Platforms exist in many ways, but we mostly hear about Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook that offer short bursts of content. But what about the newsletter? Can a newsletter become a long-form platform for cookbook authors? Welcome to Everything Cookbooks, the podcast for writers, readers, and cooks. I'm Molly Stevens, and today I'm here with Andrew Nguyen. Hey, Molly. Hi. So, newsletters. I know, right? I mean, who thought that Instagram and TikTok, Facebook, X, Twitter, whatever? You know, you have a certain attention deficit syndrome that you deal with when you're on those particular platforms. Especially TikTok, you just like that scrolls. Yeah, and it's a waterfall of content that hits you, right? Right. But here, newsletters. Right. Substack. Substack. I've been on Substack for a couple of years now with my newsletter, Pastafish Sauce, and I don't know, sometimes I think like, did I get into it a little later than I needed to? I don't know, because there are so many people who have like incredible newsletter readerships, but I don't know, you know, I think that I need to learn more. I mean, I know when we started this podcast, I may not have even really known what Substack, for those, I mean, I'm pretty sure everybody knows what Substack is, but some people are like, what? We talk about it a lot, because Substack is a platform, right? Correct. It's a vehicle to publish newsletters and have paid subscribers. You can have free subscribers and paid subscribers, but to build a community around your newsletter, they're going into people's email boxes, so you're also getting their email addresses. Correct. And once you're with Substack, you can start out free and then go paid. If you want to, they kind of coach you along the process. I don't have a Substack newsletter, but one of the things as a Substack reader that I love and I find so smart is that I get these, I don't know if they're weekly or biweekly or, but recommendations from Substack based on what I've read before. And I sing nine times out of 10, maybe 10 out of 10, I find something in those recommendations that I wouldn't have found on my own and that I really enjoy reading. And it's a diverse, it's not all food, because I read about other things too. And I think that that building of, it's smarter in a way. Yeah, but, you know, I'm curious is like, okay, so it's great to put out content out there, you know, for free, but like, what do you do with something like Substack and how much time do you want to put into it and what kind of strategy should you develop to make something like Substack help your career and build your livelihood? I want to know about that. Yeah, can you make money? Well, today's guest, Caroline Chambers is known as Substack's number one food and drink writer. I've heard her described as the queen of Substack cooking. Her newsletter is called What to Cook When You Don't Feel Like Cooking. And she's come up with a cookbook by the same name that hit the New York Times bestseller list like right out of the gate. So, we're going to get Caroline on and talk about her journey. Awesome. Well, Caroline, welcome to Everything Cookbooks. Guys, I'm so happy to be here. Thank you for having me. What a great podcast, a podcast about cookbooks. We're thrilled you're here, and congratulations on your new book. Thank you so much. It's a whirlwind. You guys know, it's been up for three weeks. I'm tired, man. This is, oh, it's exhausting to be getting a book out into the world, but it's like the most exciting, fun thing. So, thank you. I think we're going to go back and start a little bit. One of the things you're known for, you're often called the queen of Substack. Oh, gosh. And I know a lot of our listeners are, Elle, Andrea has a Substack and a lot of our listeners are either have them or starting them. And so when, why, how did you start a Substack newsletter? I think I talked about this on Substack has like a newsletter called Substack Reads where writers curate their favorite Substacks. And I wrote one recently in that. I talked about how I've never been like an early adopter of any sort of technology, like TikTok still completely. I can't do it. It took me years and years to finally realize that I should really start working on growing my Instagram presence. I had AOL until like, you know, it was really uncool. Substack came to me during the pandemic. I'm one of those food creators who had my debut during the pandemic when we were all stuck at our houses looking for something to cook. I was a caterer and then recipe developer at a test kitchen in San Francisco, then freelance recipe developer. So I was freelance recipe developing when the pandemic started and all of a sudden all of my jobs went away. All of my clients were like advertising ghee. How do we market food during a pandemic when nobody can get ingredients and you know, there's, we're trying to sell a sheet pan chicken recipe to sell our wine, but there's no chicken on the shelves. Like there's no broccoli on the shelf, you know, it was like this whole, so all my clients literally canceled everything. And I was like, okay, I finally have the bandwidth to start just doing ish for free. I had always been like, oh, I'm a freelance recipe developer, like, I don't have time to share free recipes on the internet. Like I have a real job, you know, and I had the total wrong attitude. And I didn't have the timer bandwidth to put out this free content into the world to try to grow my audience. And you had two little babies, too. I was really pregnant and I had a toddler and it was a pandemic. And my husband's also an entrepreneur. I know, it's like gives me the willies to think about, but I ended up having a lot of fun because I just started cranking out free content on the internet. It was I had all day every day and, you know, no friends, nothing to do. And what platform? Instagram. I should have also gone on TikTok and like cranked there. And I just was like, I got to focus my energy here. I don't know how to do it all. I got to focus my energy. And I will say I'm trying now to have like a bit more of a TikTok presence. I think the connections and the community building is much stronger on Instagram. TikTok is like such a random like flurry of stuff comes at you in your feed. And Instagram is really like the people who you chose to follow, especially four or five years ago, especially four or five years ago. That's a very good point. But I really still think today, too, but especially four or five years ago. So I did that. And then people kept asking me, I have like a bunch of supportive women who would follow me. And they'd be like, how can we pay you for this work? Like you're planning all because I was just, I mean, I'm telling you, I was cranking the recipes and I was providing a note and a substitution for every single ingredient, because again, COVID days, I have a chicken recipe and 50 people would say, I can't find chicken. So I'd end up writing a million DMs. So I finally just started writing a substitution for every single ingredient. If you can only find pork tinder in here, so to use that steak, here's that shrimp, here's that. So you were putting recipes in the caption in the caption. And then I started because I started doing all these substitutions, I started using my website, carolinechambers.com. I'd never been like a food blogger, but I started posting recipes there. And it were like people were going. So I was like, okay, there's something to this. People will leave Instagram if they know, because Instagram writing a recipe in the caption, it sucks, sucks to follow. You can't screenshot the whole thing in once. You can't copy paste it. So I was like, okay, people, there's a willingness to leave Instagram and go find recipes elsewhere. How can I monetize this? Like, all right, I've been a freelance recipe developer forever, like getting paid for my work. Like, okay, how do I do this? I like remember it. Like, I mean, it was a big event in my life. I was listening to like a businessy podcast in the kitchen cooking dinner for my family one night. And the person said the most important thing that a business owner, a creator, an entrepreneur, anyone can do is build their email list. They were like, how, whatever it takes, whatever, however you have to bait and switch people, however, whatever, like you have to sell your soul to get people to grow your newsletter list, do it, because Instagram could blow up. TikTok could actually get banned one day. You know, Snapchat, they could all go away. You cannot depend on somebody else to make your money, like on another platform. Plus with an email list, you have direct access. You own it. Yes. And Instagram algorithm changes again, and nobody's seeing your content, your email list, it will show up in their inbox in chronological order every single time you send it. And I was like, whoa, like light bulbs went off. I was like, oh my gosh, that is really powerful. I was starting to like sell or do these like zoom cooking classes too. So I did have a product I was trying to sell, make sure everyone saw it. Had you come up with what to cook when you don't feel like cooking, had you branded it at this point? Yes. So in 2019, I had had my first son, the way I cooked changed so much. Like all of a sudden I had this kid, I wasn't having the joy of cooking as much at the end of the day. Like it used to be my release. I always wanted to cook like a big meal. I had this little kid and I was exhausted and I no longer felt like cooking all the time. And so I came up with this concept in 2019, pitched it to everyone. And everyone said no, because I didn't have an audience for a book. Yeah, as a book, as a book. I pitched it as a book in 2019 and every single publisher. And I mean, every single publisher said we love the concept, but you don't have an audience to sell it to. And at the time I was like, F this publishing, I hate this world. And now I get it. I'm like, yeah, that was not the right time to write that book. If I had written it in 2019, it wouldn't be this book. I also like, I didn't even know the half of not feeling like cooking that I had one son. Now I have three sons under age five, like I do not feel like cooking. So I'm a much better person to be writing this book now. So yes, that is the backstory. I had that in 2019. And then I hear this podcast, grow your email list. It's the most important asset you can have. I don't know, I did some research found out about Substack and I launched there. And in 2020, I launched December 2020, Substack was a much different place than it is now. Andre, you're there. You know, it's like really robust, tons of tools, tons of support. There's like an internal Twitter, basically, it's like its own social network now. You can really like work with other authors, share posts, lots of like inner writer flirtation can happen back then. You were like on your own. It was just MailChimp, but you could put a paywall on it. Like that was the only difference. It was just good old fashioned writing and email, but you could add a paywall. And I was so nervous to do this. I was like, Oh my gosh, people, there's so many recipes on the internet. Like, who's going to want to pay me to send them another recipe? But I had grown this like loyalty in this, I don't know of this camaraderie with my audience of like, I've got you. These are going to be really easy. They're going to be really fast. I'm going to give you a substitution for every single ingredient. And so I launched, I probably had 10,000 Instagram followers at this time, and I launched in December 2020. And like overnight, I got 500 paid subscribers. And I thought like, Oh, this is going to be like a, this is going to be like a fun side hustle. Once my freelance and my freelance, despite December, my freelance work was coming back. People are starting to, you know, need recipe developers again, brands are starting to need recipe developers again. It's coming back slowly, surely. So I was like, Oh, this will be a great side hustle. We want dependable income, you know, like we need, give me some freaking dependable income that I don't have to like, whore myself out for. And so I was like, Oh, this will be that. And overnight, 500 paid subscribers. And I was like, Oh, this is a viable business. Like I could do this. This could be what I put all the eggs in this basket and go. And so I, that's what I did. I really like put everything in it, hired an editor, hired a food photographer, like really went for it and made it basically a cookbook, but a cookbook that you receive one recipe a week. And that is the origin story. And 2020 was a different time, you know, I mean, and into 2021, people were really wanting that connection, that intimacy. Yeah. And you offer that in the newsletter. First of all, like, how did you decide to use an editor and, you know, really like build a team? Because, you know, like at 10,000, you know, and with some subscribers, I mean, that's not it's a sizable number, but it's not huge. Totally. And you're not making enough money to justify all the expenses. Exactly. Yeah, that's an investment. You know, I actually, I said I hired an editor right away. It took me a couple of months because the first thing that we do as freelancers is like, I mean, I was like hoarding this new source of income, like a dragon, like protecting their gold. So I didn't want to spend any money at first. I was like, Oh my God, this is the best job ever. Like I've created a job where there's no overhead, like I'm brilliant. And it was really growing at a nice clip, my subscriber base. I realized that this is exactly the same as a cookbook, like we would never just publish a cookbook without having it edited. And the same thing was happening, then amount of people cooking my recipes weekly. If I was missing the baking powder, if I was missing the step where you flip the chicken, whatever, that really F's up a person's day. They've spent all the money on the ingredients. They've spent 30 minutes cooking it and bam, it something happens that either just makes them like feel insecure and like, is this working or really screws up the recipe? The like whole what to cook when you don't feel like cooking ethos is like, I never went enough to like Google something or like ask a friend, like, how do you see her? What does she mean when she says chiffonade? So I never use words that make a novice cook feel like a dodo. I write it as if I'm standing in the kitchen with you, we're drinking a glass of wine and we're cooking together. And I'm your friend who's a better cook than you. And I'm explaining to you how to do it. So I very quickly realized I had to have an editor the night before it sent out. I was staying up until like three in the morning, like until my eyes bled, editing and editing and re-editing because I was a nervous wreck that there was going to be a goof up. So I finally hired an editor and then the food photographer came a little bit later also when I realized that I was flooded. I had two small kids, they were both still home. I couldn't do it all and that was when I basically started hiring babysitters to help me with my kids as you do. And I realized like actually I don't want to have a babysitter watch my kids while I shoot this food. I hate shooting this food. I like hanging out with my kids. So I flip-flopped. Instead of hiring more child care, I started outsourcing parts of my job and that was like a huge unlock for me as a young mom. I had always just been like, oh hire another babysitter if you need time to work. And I started outsourcing the parts of my job that I don't enjoy like food styling and food photography. Oh my gosh, I like, like hate, no thank you. Styling a table for dinner for my friends. Yes, styling a burger to shoot to take a photo of on my like crappy iPhone. Like, no, that gives me heart palpitations. Interesting. I do. I mean it's a big like you got to spend money to make money thing. The newsletter is so much more high quality because it has an editor. So much more high quality because it has these beautiful photos from an actual food stylist and food photographer. And thus people forward it to their friends and then their friends actually join. And are they being shot in studio or are they being shot in your kitchen? So I still shoot some of them. Like if I'm today, I will shoot the recipe after we get off the phone because it's Friday and the newsletter goes out on Saturday. And I didn't have it ready for my food photographer by Wednesday, which is our cadence. She needs them by Wednesday to get them ready for a Saturday newsletter. My food photographer actually shoots them in North Carolina. She shot my wedding actually. And now she's moved into lifestyle. And during COVID, she started cooking all my recipes and she would take these gorgeous actual pictures of them because she was homeboarded to. I was like, wait, Anna, are you doing this now? So she now shoots this stuff for me. How do you know like what the demographics are of your readership, Carolyn? Because you're so smart in terms of cultivating an audience that really is a reflection of your life. You know, I've got the business like the where are they? Are they male or female, the age bracket? And then in terms of knowing like, what do they like? What do they want to see? I think when I first started trying to grow community, like on Instagram with the sub stack, I was trying to be whoever they wanted me to be. And I'd be like, you want $20 sweaters? Like, okay, here, I'll go to Old Navy. And that's not how I shop. I shop more in like the $70 sweater. I mean, this is such a niche example, but I'm wearing this sweater. So I started trying to meet them wherever they were. And then I just became unabashedly who I am. When I first started trying to grow, I was trying to make my entire Instagram presence all about food. I was like, I have to niche down. That's what everybody says in business. Like, niche down, show them, you know, only 30 minute recipes. Like, that's it. To film those recipes and to do those stories, those Instagram stories, I was like only working during Madison at my oldest son's nap. I was like, cranking out like all these videos and then he would like wake up and he would cry and I'd be like, Oh, great. The videos ruined. And I very quickly realized and COVID forced me to do this because he was stuck at home with me. I had no child care. I very quickly realized people do not mind the mess and the chaos. Or if they do, they will leave and in their place will come five more people who are just like me, young moms, trying to get it done. Their son stubs their toe and it doesn't have to ruin the video. It can just be, Hey, this is a part of life. So that was when I actually started to see real growth and real like loyalty was when I started to show this is where we are. This is the mess. This is the chaos. When I started to really share who I am and like where I am in my life as a mother and an entrepreneur, that was when the growth really started as opposed to just here's a perfect recipe. Here's a perfect recipe. Here's a perfect video. So I think my demographic, my audience has become this group of people who I have a lot of young moms follow me and then a lot of like teenage moms follow me because I think they're like, Oh, I miss those days. You mean moms of teenagers? Yes. And then a lot of a huge bracket of my demographic that I can see in my sub stack and my Instagram analytics is 55 to 70 year old women. And I think they are really enjoying like they're out there out of this phase. They're empty nesters, whatever that they've been there they can relate. And that's some of my people who I like really DM with all the time. And they've all like come to see me on my book tour now. So that's been really cool. Well, it's interesting because I feel like being a woman who's sort of in that demographic, there is this time where you you don't want to cook again. Yes. Like, it's this weird thing. It comes around. It's like, I've been cooking my entire life. I am tired of cooking, but I'm done listening to you talk about your voice and in that time that I've sort of become aware of you and be following you, I just feel like your voice gets stronger and clearer in a way of that confessional kitchen coach, girlfriend, little sassy, a little messy. And just hearing you talk about being deliberate behind it. And so it's that moment where you recognize being your authentic self, but then even taking it a step further. Like, I don't want to say you make a caricature of it, but you you amplify that part of your voice, because yeah, reading a little around sub stack. And I think some of the advice they give readers the key to growth is writing and promoting your work regularly, which we talked a little bit about and consistently. So, meshing down is one way to be consistent. But the other is to just have this voice that is consistent. Yeah, you never miss a week. You never know if it's Saturday, it's in your box. Yes. But it's multiple times a week though. When I started it was Sundays and then lots of feedback I got was that people wanted it on Saturday. So we've switched to Saturdays. I've never missed a single Saturday. I get asked a lot on podcasts and in these sub stack reader rooms that we were talking about before we started recording, if you had one piece of advice, what is it? And my number one thing is consistency. I think if you're asking somebody to pay you for a product, that's like going to Walmart and saying, I'd like a toothbrush and they say, maybe, but pay for it. I think I don't, I get it, we're human and we're flawed and our readers understand that. I know that if I miss a Saturday, my readers will forgive me. But they're paying, when I started, I was $35 a year. I'm now $50 a year. They're paying a dollar a recipe basically. So for me to just not give them one is stealing a dollar from 21,000 people. I think that's really strange. So I am militant about, it goes out every single Saturday at, I think it's 530 AM PST. So the people have it in their inbox is ready to go shopping to make their weekly meal plans. Yeah, I think consistency is key to growth. And you were able to keep that up during book production as well? Yes. That's like, you work with Molly. Not, not our Molly, but a different Molly. Yes, I have an editor, Molly, who really keeps me on track, but she doesn't, she, she helps me write. So that's incredible. So if I need to, all I have to do is the recipe. At this point, she knows my voice and my recipe writing style completely. She's been with me for three years. So all I have to do is really give her like all the ingredients and then like really crappy, written directions and she can whip the whole thing up. She can write all the headnotes, all the notes, all the substitutions, all in my voice. She's incredible. But during cookbook production, like the recipe testing phase, it was so hard to keep these recipes really top-notch and interesting because every single time I had a banger, like a really amazing recipe, I was like, this should go in the cookbook. Oh no, this should go in the cookbook. Because you're not double dipping. These are separate. There's 10 recipes that my community voted on that are like the top, top, top cult favorite what to cook sub-stack recipes are in the book. That's interesting. So you worked with your community, said I'm working on this book. Let's vote together on the 10. In the like new private chat feature on sub-stack, we like did a poll, talked about it a lot. It's funny. My editor, Amanda Englander at Union Square, who I adore, it got kind of like leaked that I was writing. Leaked sounds like I'm very important. There was a thing about how I'm writing a cookbook. So she was like, I think you should share it so your audience doesn't like Google Caroline Chambers looking for a recipe and see that you have a cookbook coming out. You know, a lot of people these days, it's kind of like the thing to wait until pre-order is available to even announce you have a cookbook. Have you guys noticed that? No, I let people know because otherwise I'm going to disappear. Yes! Exactly! Yeah. Gotta go! See you in the years. Interesting. But it's definitely a thing. Like, I mean, yeah, I could list a lot of people who wait until pre-order is available to ever announce that there's even a cookbook in the works. Wow. And I'm like you. I'm on my Instagram stories all day, every day. People know, I'm like, I'm at the pool, like people know. So if I'm writing an entire freaking book and they don't know, like that's a thing. But yeah, my editor was like, all right, announce it and then like kind of don't talk about it anymore. And I was like, that doesn't really work for me. Like, these are like my, the, my readers are the reasons. These are your first buyers of this book. There's a reason this book exists. There's a reason I have any success to have a cookbook deal. So I wanted them at least in that part, the picking of the recipes to be my girls. And so I could be like, you picked this, like Hello Green Pastas in this book because you guys said so. So it's some of the ones that are like the most clicked on data wise on sub stack, like these are my top recipes. But then there's some that were like these cult favorites that I never would have known, like the harissa roasted vegetables with whipped feta. I knew it was popular, but I didn't know it was like had this fervor behind it. And that's because it only has the fervor with like, you know, 500 people, not all 20,000. And so like those kind of recipes got in the book too, when I pulled people. And so that's cool. And those, and they've been like some of the most popular recipes in the book so far, and the ones that I'm seeing people cooking a lot. So you had a very short turnaround time for this cookbook, right? I mean, I remember when you announced and you're like, yes, and I'm going to get this done in what I was like 12 months or some bizarre thing. And I was like six months. She does not sleep. Guys, I didn't know until a few weeks ago, I was at dinner with a bunch of cookbook writer friends in New York. And I didn't know that a lot of people hire ghost writers to help them write their books. And it's not, it's just like a buddy, kind of like a kitchen buddy to like, like you write the bones and they test it. I didn't even know that. I'm like, oh my god, if I ever write a cookbook again, I need a buddy to like hold my hand and do this with me. Because yeah, there's, there's too many kids. I just, I basically just didn't sleep for six months and got it done. Well, I think that that applies to a lot of chef books, but a lot of like home cooks, like you, me and Molly, we're doing it on our own. These were all home cooks. Really? So you do it entirely on your own? Yeah. Yes. It's me waking up in the middle of the night going, oh my god, do they really know what I mean, you know, or how to get a particular ingredient? Yes. I mean, right now, a number of us on the podcast collaborate on cookbooks and I'm working on a cookbook with a chef friend of mine. And will your name like be in it or you a ghost? No, we're partners and people know that, but I'm not ghost in it. And I, you know, I could ghost stuff in the future. But a lot of people, particularly chefs will, you know, have someone do it for them, but regular. I wonder if this is the new world where these, this, this particular crew that I was with, they're all creators. So they all have like anywhere from 500,000 to 2 million followers. So they're cranking like the chefs need help because they're at a restaurant all day. They can't write a cookbook. They're at a restaurant all day. These people perhaps need to help because they're creating content all day. And if they were to have to stop doing that to write a cookbook by themselves, they would lose their audience. And thus, they wouldn't be able to sell the book. That is true. There are social media phenoms like on TikTok and whatnot. And they're told to like, oh, you got to get this manuscript in in like 10 months. And so they hire somebody. So you're absolutely correct in that. Something care about what you're talking about this really interesting is so with your sub stack, and I was curious about your inspiration, like how you stay inspired. But the recipes kind of go with the seasons. They go with your own life rhythms. They can fit formats or not fit formats. You sort of whatever you're in the mood for type thing is what's going to be up on sub stack. But when you're creating a book, especially this book, you know, what to cook, we don't feel like cooking and you're making this promise that these are going to be complete meals, one dish. That's a very prescriptive recipe. So to be doing both things at once, I could see why having a buddy to keep one or the other going. And we get a question, we get this question often on the podcast, people who have a pretty consistent social media presence, who are working on a book, asking, is it okay if I just drop off, you know, Instagram for six months, and it's not. That's pretty tough to do. So it's an interesting dilemma. Yeah, like it's really, and I would say with this book, I wrote this book from January to July, so I had seven months. And I would say trying to keep up with the newsletter and the book, my social presence, my sharing free recipes, tips, whatever it was on Instagram, really suffered. And that's not good for the book, you know, to not be continuing to build your audience who will be your book buyers. Like, that's not good for your book. So I don't know if I write another book, it'll definitely be something I have ghost written books and had like, you know, no author credit anything because they're for celebrities, which is so weird. Like nobody thinks that a celebrity wrote it by themselves. Like, why? Anyway, I've done that before. And yeah, I don't know, I could see myself perhaps bringing someone else, but it is weird. It's also hard because you're like, this is my voice. This is my type of food. Like you said, the sub tech does go so much with my rhythms of my life. And it's like, because Mattis, you know, my five year old had soccer practice, we ate sandwiches. And I realized what a great dinner recipe it is. Like, that's how the sub tech goes. Like, that's the voice. And that's literally how it comes about. So yeah, it's weird to think, you know, Tony and Idaho is like, oh, this is a great recipe. I'm like, why? It has nothing to do with my life. Right. So you come from the South, the Carolinas, right? So how does that inform your cooking? Now that you're living in California, lived in California for a fair amount of your adult life? Because Molly and I both do stuff with the Southern Foodways Alliance. Oh, cool. They're bored. And so I have this very interesting notion about how Southern food impacts our country in the world. But you're kind of like living that. Yeah, totally. And I see aspects of that in your recipe writing. When I had my catering business down in San Diego, I called my style of cooking Southern Californian, like not Southern Californian, but Southern Californian. Because what I do is so and like, you know, the entire country's food is so heavily influenced by the South. And I feel that's so much in my cooking. And you see it all the time in little ways, like grits are something that come up a lot in the newsletter, in the book, certain vegetables, certain seasonings. I use a ton of, I love Cajun seasoning as like a shortcut. And that's because I have a ton of Louisiana family. Yeah, I feel like it's in everything that I do. My mom is a great cook. And she's how I learned to cook. She was a working mom. She had three kids worked full time. And so she really is like how I got really good at cooking quickly, flavor, flee, you know, not dirtying up a ton of dishes. Because she's like the ultimate, the OG didn't ever feel like cooking like she'd get home from a full day. Her kids would be screaming. She'd have to like do their homework. And she's like, ah, to cook you guys dinner. And she is really southern. She's from Tennessee grew up on like the most southern of southern biscuits and gravies and all the things she's type one diabetic. She didn't develop diabetes until she was 28. So she had to really rethink the way that she cooked and ate. I grew up with these sort of like healthier southern dishes because of that. And I say healthier, just meaning like lower carb, lower sugar, because that's what a diabetic needs. And so I think that has really stuck with me in my cooking too, like realizing actually you can have that southern delicious not particularly nutritious thing and make it more nutritious, make it a lighter thing. So yeah, I feel like southern, I mean, I just love southern cooking so much. I wish I got back there more often. So you talk about like your influences, the southern influences and being in California and working at such a pace. Where are you getting your inspiration? I read a ton of cookbooks. That is a big reason. I don't really know when I became a person who like got on a cookbook send out list, but you guys, I'm sure get them all because you've got this great podcast. I get all the cookbooks. It's so great. So I get all the cookbooks. I read them, you know, cover to cover. They're my bedside reading, but I'm in California. And I would say sometimes the incredible access to fresh produce and farmers markets, sometimes it does me a disservice because I'm not writing for other people in Northern California. I'm writing for the whole country. I'm writing for actually the whole world. I have a huge like Australia, London. And so sometimes I will like sort of get in my head and like forget who I'm writing to. And this is when Molly does really help keep me on track. I'll be like, oh, you know, it's snap piece season and da da da da da da da da. And she's like, well, I've never heard of snap pieces. And I'm like, yeah. Just like, like nobody else talks about, you know, I'm like, oh, it's pluot season. You know, I know that that one's niche, but no, it's not. So I have to really write the newsletter, just like I did in those early pandemic days, really write it to be used, you know, by a multitude of people in a multitude of places. This week's recipe is like this sheet pan chili crisp salmon with snap peas. That's why it's on my brain. And I'm writing it to also I'm testing it even. And this happens sometimes when I'm when I'm using an ingredient that's seasonal, I test multiple other grocery store commodities, broccoli, florets, cauliflower, florets, you know, cubed, butternut squash, I'll test those as well to tell you exactly how to use them. So yeah, this week's is chili crisp salmon with snap peas. And I will write exactly how to use it with broccoli, florets and green beans and asparagus. I go to the farmers market every single Sunday with my two older sons. And that is a huge source of my inspiration. But I often don't even end up using what I find there. It's just that it triggers something else for me. It's just that it's from an inspiring place. You know, farmers market purveyors are so passionate about what they're selling, what they're doing. And so often it's just like talking to them, trying things and going, Oh, this baby cauliflower hybrid that's only available in Monterey right now is really delicious. But it would also be really great with that. Well, and this is where your your swaps and riffs and your signature flexibility that you build in. Yeah, I feel the swaps and riffs and substitutions are really like the core of the newsletter. And the reason why I think it's like, it's like a give a man a fish versus teach a man to fish thing. Like if you just tell them the recipe, anybody can follow it, you know, write a good recipe and anybody could follow it. But not anybody feels empowered to go, I don't have chicken, but I do have shrimp. I don't have rice, but I do have orzo. And writing those swaps really teaches people to use their pantry, use what they have. Like you do not have to go to the store to buy chili powder, use these two ingredients instead. And like you're going to get close. That's like probably my favorite thing about the newsletter is the swaps was I think it really teaches people how to cook and feel confident in their kitchen. You use this word right now that comes through really clearly in what you do, Carol, which is you said you teach. You know, there are people who just are like, well, I'm a cookbook writer or I write recipes. But I think that's different when you're looking to teach. Yeah, tell us a little bit more about how you organize and you label your recipe writing so that you instruct even down to the recipe length. Because I think that that's all really interesting in terms of how you tap into the needs of your let's call them students. Okay, your audience. We'll talk about the newsletter and then I'll talk about how I translated the newsletter, which has the ability to be 10 pages long. If I want it to be into a single page recipe. Just to clarify, the design of the book is every recipe fits on one page. Yes. And you knew that from the start. Well, yeah, I knew that that was the goal. And then once I wrote the book realized how close I was, that became the goal. So some recipes got slashed, some recipes got sections taken out. Yeah, but yeah, they each recipes fits on one page, which I feel very proud of because I think the home cook who doesn't feel like cooking, like, they can't flip a page. They can be bothered to do that because they're doing bicep curls with one hand. They're doing squat while the water boils for the pasta. You got to buy the book to know what we're talking about. That's right. That's right. They're listening to their audiobook, like they can't flip a page. We are referring to there's a section in the book called How To Make Yourself Cook If You Really Don't Feel Like Cooking. And then there's 19 tips on how to make yourself cook. Like do exercises during it. Call your mom, listen to a funny book. So in the newsletter, especially if I'm using an ingredient that maybe people aren't familiar with, fish sauce, harissa, whatever, I will do a special ingredient section and teach them about it and not only teach them about it, but also tell them five other places they could use it. So I don't want them enough to seek out a recipe to use it. I just want them to learn how to use it. So, you know, you've got fish sauce now, throw a dash into your next stir fry. I know you all make stir fries. Here's three links to stir fries that you could add it into, even though it's not an ingredient. Got harissa now. Anywhere that you use hot sauce typically, use a little dab of this. Stir it into yogurt or mayo to make a sauce. Add olive oil and lemon juice and make a chicken marinade with it. I will teach them many different ways to use it because I think as a home cook so frustrating to buy that new $5 to $10 ingredient and be like use one teaspoon of it and then it sits in your fridge and it rots. So I'm like don't let the new ingredient rot. Here's what it is. Here's how we use it. Here's five applications of it and then so after every single recipe is a massive notes section and then a massive substitutions section and the notes section is really my chance to teach and sometimes my notes pages are like absurdly long to the point where Molly's like your newsletter is now so like you got you got a trim the fat here because I'll do riffs. I'll say this is a recipe from the book grilled harissa chicken and zucchini with like a harissa sauce. Instead of that like try using teriyaki here and like you can use the same thing just use a terry, store about teriyaki sauce and said and all of a sudden you got teriyaki chicken and zucchini, serve it over rice. Can we use like Tabasco sauce here? Can we use Texas peat here instead? Like yes it's a little more vinegary so cut it with this and I'll give just like tons of riffs and swaps and substitutions there, leftovers. We talk about leftovers a ton. Like you do not just have to eat your leftovers in the same like don't just eat them called like chop up that zucchini, make a pasta with it, make kachio e pepe and add the zucchini like so delicious. I'll give them like so much knowledge of how to use these ingredients in their everyday life that otherwise with just a recipe you don't get that. And then substitutions section of course for the protein especially I'll say like if you're swapping in port dendollin cook it this way steak cook it this way shrimp cook it that way and I think that's if I just name like a single way that I've taught the most people I'd say it's with the protein swaps because people I love it every week so many people tag me in their recipes and it could look nothing like the recipe that I created because they've swapped so many things and then they tag me on Instagram you know and their caption is always like made a carol recipe made the you know what to cook recipe but like Cara's taught me how to swap everything so like I did this this and they love like sharing what they did to make it their own and I'm like bam you're a recipe developer like you did it you just created your own recipe like you don't need me anymore you got this and it makes them feel like so energized and patched because you guys know when you nail a really good recipe and it's something nobody else has done before you're like oh I did that like yes but if you just follow a recipe it feels really good still but you don't have the ownership of it so I think just these swaps these riffs give people ownership and thus they feel like really loyal to me and to my recipes and to support my book because it hasn't just given them a recipe it's given them like so much more knowledge than that and then okay so to translate the notes section of this newsletter into the book was probably the thing that my editor wanted to like kill me the most on when I first wrote the book I just had every single recipe and then like a massive list of notes and she was like what you want everything to be on one page and yet you gave me 20 things to talk about like we got to trim some fat here we also need like some organization to these so there are seven types of notes in the book and those are laid out in the front matter and it's like learn tip riff swap slow substitute slow yes slow that was that was interesting yes okay so from those chats with my subscribers I had this overwhelming flurry of can you please add slow cooker instructions if it's a slow cooker a bowl recipe and I was like what you guys I had no idea that was something you wanted because I'm never going to use a slow cooker as the main tool because not everyone has it right it's not a slow cooker book there's no special tools needed in these book in the book or the newsletter I was like you guys you never told me I didn't know that that was something you wanted if I'd known I would have started adding that to the newsletter and it was like once one person said it it was like overwhelming and this was I was pretty close to being finished with the book by the time I got this feedback and I like remember screenshotting it and sending it to my editor Amanda and being like oh my gosh and she was like well guess we're adding a slow section I was like yeah we have to so now every recipe that you know you sometimes you look at a recipe and you're like oh I could do that my slow cooker so now it actually tells you how to do it in your slow cooker and that's because I think I have so many busy people who are working or juggling multiple kids or one kid has soccer practice one has baseball practice you know and so the slow cooker just really makes it easy did you have to retest I had to test them all yeah oh god yeah I did have of course a recipe tester so she helped me do that alley slagel New York Times writer so wonderful she was my tester for the whole book and that was so nice to have a recipe tester who's also like a real recipe writer and cookbook author and developer because I'd be like alley I want this recipe it's in the 30 minutes chapter I wanted to fit into the 15 minute chapter like I'll pay you double you know I'd be like I'll pay you double for this one I need you to like totally figure out how to do that and so I had that ability so that was incredible yeah she's a perfect candidate she's a pro and she's so quick and she loves minimal ingredients she was the perfect person for the job yeah it's so interesting Carol listening to you because we often talk about how having guardrails and I think I mentioned this earlier in this conversation you know can really clarify a work but when you're developing recipes for this book and even for your sub stack but not so much because you have room for notes but for the book yeah these are recipes that have to be straightforward enough that they can be riffed on endlessly yeah totally it's definitely a very specific type of recipe right like we're not yeah you're not teaching you're not teaching we're not teaching foundational classic like from scratch yes methodology we are into like I'm gonna tell you to use a store bought pesto in those meatballs and like so your meatballs are gonna taste totally different than you know Sarah and Idaho's meatballs because you're using totally different pestos and that's okay I just did your curry meatballs out of the I did yeah and I didn't have red curry paste and so I was like I agree that'll work just like I've been given permission in there yes there is there's a lot of permission there's a lot of encouragement there's a lot of like with a sharp knife and a good attitude you can do anything type of thing yes I hear that word permission a lot people are like thank you for giving me the permission to swap I just wouldn't have thought to do it and that's what we were all just nodding our heads about but not being able to put into words like these recipes are they're simple and they're straightforward and they're not oh my gosh you did a recent cooking class and I was just looking at like the recap and I was like that's a good example of something that I cannot include that I would love to it was like what did you cook it's a riff on Vietnamese fried imperial rolls yes and it's like this totally new hack but it's so weird and out there and it's really cool it's really cool but it took like for friggin forever to explain on a page because it's so out there so that is a great example of something I cannot do I would say probably 50% of my readers actually really love to cook and then 50% really don't like to cook they don't want to think about it they never they don't own any other cookbooks like this is not their passion but 50% really like to cook and they just like my recipes for those simple nights but for the nights when they feel like cooking they want to cook your recipes and your recipes and like learn and try a new technique but this is not that and so I won't I won't write these books forever that are very little technique no special tools but right now the phase of life I'm in it's actually how I cook do I love being able to share like hey you don't have to just like roast chicken and broccoli and like that's it like with five extra minutes you can make that a really interesting meal by you know marinating it in this honey mustard sauce adding panko on top sprinkling Parmesan on your broccoli adding a little garlic like simple simple things that can make those basic recipes really shine interesting what you're saying about the the phase of life you're in and how you're cooking in your newsletter and your your book that just came out reflect that you also your podcast and part of your newsletter is the so into that and you branch into you talked about the seventy dollar sweater but you do some lifestyle and some makeup I'm just curious when you started to add that component to your messaging the reason that so into that came to life is that I realized that my on Instagram in my stories I'm not talking about food all day I'm talking about motherhood and seventy dollar sweaters and the sneakers I'm loving and going on hikes with my friends and how I work every day I'm becoming a better better friend better sister better daughter those are the type of things I really like light up and get to talk about and have like great DM conversations about so so into that it started as a podcast it still might be a podcast but right now it is on a very extended summer vacation because oh my gosh you guys podcasts are so much work you're heroes so it's on vacation right now but I kept the so into that umbrella brand whatever it is the podcast came out on Wednesdays and I would send out a newsletter as a part of it so I just kept the like idea of it alive via newsletter that is sent on Wednesdays and it's just all the things I'm into right now if I'm you know on vacation with my family I sent one that was like all the things that they were into my mom my dad my nephews I really like it some people who subscribe to the newsletter were like wait I just subscribed for the recipes like I don't need this and that's just like a part of growing as a brand I think like when a makeup company like all of a sudden lunches lipstick not everyone's gonna use the lipstick they're just good they only want you for the mascara you have to kind of be like oh that's a growing pain like I thought you'd really love it but ouch that kind of hurts but okay you know it's fine you don't have to read it and so I came up with a way for them to unsubscribe to that part and like moved on and it is really I think it's really helped grow my community because like I said like we're not just like living in a vacuum of where we only need recipes people I think follow me and like my recipes because they also trust who I am and that they're in the same life phases me or that they were in the same life phases me and so the lifestyle all just kind of like fits with it and it's just fun I have a lot of fun doing it you know after I wrote the book and was keeping up with the newsletter I was so burnt out I mean you guys know the end of writing a cookbook you're like oh my brain is done with food and that was about the time when I launched so into that I needed to think about something outside of food and like remember that like I'm an interesting person outside of just recipes and it's a way to keep content going and so we keep going going yeah you have affiliate links on on that too so that's like yeah it's a little income driver exactly yeah I have affiliate links in there and it also gives me an opportunity like I'll link this podcast in there maybe you're listening to this because you clicked on a so into that link I get to link like other places that I'm doing things brands that I love like I love sharing small female owned brands especially and like it's a great place to do that so yeah I'll do those like big Amazon affiliate links for like my boys new favorite tennis shoes and then I'll also get to share like Cafe Panna I shared in my last one you know that's cool we could talk to you for a long time I know I wish we were in the same room I know we could go all day and really appreciate you sharing so much with us and with our listeners but before we let you go car because we know you have something else to do today I'm sure like 60 no no no any advice for aspiring cookbook authors who want to grow their platform share who you are unabashedly share parts of your life that you think no one is interested in because there is an audience for every single person who loves food there's an audience for every single one of you if you are like a Dungeons & Dragons fan there is a community who will lean into your I think Dungeons & Dragons people call themselves nerdy into your nerdy style of cooking and the things that you love to talk about if you if you go on vacation every other week and like you get home and you want to have only 10 ingredients in your pantry like there are people just like you so lean into what you actually are and where you are in your life and then you'll be able to enjoy it and you'll be able to talk about it more and then consistency you got to come up with a rhythm and post every single Tuesday or whatever it is and grow that audience by showing up and consistently and being exactly who you are I think there's truly people I've gotten this question a lot lately because as you guys have noticed I'm sure a lot of food writers are turning to sub stack like there was a patreon movement of 2020 and then 2024 is the era of sub stack and so I've gotten a lot of writer friends cookbook author friends food people being like do you think there's still space for me I'm like yes I am positive that there is space for every single food writer to be on sub stack because like we were just talking about my recipes are so different from your recipes and from your recipes and we each have our own person who wants to follow that so show up show up people exactly who you are and the type of food that you cook for where you are in your life and there will be people who follow that momentum and like want to be a part of that most definitely and overlaps too that's the amazing thing yes I bet you and I have so many of the same followers exactly it's the Venn diagram yes yes and you'd think like somebody who follows what to cook when you don't feel like cooking recipes would never but like yeah they will yeah I'm there Tuesday you're there Saturday yeah yeah they've got that fish sauce they want to use it thank you so much for coming in thank you it's been a joy thank you guys thank you for listening to everything cookbooks for more episodes and ways to contact us go to our website everything cookbooks.com the show is available wherever you get your audio and if you like what you hear please do leave us a review it really helps people find the show any book mentioned in the show can be found on our affiliate page at bookshop.org thank you as always to our editor Abbey Circatella and until next time keep on writing reading and cooking
Molly and Andrea speak with Substack's number one food and drink writer, Caroline Chambers, about her experience building a successful following that led to the release of her new cookbook, What to Cook When You Don't Feel Like Cooking. Caroline shares how the pandemic spurred her shift from freelance recipe developer to newsletter writer in spite of past rejections of her cookbook proposal. She talks about her ethos, writing voice, building an audience, why she prioritizes instruction and how she balances realism and professionalism within the newsletter along with the most important piece of advice she has for aspiring platform builders.
