The Rags to Riches Journey to Success of Food Blogger and Bestselling Cookbook Author Marye Audet-White Restless Chipotle

On the Vegetarians & Meat-Lovers Podcast with Julie Hoag. The epic rags to riches Journey to Success of Food Blogger and Bestselling Cookbook Author Marye Audet-White, Restless Chipotle: Enjoy the epic chat between host Julie Hoag and food blogger/cookbook author Marye Audet-White, the Restless Chipotle. With a 40 year focus on the importance of family and a passion for southern comfort food, Marye Audet-White is an expert in melding the two together effortlessly. Marye's a NY Times Bestselling author with 10 cookbooks under her belt and her recipes have been featured in Good Housekeeping, Country Living, Today, House Beautiful, Texas Living, Food & Wine, and many more.

Marye shared her personal and professional life journey from being poor, struggling, and even dumpster diving to feed her family, to being abandoned by her ex-husband, left to raise her children alone, to her amazing rise as a successful food blogger and bestselling cookbook author. Her story is both inspiring and courageous. She worked very, very hard to reach her success. Her drive and dedication show how tenacious she really is and what a smart businesswoman, plus being a busy mom on top of all that! She's really quite an amazing and admirable woman, and I thoroughly enjoyed getting to talk with her on the podcast. She deserves all the accolades and respect! Check her out more via the links below:
YouTube  https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8Gc2ckH2tRlfAe1Xmr3n7w
Website: https://www.restlesschipotle.com
FB - https://www.facebook.com/RestlessChipotle   
Email List -https://www.restlesschipotle.com/subscribe/
Affiliate links to cookbooks, the podcast may receive a small monetary award if purchases are made through the links that go to support the podcast. Thank you.
Mexican Slow Cooker Cookbook: Easy, Flavorful Mexican Dishes That Cook Themselves https://amzn.to/46yoXsP
The Everything Cookies and Brownies Cookbook (Everything®) https://amzn.to/3JF25y5
Bread Bootcamp: It's Not a Cookbook...It's an Adventure https://amzn.to/3NV3kvE
Effortless Summer Entertaining - For the Rest of Us (plans and recipes) https://amzn.to/3PNHP0S

Marye shared a recipe!
Crockpot Smothered Chicken

Serves 6
We love this all year but it's especially good on chilly, blustery days. Serve with warm cornbread or buttermilk biscuits.

Ingredients
2 1/4 pounds boneless skinless chicken breasts or thighs
10.5 ounces cream of mushroom soup
10.5 ounces cream of chicken soup
8 ounces button mushrooms sliced
8 ounces onion cut in half then sliced
1 ounce onion soup mix
1/2 cup chicken stock
1 teaspoon seasoning salt


Instructions
Spray the inside of the crock with no stick spray.
Lay the chicken in the bottom of the crock.
Sprinkle with the seasoned salt.
Cover with the onions.
Mix the soups and the onion soup mix until smooth.
Stir in the chicken stock.
Spoon over the chicken.
Top with sliced mushrooms.
Set the crockpot on low and cook for 8 hours.

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Transcript

This transcript was created by YouTube so it isn't 100 percent accurate. If you have questions please email me at jahoag15@gmail.com and I will be more than happy to clarify for you and answer any questions you may have.

The Rags to Riches Journey to Success of Food Blogger and Bestselling Cookbook Author Marye Audet-White Restless Chipotle Season 1 Episode 22

0:03

hello everyone I'm really really excited you're here today on vegetarians and

0:09

meat lovers podcast and I'm getting a text right in the middle of the beginning how lovely welcome to my

0:15

podcast where we talk about all things related to food and cooking vegetarians and meat lovers because I am a

0:21

vegetarian in a meat eating family so I have to cook meals that fit both types

0:27

of food and today my guest is Mary Audette white now did I say your name

0:32

right exactly perfect awesome okay and I'm so excited to talk with her she is amazing she's really

0:40

amazing with a 40-year focus on the importance of family and a passion for

0:45

southern comfort food Mary Audette white is an expert in melding the two together efforts effortlessly Mary's a New York

0:53

Times best-selling author with 10 cookbooks under her belt and her recipes have been featured in Good Housekeeping

0:59

country living today house beautiful Texas living food and wine and many more

1:05

her website is the Restless chipotle.com on Facebook she is also Restless

1:11

Chipotle and you can sign up for her email list which I'll put all these links down in the podcast show notes so

1:16

everybody can find them as well but that's at Restless chipotle.com backslash subscribed backslash and we're

1:24

gonna have in the podcast show notes also a crock pot smothered chicken recipe that Mary has shared with us

1:31

thank you for sharing that and welcome to my podcast thank thank you it's really nice to be here

1:36

you have quite the career now tell me how you got started in all of this because I mean that's a that's a Quite a

1:43

feat to have 10 cookbooks that is just awesome okay well several of those were

1:49

ghost written for companies so my name's not on them but I still take credit for him because I wrote them

1:55

um it's they were they were just somebody asked me if I wanted to do it

2:01

and I said sure and I didn't know any better that you know it was hard work and I thought not a cookbook why not and

2:09

so that's what I did uh one that you can find on Amazon is uh Mexican slow cooker

2:15

cookbook and that one is under my name and then I did um cookies and brownies cookbook like a

2:23

century ago and that one is also under my name and then there's a few more about I can't remember what they are

2:29

right now oh I have it written down bread boot camp and effortless summer entertaining

2:34

for the rest of us right does that sound right yeah very awesome so people can

2:39

put your name in Amazon and find those books and I'll put as many of the links down on the podcast show notes that I can so people could just get right

2:45

through to those but yeah they are a lot of work aren't they they are

2:52

um I really had only been blogging for a couple of well it was a couple of years

2:58

but it was more hobby blogging at that point that was in like 2005. and

3:05

um a um what are they called those people and

3:11

agent publisher yeah yeah yeah yeah an agent came to me and said hey would you

3:17

like to write a cookbook about cookies I'll like your recipes I said sure why not that would be fun yes sure so that

3:26

was the first one and um that was an experience and then I did several more more after that so

3:33

that's awesome and so how long have you been running your blog um under its current name

3:40

in since 2009 prior to what I started about 2005.

3:47

okay so I've been around like a long time you've seen a lot of changes across

3:53

the internet in social media and all of that because it's changing so rapidly right it is but it's always changed

4:00

rapidly I think um you know we used to just post recipes without pictures and not have social

4:08

media to you know so we would just go to each other's blogs and share we didn't make money it was just kind of what we

4:14

did sir right that's amazing and what got you into it

4:20

like what what was your thought process like hey I want to share or just wanted to present things to the world what was

4:26

your thought process my two oldest kids had were adults and they had moved away

4:31

from home my daughter had moved out of state with her family and my oldest son

4:37

had joined the military and he was in Japan and they were constantly emailing

4:43

me and stuff mom how do you make blah blah blah and I would so I said you know what I'm just gonna start a blog I'll

4:50

put all the recipes on there you guys can follow them and that way I'm not getting all of these texts and emails

4:56

and not that I mind talking to them but it was like so yeah

5:03

that's really cool so it basically started as a family communication and it's turned into this that's that's

5:08

pretty cool it is I feel very blessed we uh currently we're getting over a

5:16

million page views a month so that's awesome yeah

5:22

it's really hard to wrap your your mind around sometimes it really is so like is

5:28

the the podcast or the um not podcast the the website you have now did you move things from your old podcast or did

5:35

you start fresh with the new Chipotle Restless Chipotle one or did you pull it from your old one some of them I pulled

5:42

from the old site and and then some of them over the years has been like oh I'm

5:48

not keeping that honestly because your lifestyle changes right when I first started blogging I was I had small kids

5:56

I was homeschooling I was we had goats and chickens and all you know I I did a

6:03

vision and I was like everything has to be organic and you should use milk and

6:08

you know all of the things and now I'm like so you open up a can of cream of chicken soup

6:15

so some some of the things that were just too um

6:21

to snobby about certain kinds of foods I had to get rid of so that nobody would

6:28

be laughing at me about it I totally get that and also I think what

6:33

changes through time with being a parent is what your children eat because you talk to me you know 10 15 years ago

6:39

there is nobody eating salad in my house and now they want salad right like what they eat changes and I feel like that

6:45

also impacts what I'm making because now they eat so many different things that I

6:51

have so much more freedom when I'm cooking at least my children started out picky and got less picky as age when

6:57

that happens a lot of mine was you know when I first started I have eight kids I

7:03

had six you know and so my youngest is going to turn 20 on

7:09

Saturday and how I cooked for eight kids and how I cook you know with I've still

7:15

got four kids at home but um you know how I cook for four for six

7:21

adults at home is very different oh totally I'm going through that too

7:26

because my three boys are all three teenagers and yeah it's like basically we're feeding five adults we have I have

7:31

three boys and then my husband so yeah feeding five adults is a lot different things if you have three boys that are

7:39

teenagers you're feeding more than five adults they count you're right that's very true I I'll go to the store

7:46

and I'll buy all this food and I'll be like this is gonna last a really long time and it just doesn't no my um

7:52

youngest son is a personal trainer and a bodybuilder yes so we go through a lot a

7:59

lot of chicken breast at my house and I'm like really you know we

8:05

bought 10 pounds three days ago so oh I still at that because my oldest also

8:11

does do bodybuilding and weightlifting so and he's very specific he wants a lot of protein and he wants vegetables and

8:19

fruits so yeah I totally can understand where you're coming from with that one and he's 19. so he's my oldest

8:26

um he's it's first year just finished his first year in college so amazing for you yeah amazing for you to also like be

8:33

able to get these cookbooks done and blogging with children I mean that's a huge challenge right I mean it really is

8:38

I I am very lucky in that I do not require a lot of sleep I have never a

8:44

lot of sleep and so if I I can work 20 hours a day for an extended period of

8:50

time without there being a problem problem and so what did it I would wait till the kids went to bed and then I

8:56

would just you know I'd um divide the number of recipes that was required by the number of days I had to

9:03

do it and then okay I have to do 10 recipes a day I have to do you know I have to write down 15 recipes a day or

9:09

whatever yeah that's a lot but you're kind of like me I don't require a lot of sleep either but thinking of doing 10 recipes in a

9:15

day blows up my brain I generally do I don't do as much as you do but I do like one you know like because it you know

9:21

taking pictures too is quite a challenge I mean obviously you had to learn photography as well which I've had to do also and that's a feat in itself yes it

9:30

is I didn't have to do photography for the cookbook so there was that and it was also easy in that a lot of the

9:37

recipes that they asked for were recipes that I had been making for years well I

9:43

knew they worked and you know and so there was that that made it a whole lot easier it's not like I was Triple

9:49

testing recipes and things that's what I was going to ask you like for your cookbooks do you have a certain

9:55

number of times you make it before you say okay this is it or is it based on how it tastes like is it always the same

10:01

do you have a standard or is it very um it varies if I'm doing a recipe for

10:07

something that I've been making for 40 years I am not probably going to test it

10:13

a whole lot before I do it and put it on but if it's a relatively new recipe I

10:19

usually try to um to test it at least four or five times just to make sure

10:24

that it's pretty similar each time the first time I have to figure out

10:29

how to measure because I I don't measure if I'm just cooking for us I don't use

10:35

measuring things so it makes it much more difficult when it comes to writing

10:40

the recipe if I don't I understand that too because my grandma was like that and I learned some cooking

10:45

from my my mom and my grandma my grandma was like that she's like you just do this you just do that and it wasn't

10:50

exact you know it wasn't this exact thing so it is something to learn and pay attention to okay I need to tell people this is one cup in one third cup

10:58

like you have to be yeah it's a different way to cook it is totally different plus a lot of times I

11:06

um adapt rest I have probably close to 100 old cookbooks from like

11:13

1880 to about 1980 and we'll take recipes out of those and adapt them but

11:21

the one thing people don't understand is even 50 years ago flour was different you know certain masks my mom had my

11:29

fudge recipe that is on my blog is my mom's recipe and when I read her recipe the first time when I was getting ready

11:35

to put on blog it said start with a five cent Hershey bar and I was like

11:41

because I'm not even sure you can get a little edge with that right so right so

11:48

everything is different and when you're adapting those old recipes you have to be really really careful

11:53

that's really cool and that's actually like me too like I have all of my mom's old cookbooks so like I have the cook up

11:59

book from my Grandma's family like from their Church in South Dakota like I have my mom's

12:05

1960s barbecue I mean when you look at it you can tell just by the pictures I mean this is from the 1960s and I love

12:11

to do that too and as well as taking my mom and Grandma's recipes too I don't have like a ton of them but I like at my

12:16

mom's old recipe cards with inner handwriting and my grandma too and they're just really it's just it's

12:22

really special to have but it's but you're right you do sometimes have to modify those which you wouldn't expect

12:28

but you do you do because even the texture of the flower is different than it used to be so if you're doing a cake

12:34

recipe and it says two cups of flour you might need two and a half cups or you might need one and three-fourths cups

12:40

it's it just it's crazy right and I think the region is

12:45

different too like when I look at the cookbook from South Dakota it's very different there's so many I mean we have

12:51

a lot of hot dishes in Minnesota too you know casseroles people call them casseroles but we call them hot dishes a lot but they are different than if

12:57

you're going to look at foods from where you are or the East Coast or California and it's kind of mind-blowing to think

13:03

how many different types of foods we have culture foods are foods of cultures around the country that's true and I was

13:10

worried for a while in the 80s that they were going to all start melding together because there were so many chain

13:16

restaurants and they were all the same and everybody was doing the same kind of cooking and you know but I think in the

13:23

past 10 years probably in the past 10 years we've kind

13:28

of gone the other way and people are more interested in their culture their

13:33

cultural cooking and you know their different things like that oh absolutely

13:39

and so have you always been in Texas and so you kind of cook with that type of Texan flavor or if you've been other

13:45

places and has it impacted your cooking I've been other places um my ex-husband was in the military and

13:52

we traveled quite a lot um so but I have been in Texas

13:58

let's see I'm 63 and so I've been in Texas at if you put it all together at

14:04

least 55 of those 63 years I'll say yeah I think you're very influenced

14:11

it's my influence my mom was from Michigan and so I do have a bit of that influence in the you know the more

14:17

Midwestern kind of stuff and some of the things but for the most part it's pretty Texan yeah oh that's really cool and I love

14:25

your title of your pot or your I keep calling you a podcast but your website how did you come up with that name

14:31

um it just happened I was like back when again way back then we um

14:39

nobody was really worrying about having a key word in the name okay there was no

14:46

such thing as keywords yeah so you just wanted something that was memorable and I was like okay what's memorable what's

14:52

memorable and I was like I looked over and I had some Chipotles on the counter

14:58

that I was working with oh wait Chipotle and my um one of my kids came in and

15:04

said mom why are you so Restless right now because I do have ADD but I'm around

15:10

and I was thinking I was like what else what else and so that's how it happened

15:16

that's a fun story but I totally get it sometimes that's just how things happen

15:21

they just poof yeah you know and it's just the right timing and that's very cool

15:26

and so what are your favorite things to cook with and do you like to cook more entrees or desserts breakfasts

15:34

casseroles what are your favorites I am absolutely a bread person I learned

15:39

how to make bread when I was 14 and so I've been making bread a very long time

15:46

um I love making bread and but not that many people want bread recipes

15:51

so I you know you have to make what people want to come see and so

15:58

for myself I love making bread I love making desserts um the uh the baking aspect of it is my

16:05

favorite but I just like all of it I just like to cook I like to make things taste really good

16:11

I like to really I don't know about you but I like to try unusual things together too you know like things that

16:16

you wouldn't normally have together I think that's really fun to experiment with yeah yep yep

16:23

and so do you think people don't like bread because they're trying to stay away from carbs or why do you think people don't like people don't have time

16:30

to make bread oh yeah yeah for I've got some um batter bread

16:37

recipes that are very quick but for the most part when somebody comes home from work at night they are not one a loaf of

16:45

bread and um if they have Sunday afternoon off most of the time unless

16:50

they really love to cook they are not wanting to spend it making a loaf of bread so I have it on the blog for

16:57

people who want it but I don't do hundreds of breads you know that's not

17:02

what it's about because um there's just there's just not that many people that want those recipes

17:09

right and the other thing I think too is that there's so many amazing bakeries out there that make it so it's just so

17:15

easy to just pick it up and be like I mean that's good yeah you have to enjoy the process of it and there's some

17:22

people that do and there's some people that don't right exactly exactly so did you find it a challenge

17:29

feeding talking about feeding children have them all have a different tastes

17:35

and different things they liked or do they just have to eat what they what you put out how did you go about with your

17:40

parenting and feeding kids I'm pretty I'm pretty laid back sort of

17:46

parent I guess but um the deal was you could eat what was on the table you had to take one bite if

17:54

you didn't like it I wasn't going to push it nobody had to clean their plate and if there was absolutely nothing on

17:59

the table you liked you could make yourself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich yeah yep that's pretty much what I did

18:06

too I was very I never wanted to force my kids to eat their whole plate because I didn't want them to overeat and get

18:13

used to overeating and then lead to obesity and all of that I know so many parents do that and I get not wanting to

18:19

waste food but you don't want to make them feel like they have to eat when they're full yeah and really with kids

18:27

you've got to pick your battles and yes

18:32

[Laughter] I totally get that what's one recipe your kids absolutely have loved though

18:38

that you just that they remember from childhood and they're like oh they want to make it over and over again

18:43

um this is really funny because it's absolutely not on the blog but I was going to ask you and is it on the blog

18:49

you know um American goulash my mom used to make it oh yeah my mom did too so

18:55

there was there's that that I have to make on a regular basis for my kids

19:00

um and my mom's potato soup recipe which is on the blog okay and

19:06

uh my mom's chili which isn't Texas Chili it's more of a Midwestern chili

19:11

soup I think that it is called it's like stewed tomatoes very fresh tomato flavor

19:17

and um kidney beans and hamburger and green

19:24

peppers and onions and macaroni so in macaroni and macaroni and so if

19:31

you tried to serve that to a real Texas person they slap your hand but

19:37

um addicted to it because my mom made it and when your mom or your Grandma makes something on a regular basis you know

19:43

yes so we have a tradition that the first cold day of the year I always like that and that's what we have for dinner

19:49

because that's what my mom used to do when it was really cold the first cold day of the year she would call and she said I made chili do you guys want to

19:56

come over and we'd be like we'll be there in 10 minutes and you know isn't that so true there's so much

20:03

memories and Foods in in dishes I mean it's just amazing even my I see that in

20:08

my kids too and sometimes it's just really fun to see them react to that and be like are you gonna make this again

20:13

are you gonna make that again you know and like it's just really fun to see that we all care about food but there's

20:19

so many memories in it too yeah and that's I think that's a big part of it and I think it's funny but when you lose

20:27

someone like your mom or your dad you know you never you can never

20:33

fix the food the same way it never tastes the same for what you do it just

20:38

doesn't so I told my kids to enjoy while they could because the flavors were going to change

20:43

when they started making them I know it's so true like I think of my grandma and she you know she was one of

20:49

these people that lived through the Great Depression so she was very very frugal but even being you know someone who always didn't have a lot of

20:55

ingredients she made everything taste amazing like she probably is the best food I've ever eaten in my life like

21:02

she's made the best food I've ever eaten in my life like you just can't duplicate it and I don't know she just had this

21:08

Talent you know she started cooking in eighth grade because they lived in South Dakota and their the parents were out in the

21:15

field so she kind of became the mom and she was the cook and so she started cooking in eighth

21:20

grade you know so she learned through being thrown into the fire of making food for a full

21:27

family there were five siblings so yeah but yeah no we can't you can't duplicate

21:33

it no duplicating it it's so interesting it's almost like there's magic in the

21:38

food you know like you have the same recipe but what is it that's different yep who knows

21:45

there's something anyway but it's just amazing so what has been your most surprising thing in your journey to

21:52

where you are today with all of this the blog and your YouTube channel and your

21:58

cookbooks and your success um I

22:05

was in a very difficult relationship prior to my divorce and I came out of

22:12

that um I didn't I didn't have a job outside the house we homeschooled and you know

22:17

it was the whole it was a very classic Atomic kind of family you know the

22:24

husband and the Y and all that everybody had their roles and when he left because

22:30

he had found someone else um I had six kids at home and

22:38

um I hadn't worked since 1981. oh wow and it was uh 2009 and

22:48

that's a big space of time that is and I came out of that feeling like I was

22:54

trash you know I yeah right I didn't have anything to offer anyone I didn't

23:00

have any abilities I had this little hobby blog that I was doing but that was nothing you know that was nothing right

23:07

so when I look and like my ex-husband didn't make a lot of money we to be

23:12

honest we dumpster dive sometimes to start food on the table um me and the kids did and um it sounds

23:19

terrible but you know you do what you have to do you have to survive yeah to survive so when I look back at that

23:26

those times and then I look now for example in January my husband my current

23:34

husband and I um flew down to Buenos Aires and got on

23:39

a ship and we went to Antarctica and Falkland Island and we did all of these

23:45

things um and I coach other bloggers

23:51

um oh nice and stuff like that and so people like some people actually look up

23:56

to me and the idea oh yeah people looking up to me is I it's hard for me

24:01

to wrap my brain around it's hard for me to go to the grocery store and buy

24:06

whatever I want without having to worry about what the price is so I guess

24:12

that's the biggest change is just how much I've grown from it

24:17

um I've spoken at conferences which is something the me you know 20 years ago would never have done

24:25

and I've spoken at conferences I've um I've been a coach I've I've been in book

24:34

signings I've you know I've traveled all over the world all of these things that

24:40

that me would never have imagined me being able to do that is absolutely phenomenal and that

24:47

is so moving to listen to what an amazing journey you've been on and to go from that to this is just it is it's a

24:55

huge blessing I I am so grateful so great that is awesome that is so awesome

25:01

I love to hear that kind of story to hear where you came from a place not only that was financially hard but you

25:08

know just yeah having the confidence to be like okay now I need to do something and I haven't done anything like this in

25:15

years and I have all these children that I have to I mean that's daunting it was

25:20

scary um my ex-husband didn't pay child support So yeah so it was it was really

25:26

scary it you know when you're you're those first couple of weeks

25:32

um it was like okay what am I gonna do how am I gonna do this the kids had

25:37

always been homeschooled so I don't want to put them in school because I felt like that was too much of a you know a

25:43

change form they were already going through so much change and then just I just kept trying to find writing jobs

25:50

online and I would at one point I was writing 80 articles a month for other

25:57

websites and um amazing and then working on my blog when I was done in the

26:04

evening wow so you know I've had a couple of people say it's so easy for you you know

26:13

you hit success so easily and I'm like well most of the time if somebody is

26:19

really successful they've been working at it really really hard right and you obviously learned how to

26:25

work very quickly and efficiently and write really well really fast so you you learned skills it wasn't just like you

26:32

got lucky you you worked at it yeah actually having to write for all of those different websites was such a huge

26:39

blessing not at the time because I really hated it and I was tired but

26:45

um but because I wrote for all of those different people and the way that they wanted things to write you know that was

26:51

before SEO or it was right when SEO was getting started and so I learned a lot

26:56

from writing for different companies I learned what worked I weren't learned what didn't work I learned what my voice

27:02

was you know all of that yeah yeah I've heard other people who've done writing for other people and or other

27:08

companies or whatever and they do they think that you almost find your voice a little bit better because you're you're learning to write in a different way and

27:16

then it helps you realize that you when you do it for yourself it's it's different yeah yeah right yeah exactly

27:22

yeah that's fascinating what a journey you've been on and what a great amount of

27:28

content like do you ever look back and be like wow I did all that yeah I do

27:33

especially when I'm having to like do updates and work on it oh no

27:39

when you do so many things and you have to like send out an email and like yeah there's so many things to add you're

27:44

like wow I really did a lot yeah a lot yeah but there's uh close to a thousand

27:51

um recipes on my blog and honestly I have deleted probably five or six

27:57

hundred over the years oh wow and now why do you delete them

28:02

um you know some of them were as I said just so ridiculous like there's not a

28:08

lot of people that want fresh goat milk ice cream or oh it was more of a homesteading like thing

28:16

and a lot of involves um that's just not the direction I went yeah

28:23

so it's kind of more like you were changing the focus of your entire blog yeah like fit in anymore and a lot of

28:29

this stuff was just again it was just different from you know that was

28:35

gosh it's over 10 years ago and you know our

28:41

eating habits and what we like and how we eat has changed so much in 10 years anyway I just some of the things are fun

28:49

to see on the blog um from a long time ago I've still got a few things from like 2006 and 2007. but

28:57

some of it was just not appropriate for who I am now and how I cook now and my

29:05

demographic right right that makes sense you figure out your Audi who your audience is and

29:10

that doesn't really fit anymore so yeah that makes sense now do you have other people helping you create things at this

29:17

point or do you do more still do the bulk of it yourself I do a lot of it myself I do have people help

29:23

um especially as you know uh this year my husband and I traveled more my oldest

29:30

daughter moved in with us because she has brain cancer and so there's taking

29:35

her you know we have to take her to chemo and so there was really no way that I could put in the kind of hours

29:41

that I used to put in but I I still do a lot of it that's good oh I'm so sorry about going

29:47

through that yeah well you know it life right it's like life it is life unfortunately yeah you can either be

29:54

negative about it or you can be positive about it right at least you're able to take her in and she has a place to go

30:01

where you can help her out you know like not everybody has that even so right

30:06

yeah and it's you know there's been blessing in it too even though that sounds weird but I like to look I like

30:12

to look at the positive sides of things I've rarely been through anything that I

30:17

can look back on and say oh that was terrible because there's always been something that came out of it that was

30:22

good so and that really um she's doing great so

30:28

there's that that's good that's awesome but you're right there I don't think that even if it's

30:35

something small you're still going to learn something right I think you're right I agree yeah

30:41

so tell me about I was perusing your website a little bit and I was kind of fun for me to look at your section where

30:48

it said tell me about so tell me about your amazing ingredient substitution ideas and like this has happened to me

30:53

before where I'm like oh the buttermilk went bad or oh I don't have as much

31:00

sugar as I thought what are some how did you figure out these things for substitutions did you read up or did you

31:06

just try it out um most of them came out of the really old cookbooks because those people have

31:13

a lot of smarts right yes for example one of my cookbooks from oh 18

31:22

50 1860 there was a little note in it put a pinch of ginger in the yeast water

31:31

when you're making bread and so I did I did that and pretty much

31:37

now everybody is doing that because it's such a great activator but I think it started with me because it

31:43

was 2009 but right um but yeah so I never really would have

31:49

thought about that but some of those old things that they used to do really make sense so a pinch of ginger in with yeast

31:57

and sugar and water really helps activate it really really well

32:02

um so I learned those things from from the cook you know cookbooks like that

32:07

and like the Depression era and World War II World War II era cookbooks

32:15

um where they had to cook with rash and you know they had ration cards and all of that

32:21

um they had a lot of ways of doing things and some of those recipes we still use

32:27

today like um I think there's one called a crazy cake or something like that it doesn't it's like water and oil and

32:35

nothing I don't know but I couldn't think what all was in it but anyway so so as Generations have gone through

32:42

things they've learned how to get around their problems right what they're what

32:48

they don't have and um so I learned about the ginger thing I

32:54

learned um about how you can take baking soda

32:59

and um I lost it in my head the the cream of

33:06

tartar and oh yeah together and and make baking powder basically and so um you

33:13

know once you start understanding and then you start looking at it you go wait this is chemistry and right right so

33:22

um but I use a lot of those old things and so when I wrote actually that just published today oh it did are you

33:29

serious maybe that's why it was that maybe maybe as I saw it because it was right there you know on the front yeah

33:35

but it written down all of them but I think I've got like 50 on there but oh wow

33:41

yeah so like you can use molasses you can mix a tablespoon of molasses in with

33:46

like a cup of brown sugar and have like a cup of white sugar and have a light brown sugar wow same flavor you can add

33:55

um a tablespoon of cornstarch might be a teaspoon

34:01

um anyway to of cornstarch to sugar and blend it up in your blender you're gonna have powdered sugar I mean that has come

34:08

in handy numerous times oh yeah I could bet yeah yeah so and you can use sour

34:14

cream for buttermilk you can use Greek yogurt for buttermilk you can you know and I really like to culture my own

34:20

buttermilk so I I just I can get it is Rich and as thick as I want a lot of

34:27

times the buttermilk from the store is skim and I don't skim milk so I'll get

34:35

whole milk and put a little bit of of the store-bought buttermilk in there but you can also get cultures on Amazon and

34:42

then you just let it sit and it creates a whole thing of Buttermilk you know the way you want it yeah so I mean and when

34:49

you talk about that think about how it was back then that they couldn't just go to the store like and now we have all these amazing delivery things because of

34:55

covet all these people are delivering grocery stores all I need to do is call or order online and poof it appears at

35:01

our door and they did not have anything remotely like that you know they had to travel they had to travel no it's crazy

35:09

I love I love the delivery thing I mean I went to the gym with my son this

35:14

morning we left here at about 20 after five and went down to the gym and when

35:19

we got home all of my groceries were sitting on my friends ready to come in it was like huh

35:25

such a Time Saver but yeah think about how different that is so but but those things come in handy too because we do

35:31

run out of things even though it's still convenient to get things you know sometimes you'll be making something and

35:36

something went bad and you're like oh you know you still want to make it so those those substitutions really come in

35:42

healthy healthy come in very helping one thing that made me think of and I don't

35:47

know if this is probably a common one too but putting a piece of bread in brown sugar when it's hard that's what something I

35:53

learned from my mom and my grandma when I was younger that's not really a substitution but that's like a fix and I

35:59

was telling my son that when we were making some cookies and he said oh it's all hard I said well let's just put a piece of bread in there and then we'll

36:05

be able to use it and he's like what it was it was fun to teach him that

36:10

that's the kind of information that you should get passed down it's not passed down anymore right exactly yes I mean it is weird I

36:19

don't even know why that works but yeah you're right it's chemistry and it's biology and it's all those things yeah a

36:25

lot of our science classes happened in the kitchen when we were home oh I bet

36:30

yeah yeah the kids love to play in the kitchen they really do just to make

36:36

things and just play with stuff here usually if they're involved with it they they're better about eating different

36:41

things too yes that's so true if they had a hand in making it like oh

36:48

maybe I'll try this yeah okay I'll try one bite my son's still my

36:55

youngest one still has issues like he doesn't love beans so like when we have chili he's oh it has beans in it you

37:01

know like he doesn't love the beans but he's getting better he eats most things but it's so funny how they go through

37:08

different phases in life and oh we were talking earlier how it impacts your cooking in yeah having the number of

37:13

kids home you know it's constantly changing how we cook it is it is and I

37:20

was a super picky eater when I was little I would only um I would only eat

37:25

spaghetti with butter and Parmesan on it and I I would

37:32

eat uh salad and Brussels sprouts oddly

37:38

enough oh wow and uh bananas and that was pretty much

37:43

it yep yep sounds sounds pretty familiar a

37:50

lot of kids go through that where they're just like just this little little grouping of foods they're willing to eat and a tiny bit

37:56

and hopefully they'll all grow that I think most most people do oh girl they didn't start to eat more thanks so we

38:03

shouldn't really parents tend to freak out about that kind of stuff though we really shouldn't I um I think uh my pediatrician when my

38:10

mom asked him said don't worry about it she'll eat when she's hungry excuse me that's good that's good advice

38:17

that's what everybody needs I think because some people get so hyper about it like you know you have to eat this much broccoli and this much voila my

38:24

kids wouldn't touch broccoli they still don't love it but I never forced them to eat broccoli they

38:30

tried it but I never was one of those parents were like you have to eat the broccoli you know like

38:35

it just wasn't me it's not worth it it isn't at all so

38:42

were any of your kids vegetarian or have they all been meat eaters um actually I am pretty much vegetarian

38:47

oh you are too okay so several of the kids are and then so we kind of have it

38:53

split down the middle we have the vegetarian leaning side over here and we have not

39:01

vegetarian leaning side over here so yeah we're pretty well split up

39:07

when the kids were really small um I didn't I think I only had two or three we were actually vegan for about

39:15

three or four years so okay

39:20

it'd be tough to be vegan I think I mean I think I could do it being a vegetarian but I I like to have the dairy in there it

39:27

just yeah like cheese yes that was what that's what brought me back

39:33

yeah absolutely so you have the whole challenge of making a meal and making everybody happy too which is what I

39:39

constantly have dealt with myself yeah I don't try to make everybody happy I make whatever

39:45

I'm putting on the blog and they're not I mean they're all adults they can go to

39:50

you know Burger King or Whataburger or whatever exactly so true and and it's it's it's

39:58

not as hard as people think though if you're trying to make things for fitting to feeding two different types of diets

40:04

people are always like I think it's such a big deal oh what are you gonna eat what are you gonna make that sounds really hard it's really not you just

40:09

have to be very mindful how you do it my mom lived with us for the last uh year

40:16

or so of her life and she was on a very strict diet

40:21

um for her heart which was actually pretty silly but that's that's a whole nother story and then

40:28

um I was pregnant and I was on a very careful diet because I tend to have high

40:35

blood sugar when I was pregnant and that kind of stuff and then there was the family so I um be done you can you can

40:45

cook three or four different ways it's not that hard right I mean if you take things out

40:50

before you put meat in other portions you just have to split things up at the right time just be really mindful that's kind of how I always think of it just to

40:57

be really mindful what you're doing and kind of plan it ahead pay attention where you put meat where you don't put meat because I had a few recipes that

41:03

I've put out and some people that were vegetarians totally bulked at me saying well how can you put meat in the same

41:09

dish when you're eating it meatless I said you just put it on one side and they're like no no you can't do that like they thought it was all like taboo

41:15

and I'm like I've done it many times and it doesn't drift if you do it right and you have the right recipe the meat's not

41:21

going to drift over there yeah that's true but you know people some people are

41:27

purists and they're like nope nope I'm not doing that that's not even right

41:33

to each their own so what have you run into if you run into people that were

41:38

you know cutting you down you get people that are naysayers and what do you say to them we just ignore them how do you

41:44

deal with people who are negative towards you or do you not experience that negative towards me about

41:51

like saying things like maybe bad reviews or saying they don't like your

41:57

recipes those kind of people those people yeah so yes I do get those most of the

42:05

time I try to be nice um because I do think of myself as being

42:11

a very nice person sometimes it really hurts I mean I have more than once cried over something that somebody wrote yeah

42:18

but the funniest one was somebody I have um

42:23

copycat Cracker Barrel uh hamburger steaks right with onion grapes

42:29

really popular recipe on the blog and one person came on and said that they

42:35

they gave the recipe a one star rating and she said I hate this recipe because

42:40

I went to Cracker Barrel two weeks ago and I got food poisoning from this very dish and I was like

42:47

oh geez I don't really think food poisoning is

42:53

one of the ingredients but wow some people are weird they are weird

42:58

but that just made me laugh because it was just so over the top and funny and I

43:03

go ahead and publish those I mean I don't care people can think but you're always good you know you're always gonna

43:09

have people that like I have a couple of recipes some people have really good luck with it it's amazing they love it

43:16

they just go crazy over it they leave beautiful reviews and then there'll be a whole other batch of people on that same

43:22

recipe that'll be like this recipe didn't work it didn't set up it didn't do this I'm like I I don't understand

43:28

how that happens but it does it does and is out of your control could

43:33

be bad ingredients but then often people will yeah they'll blame the recipe and be like oh no it's the recipe there's

43:39

like so many other reasons why that could have happened yep but yeah we went I had a Thanksgiving

43:45

with I had a pecan pie recipe go viral and um I got a lot of comments this pie

43:53

didn't set up it's it's goopy all over the you know it's like running all over the place it's running right out of the

43:59

crust and I said um did you refrigerate it overnight like

44:05

it says to in the recipe oh geez

44:11

what are you gonna do it's so annoying though when people would leave a negative review for that

44:16

and it's something that they just didn't even follow directions for so it like reflects negatively on you when there's

44:22

no reason it should it's they did it I don't think I don't think it reflects negatively on me yeah I don't think most

44:29

people really really look at those reviews I mean maybe they do but I think

44:34

most people are responsible enough to read the reviews and see well okay 80 of

44:41

the reviews are really good and there's just this 20 over here that's really bad and I'm guessing that the 80 you know I

44:48

mean if you have like a hundred percent bad reviews or something all right another thing

44:54

that's true that's true and so you do have to and we all know that because we know people that are super picky or

45:00

ridiculous so we kind of have to expect that and as a person who's creating content you have to accept that you're

45:06

going to get those people that are going to come at you if you're putting something out in the world you're gonna get those people like my worst one was

45:13

somebody gave me a one star because they said they didn't order my book and I'm like what why would you give me a one star

45:19

and leave a review that you didn't order my book I'm like I don't even understand that that even

45:25

mean yeah I know I'm not gonna be everybody's cup of coffee you know some

45:31

people are just not going to be your people that's right that's right but you do need to have a thick skin do you when

45:38

you find you said you coach people do you do you bring that kind of stuff up with people when you're coaching most of

45:44

the time with the people I'm coaching we're working on growing their blogs um okay so but we do talk about that a

45:50

lot and you know it's your blog it's like your house so if somebody comes into your house and they're super rude

45:56

if you want to toss them out on their backside you have every right to toss them out on their backside just because

46:01

somebody leaves a comment on your blog doesn't mean that you have to publish it right that's so true

46:08

and don't take it to heart just or have you know have

46:13

like one of your kids or your husband or your best friend give them your

46:20

um you know give them access to your blog and just give them the job of going

46:25

through the comments and answering them and and deleting all of the nasty stuff that way you never have to see it that's

46:32

true that's a that's a definitely a good way to do it to just get it out of there

46:37

so you don't even see it yes that's not going to help you you just needs uh if you can't if you can't shed

46:43

it and just let it bounce off you that's a great way to deal with it yep so where do you see yourself going in

46:50

the future do you have things in the works or plans or what's your future plan working on my YouTube channel uh

46:58

and trying to get that going I really enjoy doing YouTube um this year I haven't gotten as much

47:03

done as I usually do uh just because again the travel and my daughter being sick and stuff but I'm gonna get back

47:09

hopefully soon but um I love doing that and I never thought I would love being on camera like that but right it was

47:17

just fun and I like getting the emails and stuff and people like me and that's always a shot to me

47:26

um so there's that really I don't I don't think anything's going to change a whole

47:33

whole lot I mean my blog is quite large and I'd like to continue to grow it I've

47:39

considered I did start a bread blog for a while but I can't keep up with it so I'm gonna pull all of the recipes over

47:46

to my regular blog and shut that one down it's just too much but um

47:52

so maybe at some point I'll start another blog but I don't think so

47:59

um I'm thinking about writing fiction next oh so nice so there's that

48:04

so what would you write what what kind of genre would you write um I would I would write probably

48:12

um fantasy fiction oh nice that's very cool now would you do it in the future or set in the past

48:19

or current times have you thought that far ahead like probably different well probably current times probably current

48:25

times and just to have something strange about it you know but oh yeah oh that's very cool I hope you do that's another

48:31

adventure for you yeah I always wanted to write a I always wanted to write a book so

48:37

that would be fun that's very cool now when you coach people do you do it as an

48:42

organized thing or you just kind of do it for people here and there or do you have like because some people have like you know organized courses or classes

48:49

where they coach people I used to have courses but and they were in um SEO but SEO changes so much and so

48:57

fast I found that taking SEO course is not the best way to learn it

49:04

um so I was coaching people by myself and then

49:09

um one of my first coaching clients who has become my accountability partner and very dear friend is now co-coaching with

49:17

me so we're both coaching we take a very limited number of people

49:24

and then yeah and and it's just basically helping them figure out where

49:29

their weaknesses are in their blog and where their strengths are how to play off their strengths and kind of

49:39

very cool now I didn't examine every spot of your your blog your website do

49:44

you have you have strictly all food or do you go into any other areas of family life or is it basically all recipes and

49:50

food it's mostly recipes and food there's a few posts on there about the

49:55

travel that we've done um oh okay these pictures and stuff but it's like it's very casual it's not like

50:02

a travel blog or even okay travel blog post it's just like this is where we went and you know just like you would

50:08

show your friends pictures because yeah like my readers on my blog I'm very close to a lot of them and um so there's

50:15

a very is very they're very special and I want to share things with them right and it's giving you more

50:22

information or giving them more information about you and kind of just like bonding and yeah just sharing and

50:27

showing more of who you are yeah that's really cool very cool

50:33

that's awesome so what's your recipe you're working on right now do you have a specific one

50:41

um right now I'm doing a lot of updates and reshooting old stuff so okay sure

50:49

um in the next couple of weeks we're gonna move towards Thanksgiving stuff

50:54

and um I'm looking to find the holes that that I've left like if you have a

51:02

Southern food blog there's certain things you should have on your blog you should have caller you should have grits you should have yeah so um I'm trying to

51:10

fill those holes so one of the next things that's going to go on there is I

51:15

want a 30 minute version of chicken and waffles so that's what I'm working on right now

51:23

that was so funny that that reminds me of something my son recently we were ordering food and there was chicken and

51:28

waffles and my entire family had never heard of chicken and waffles besides me and I'm like how have you guys not heard of this I guess that's because we're

51:34

from the north but I'm like maybe I've heard of it because I've you know been a food blogger I blog about food like

51:39

that's a thing and they're like that's a thing and I'm like yeah it is it's kind of funny that they didn't know

51:47

so I have to ask being a food blogger do you do Pinterest I do Pinterest I have always really

51:54

loved Pinterest and me too interest has always been really good to me so

52:00

yeah I I mean I don't think I do it as much as I did five years ago when Pinterest was at its height but right

52:08

but I still do it on a regular basis so you're mean when you're kind of focusing on these days is more YouTube

52:15

um or do you have other platforms you use frequently usually Pinterest and

52:21

Facebook is you know okay that's where I spend a lot of time when I'm not on my

52:27

blog YouTube definitely spend a lot of time there but like I said this year it's probably not

52:35

in the upper levels of where I'm at because of so much going on but I like

52:40

to I like to think of blogging as kind of a table with four legs or three legs

52:46

either way um like a three-legged milking school stool I prefer a four-legged table so I

52:53

like to have my I like to have the Google traffic I like to have Pinterest traffic I like to have Facebook traffic

52:59

and then I like to have some kind of um book or digital product or

53:08

um something YouTube something that's going to you know balance that out

53:14

because you can over the past year I lost

53:21

70 68 68 or 70 percent of my Facebook traffic

53:27

oh which was really significant and really down but most of my traffic it's

53:33

it was pretty evenly spaced between Google's my number one and then Pinterest is my number two or three

53:40

depending on where Facebook is and then Facebook comes in here like this so if

53:45

you lose 68 of one of those yeah that's that's a significant amount I mean it

53:54

is a significant amount it hits you financially but you're just losing the one because and you still have the rest

54:01

of them right so yes yes yes so that that's why that's my always my advice to

54:09

anybody if they are doing anything whether it's blogging or any kind of entrepreneur where they're responsible

54:15

for their own income they're not working for somebody else then they need to make sure that they

54:21

have several different streams of income coming from several different places so that if one gets kicked out from under

54:27

you you're not gonna suffer for it it'll be like oh dang I can't get that new

54:33

couch I wanted to get shoot but um but it's not going to keep you from being

54:39

able to feed your kids or anything like that absolutely and you know that's just the

54:44

thing too we don't own these platforms they can change their logarithms you know for me my biggest ones are

54:50

Pinterest and Google as well but my Facebook has been horrible for me but I I kind of quit working on it because it

54:57

became horrible and I'm like I just kept backing away because I'm like I'm doing effort here and there's nothing coming

55:02

back so why am I bothering right I usually suggest to people that they put

55:07

the most time in where their money is coming from um and you know kind of break it up that

55:14

way but I put a lot of time into Facebook only because I did really well on it before and

55:22

because I love a challenge and I want to figure out what happened and how I can fix it yeah yeah

55:30

I totally get it so do you do you dream about recipes do

55:35

you wake up in the morning you're like oh I want to try this or how do you get your new Inspirations

55:40

um usually from the old cookbooks I'll be you know I read those old cookbooks a lot and I'll see something uh well

55:48

there was one I did I don't think it's up on the blog yet but it's called Dixie

55:54

Chicken and I was like well so I wanted to see if it was anywhere else on the

56:00

internet and so I looked all over the place and there is a recipe called that but it's not the recipe that I've got

56:07

and this was from like a 1940s cookbook and I was like that's interesting so

56:13

um so I've made that and I adapted it from what it was and made it a slow

56:19

cooker recipe it should be out in the next well I'll probably do it in August because it's more of a back to school recipe but

56:25

um but it's it's really creamy comfort food and it's really easy and um and so

56:31

I get a lot of that where you know the older recipes one of the

56:37

recipes I did from one of the old cookbooks and this was a 1930s cookbook

56:43

was chicken pot pie with mashed sweet potatoes on top instead of

56:48

oh and that was very it's really good and it's really different

56:54

um yeah so that's usually where I get inspiration from I like that I like that you dive into

57:00

those old cookbooks and you know I've done some of that myself too it's really fun like you said you'll you see

57:06

different types of recipes different types of food combinations that are just different because they're from so long

57:11

ago yeah it seems like sometimes food blogs

57:16

especially when you get in the higher traffic ones that

57:22

sometimes it feels like everybody does the same thing and to a certain extent that's you know to a certain extent

57:30

you have to do that because those are the recipes that people are looking for and that's how you're going to make a

57:36

living and that's what we all want to do is make a living yeah but it and it's kind of like

57:41

um um I'm trying to think of store JCPenney and Sears Macy's in Bloomingdale's all

57:50

of them kind of have the same thing they present it in different ways so that's how I see it but it's still nice to go

57:57

into a boutique store once in a while and it's something that's nobody else has yes so as long as there's balance

58:05

it's not a problem right that makes a lot of sense to me well this has been so amazing is there

58:11

anything that we haven't talked about or that you'd like to mention before we end our chat I don't think so it's been

58:17

really fun though it was I really enjoyed getting to know you this was really fun thanks so much thank you for

58:24

coming on and I really enjoyed it and I'll put all of your links down in the podcast show notes so people can

58:29

find where you are and so thank you so much you have a good day

58:35

you too bye-bye bye-bye


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