another one is The Pancake Princess, and Erica is the author and her styling and attention to detail is just amazing. I love her photographs and recipes so much.

Another blog I really love is Circa Happy by Pang, and she’s Thai. Her recipes have a lot of Thai influence, and she’s only been doing food photography for less than a year and they’re totally professional caliber photographs. They’re just absolutely stunning.

Who do you follow on Pinterest, Instagram or Twitter that make you happy?

I mostly use Pinterest as a personal way to collect recipes, but I do check Instagram constantly. I love Instagram so much. A friend of mine, Ana, and her blog is Fluxi On Tour. She takes the most beautiful Instagram photos. They’re all on her iPhone and a lot of them are landscapes and cityscapes. She’s a travel and food writer, and she just blows me away with the caliber of her iPhone photography. I don’t know how she does it but they’re just incredible. So I always love seeing her posts on Instagram.

What is something all home cooks should have in their pantry?

I would say maybe a variety of cooking oils, like olive oil and a neutral oil like sunflower or grape seed.

I’ve been really using a lot of ghee lately. It’s nice because you can keep it at room temperature even though it’s derived from butter, and it has a really high smoke point. So it’s really great for making popcorn or anything that you need really high heat for, and you want that kind of warm flavor like pancakes. You don’t get the butter burning in the pan because it’s got such a high smoke point. And it just adds this delicious warm richness to anything that you make.

I usually purchase it. A good friend of mine actually gave me a big jar of homemade ghee for a holiday gift.

I was just like, “Wow! This is the best gift ever!”

Name one ingredient you cannot live without?

I’d have to say, well, chocolate is really obvious, but for a savory ingredient? Maldon Salt is just my favorite finishing salt. It’s such a small and simple thing, but it can just make any dish, even sweet things, it just adds this crunchy amazingness that makes people go, “Wow! This is awesome!” And it can be the most basic thing but it has this delicious flaky, crunchy salt on top.

What are a few cookbooks that make your life better?

Oh boy, cookbooks. Well, one that I just have in my head because I used it the other day is The Perfect Scoop by David Lebovitz. And it’s all ice creams and it’s kind of like the ice cream bible. It was the first ice cream book that was a very natural and fun and really thorough way with ice creams.

I’m a huge Deborah Madison fan so I love her book on soups. I use that one a lot. And she has one called Local Flavors that’s all about farmers market cooking, and it’s not one of her better known books. But I’ve probably made a third of the recipes in that book and every one is just fabulous! They’re really unique and they’re simple and they’re just super good. It’s things that I would never think of to cook. I feel like I owe a lot of my aesthetic to Deborah Madison.

What song or album just makes you want to cook?

I would have to say Lovely Day by Bill Withers is just one of the most fun upbeat songs that I’ve ever heard.

Keep Posted on Alanna:

I would say Instagram is probably a good way to keep in touch with me. And my handle is The_Bojon_Gourmet. (BojonGourmet.com)

Have Alanna's Special Dish Recipe Sent to You Now:

015: Katy Atlas: How Cooking Doesn’t Have To Be Complicated

March 20, 2015 by Gabriel Leave a Comment

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Sugarlaws

On Sugarlaws Katy shares health and beauty tips, very personal stories including her new adventures in motherhood and of course FOOD. Katy has also penned a series of incredibly well-received novels called, Moving Neutral.

I am so delighted to have Katy Atlas from Sugarlaws joining me on the show today.

On Starting Her Blog:

This is a thing that I’ve never really talked about on my blog, but I actually had a personal blog in college.

So actually before Sugarlaws was born I had a live journal for about three years in college. And then I gave it up when I started law school because I had this idea that I was going to be this very serious lawyer, and very serious lawyers don’t blog and certainly don’t write about things that they do on the Internet.

I found that I just missed it so much. I just kind of missed having that outlet. I missed sharing with people that way. I missed getting to know people through blogging. And so when I was a year out of law school I started Sugarlaws. In a lot of ways I think it was kind of a natural outgrowth.

I love to write. I’ve always kind of been a writer. I think it’s something that I was born with. And so it felt very natural. Again, I think it was also a way not even just to write but to communicate and to connect with people.

When I first started Sugarlaws it was exclusively recipes. It was because I was learning how to cook. I was sort of on my own for the first time.

In law school I hadn’t really cooked very much and I was starting my first job and I wanted to learn this skill. I found that I was taking pictures of these recipes, that I would make them and email them around to my friends and my family. I just thought, like, “Okay, well, why not put them on the Internet?”

I originally thought it would sort of be my own little cookbook that I could come back to and have all these recipes and figure out what I liked about them and what I didn’t, and what I tried and what I wanted to try. Then suddenly people started reading it. That kind of shocked me at first.

It’s like, “Who are you? You’re not my mom, what’s going on?” It was really my cooking adventures for the first year and a half. Then eventually as I felt like I’d mastered a lot of cooking skills I expanded it to add fashion and beauty and lifestyle. And now again I’ve kind of expanded it to write about parenting a little bit.

On Her Connection with Her Readers:

One of the things that I always think is really cool is I’ll get emails from readers a lot and there’ll be people who say, “I’ve followed you since those early days when you were taking a photo with your little point and shoot,” because I didn’t even have an iPhone back then.

And they looked terrible but they kind of, I feel like, I really feel like those are my friends. Those people that I know now or have known me for six years, seven years now. I think what keeps people coming back is the human being behind it. Lots of blogs have beautiful pictures and that is something that obviously the blogging world is just amazing at creating, but what makes blogging different from magazines and other places where you can see these beautiful images, are that you kind of get to know the human behind them.

I think that really has been, if there’s anything I think that makes my blog popular, it’s that people sort of feel like they know me.

On Her Epic Holiday Fail:

Yes. So last Christmas we . . . well so I have a very big kind of extended family.

We had my parents in town and my sister and then my husband’s parents and his brother and his brother’s wife and their son. And I was responsible for cooking Christmas dinner.

I did all the things in preparation, like I had my recipes ready, I had a schedule of what needed to go in when. It all was going okay until everything got ready. At that moment had I been a really on-the-ball hostess I would have said, “Sit down at the table right now.”

But instead, people were talking and that was fun and so I just sort of gently hinted that people should go to the table. It took like an hour to get everyone to the table, at which point all of our food was burnt.

There was nothing to eat.

Usually I take pictures of everything. I take pictures of my shoes practically every day. But I couldn’t take any pictures of these burnt potatoes because I was so mortified by them.

It was just one of those moments where I was so excited to cook this Holiday dinner and I really felt like I could rise to the challenge. And then I just burned everything.

I think in some ways I actually kind of love it as a story now. At the time I was really disappointed in myself. I couldn’t talk about it for a while. My whole family had to pretend I’d done an okay job, that it wasn’t really that bad. Then they threw everything in the trash after we were done.

So it was just a total epic failure.

But you know I think probably everyone in their life is going to have one of those stories. You know one of those Holiday dinners that just didn’t quite go the way you planned. Those are probably going to be the ones that you remember even more than the ones that go perfectly.

On Cooking:

I started Sugarlaws when I started getting into cooking. Everybody gets through life making a couple of dishes pretty well so that they can eat. I had a few of those. But really when I started to get fascinated with cooking and with all the techniques and kind of learning about it, not sort of seeing it as a task that has to get done every day, and more seeing it as sort of a creative outlet, and something that I could learn how to do and a skill that I could pick up, that’s really when I started enjoying cooking.

That’s when I started going to the farmers’ market and going to different food blogs and picking out recipes and thinking about what techniques I wanted to master. I took a bunch of cooking classes. It was really a long learning experience that is well documented on Sugarlaws. I kind of went from here are some cookies with four ingredients to all of a sudden I’m piping my own eclairs and rendering duck fat.

Now it’s funny because cooking is still obviously a huge part of our lives but now what I gravitate towards more are easier recipes that can be healthy and manageable for our family. We’ve obviously got a lot on our hands with an eight-month-old and both my husband and I work. So now it’s kind of taken its own little turn but I still really enjoy it.

On Cooking as a Parent:

I cook very differently because we used to order out and go out. We could certainly go out on a much more frequent basis and now we don’t.

Now it tends to be a lot more meals that I prepare at home. I find two things. One, is that I have to be a lot more organized about it. It can’t be like, “Oh, I bought two things for a recipe and then I’m missing the other four ingredients,” because then we have no dinner. So that doesn’t work very well. And then also I really strive for recipes that can just be our staples, something that isn’t necessarily learning a new technique all the time but is just like, I know how to make this. I know it will be good.

I love our slow cooker. It’s the lifesaver for a new parent.

Because nothing burns. I definitely kind of experiment still with recipes. I’ll work one into the rotation and see if it works and make it a few times. Then, if it sticks around, then it becomes sort of part of our repertoire and one of the staples. But it definitely has changed a lot.

I definitely gravitate towards healthy but easy and low maintenance, and something that is not going to burn.

On a Dish that’s Good for Parents:

I have two that are kind of go-to’s a lot, and they’re both slow cooker recipes. I just find that those are just life savers. One of them is barbecue chicken. I’m so obsessed with the recipe that I literally have it going downstairs in our slow cooker for dinner tonight.

It’s the easiest, the recipe’s on the Sugarlaws website but it’s so easy. It’s chicken breasts, barbecue sauce, Worcestershire sauce, Italian dressing and just leave it in the slow cooker for six or eight hours. And then shred it with two forks and put it on a wholewheat bun, and you have a really delicious, incredibly easy dinner that takes, active time, five minutes.

Then I also have a Southwestern stew that’s one of our favorites. It uses black beans and corn and chopped onions. And then a lot of the time I just kind of throw in some taco seasoning. These are really low maintenance recipes but I swear I really do like to cook and can do the fancy stuff too but lately with a baby…

On Her Book Series called Moving Neutral:

I was an English major in college. I’ve always loved to write, loved to read. I read all the time.

I started reading a ton of young adult books and just love them, love the stories, love the pace of them, love that you could pick them up and sort of fall into these characters’ lives. I just found them really, really enjoyable.

After a while I started getting these characters in my head and, you know, it just kind of felt really natural to try to put . . . well I want to say pen to paper but obviously it was fingers to keyboard. And try to tell the story.

I love writing and I think writing fiction is one of the most fun, enjoyable, hair pulling, intense activities that you can challenge yourself to. The discipline that it takes to write a book is just something that I’m glad that I challenged myself to do because I really learned a lot from it.

I would encourage anyone to take that story that they have sitting around in their head and those characters that they think about every once in a while and try to tell their story. I’m so proud of that as an accomplishment.

It is one of the things that I am probably most proud of at least before our child arrived. I loved it.

I think there’s something to be said for sort of staying in your niche, but I always felt like I write about fashion, I write about food, I write about beauty, but foremost I’m a writer.

Not so much foremost, I am a fashionista or a beauty expert or even a cook, I’m really kind of first and foremost a writer.

The Pressure Cooker:

Which food shows or cooking shows do you watch?

I love Martha Stewart so I watch her show a lot. I have a lot of her cookbooks. I think she’s just totally terrific.

What are some food blogs or websites that we have to know about?

I rely on the big ones like Bon Appetit. Cooking Light actually I think has really good recipes. And then a lot of Joy the Baker, I love her blog. Smitten Kitchen obviously is a huge one that I think probably you already know about, I love her blog. Cupcakes and Cashmere is kind of fashion and food but she always has great recipes.

Who do you follow on Pinterest, Instagram or Twitter that make you happy?

So on Instagram in particular I follow a lot of my friends. I follow a lot of bloggers too.

The nice thing about the blogging community is that the ones that I follow that make me the happiest tend to be the people that I actually kind of know in real life, and have gotten to know through various projects.

They feel like my friends in addition to obviously they’re creators of really, really beautiful content. So I always really like it when I know the person and have some connection to them.

What is something all home cooks should have in their pantry?

Maldon sea salt is the biggest one. You never think of it but it actually makes such a huge difference in your recipes. You don’t want to be pouring table salt on to everything.

Name one ingredient you cannot live without?

Cheese. Like probably parmesan cheese. My husband is always like . . . I’m like, “Let’s just put some parmesan cheese in there” and he’s like, “It doesn’t go in everything.” But I disagree, it pretty much goes in everything.

What are a few cookbooks that make your life better?

Back to Martha Stewart. I have a bunch of Martha Stewart cookbooks that I really, really like. I just find that those recipes are kind of foolproof. They really, really work. They always turn out great.

I also have The Art of Simple Food, which I think is kind of, almost less of a cookbook, and more of just kind of a cooking perspective on which I really, really like.

And then I do a lot online. I love my cookbooks and when I have a Saturday I love browsing through them. But I also, when I’m looking for a recipe, I also look a lot online.

What song or album just makes you want to cook?

I love the 60s and the music of the 60s. So I put on Bob Dylan or Crosby, Stills and Nash or the Beatles. Those are just the songs that sort of speak to my soul, and those are always kind of the immediate go-to songs.

Keep Posted on Katy:

My blog is Sugarlaws.com and pretty much across the board on social media I’m just @Sugarlaws. So that’s Twitter and Facebook and Instagram. So it’s easy.

On Growing Up in Egypt:

On Egyptian Cuisine:

On What a Typical Egyptian Meal Looks Like:

On Must-Have Dishes for Visitors to Egypt:

The Pressure Cooker:

On Keeping Posted with Noha:

On Cooking as a New Parent:

On Putting a Meal Together Quickly:

On How to Make Cooking Fun:

On Her Food Heroes:

On Her Blog:

The Pressure Cooker:

On Keeping Posted with Emily:

On Being Such an Open Book:

On Starting Her Blog in 2010:

On Her Interest Around Food:

On Her Go-To Sources for Inspiration:

On Deciding on What to Make for Dinner or Her Blog:

On the Difference in Food Culture Between Denver and Chicago:

The Pressure Cooker:

On Keeping Posted with Lauren:

On What Drew Her to Farming:

On Their Farm:

On What They Grow on Their Farm:

On Growing Produce for Beginners:

On a Resource for Those Wanting to Learn More:

On Writing Her Blog:

The Pressure Cooker:

On Keeping Posted with Andrea:

On Finding Her Passion for Baking:

On No Longer Being Vegetarian:

On Her Interest in Food:

On the First Thing She Baked:

On Things Not Going as Planned in the Kitchen:

On The Food Culture in Portland, Oregon:

On Special Places to Eat in Portland:

The Pressure Cooker:

On Keeping Posted with Kylie:

On How Her Blog Started:

On Her Sense of Fearlessness in the Kitchen:

On How Becoming a Parent Changed the Way She Cooks:

On Her Videos:

On Her Book, Bon Appétempt: A Coming-of-Age Story (with Recipes!)

The Pressure Cooker:

On Keeping Posted on Amelia:

On Being a Recovering Pastry Chef:

On Moving from Pastry to Cooking Savory Foods:

On Her Passion for Food and Cooking:

On Vegetarian and Gluten-Free Cooking:

On Turning Down a Cookbook Offer… Twice:

The Pressure Cooker:

Keep Posted on Alanna:

Have Alanna's Special Dish Recipe Sent to You Now:

On Starting Her Blog:

On Her Connection with Her Readers:

On Her Epic Holiday Fail:

On Cooking:

On Cooking as a Parent:

On a Dish that’s Good for Parents:

On Her Book Series called Moving Neutral:

The Pressure Cooker:

Keep Posted on Katy:

Have Katy’s Special Breakfast/ Dinner Recipe Sent to You Now: