The Foodstak Legacy Files

Q: Hello Rachel.  Can you briefly introduce yourself? A: Hello! My name is  Rachel Ciordas (Chore-Dash) and I create gluten free baking and cooking recipes and workshops and share them on  Next Level Gluten Free Newsletter . I’ve been a chef and cooking instructor for 15 years and have had many thousands of students.  I’ve taught cooking classes in cooking schools, hospitals, offices, grocery stores, small boutiques, health food co+ops and even in homes.   I’m based in Kansas City, basically in the middle of the middle of the U.S.  I LOVE to travel  and visit as many countries and exciting places as I possibly can.  As a family we travel in Europe quite a bit because my Husband is Romanian and we go to visit family and explore other countries on the way there or back.  I bring back so many ideas, techniques, and flavors and incorporate them in my recipes!  Q: How would you describe the layout of your kitchen, it...

This week, Sarah invited us into her kitchen in Hungary. Q - Hello Sarah. Can you please tell us a little about yourself, where you live and your substack publication? Portrait photo of Sarah Copeland. Image by Aubrie Pick. A -Hello, I’m a four-time cookbook author,  parent to two school-age kiddos, and nature enthusiast living in the Hudson Valley, New York. My substack is called  'Edible Living' , a name I’ve been using for nearly two decades to define how I think about a life with growing, cooking, and sharing food as a central theme of how we connect with ourselves, our families, and our larger world.  I write a lot about Central Europe, Hungarian foodways,  and our life straddling the US and Hungary, where my husband is from. I also dip into dinner strategy, nutrition (light), and world travel since travel is the spark that keeps me growing and learning in life and my work.  My books are  The Newlywed Cookbook,   Feast,   Every Day is Sa...

Q. Hello Sophia. Please tell us a little about yourself and your Substack publication,  Real Simple Food ? A. I was born in Essen, Germany  - a city that is far from a culinary hotspot - but have spent the past 25 years dividing my time between a small village in Austria, London, Rome and Brussels, Belgium, which is home for now. I have my parents to thank for not only being exceptional home cooks but also for exposing my siblings and I to an incredibly broad variety of different ingredients, flavours and culinary traditions from a young age. In part because I was born just after my parents returned from living in Morocco.  It was no doubt my childhood, nourished by a world of different flavours, that planted the seed for my passion for all things food and the wish to share my own recipes. At first through a food blog, followed by freelance recipe development and food writing assignments, a series of supper clubs and pop-up events, and now my newsletter ...

Hello, Leslie. Can you please tell us a little about yourself, where you live and your substack publication? Image credit Manny Rodriguez A: I’m a former journalist living in Dallas, Texas,  juggling what has come to be known as a “portfolio career.” I’m a digital publisher, having founded my international cooking website,  Cooks Without Borders , in 2016, and its companion  Substack newsletter  in 2023. My newsletter won a People’s Voice Webby Award earlier this year (in April 2024), just a year after it was launched. Born and raised in Los Angeles,  I went to college in northern California, lived in New York for 15 years as a young adult, then in 2001 returned to my home town, as a contributing editor for  Travel + Leisure , and then as Food Editor at the  L.A. Times . In 2009, my husband, son and I moved to Dallas, where I became restaurant critic and dining editor for the  Dallas Morning News . During my New York years, I went to ...

Q: Hello, Emma. Can you please tell us a little about yourself and your Substack publication? A:  I’m honored to be here! I’m a mother,  cookbook author , and culinary teacher empowering home cooks to make simple, delicious, seasonal meals that they can be proud of.  As a first-generation American, raised by an Italian mother in a multicultural family, food was woven into the fabric of my upbringing.  From an early age, I shadowed my mother in the garden and the kitchen.  Despite a long career in food, as an exhausted and overwhelmed mother of two, I  was not  prepared for the daily struggle of feeding my family. Eventually, I developed techniques and tools for nourishing my family - and myself - while emphasizing joy, connection, and healthy relationships around food.  My experience overcoming this challenge is what sparked  Time For Dins .  Caregivers are faced with enormous pressure to nourish their families w...

Q: Hello Devan. Can you please tell us a little about yourself, where you live and your Substack publication? Image by Luke Johnson A: Hi there! Yeah, my name is Devan Grimsrud.  I was born and raised in the suburbs of Minneapolis, Minnesota and now live in Berlin, Germany, in a little neighborhood in the northwest of the city called Wedding. I’ve been publishing my weekly Substack newsletter since January 2023. It’s called  darn good  as an homage to my Midwestern upbringing and, coincidentally, my initials. It’s a newsletter for people who love to eat and can't wait to cook. I would describe the recipes as playful and fun, with a focus on being “highly cookable” (a favorite tagline of mine from Alison Roman’s debut cookbook,  Dining In ) and delicious, of course. Q: Can you please describe the layout of your kitchen? How much of a role does it play with your family and when writing for ‘darn good’? Image by Luke Johnson A: I have a ...