HAYDEN HASS
DELISHAAS: Favorite Recipes from My Midwestern Kitchen
Published Spring of 2024 from DK Penguin Random House
Hayden Hass, @Delishass, is a popular and inspiring Chef and Food Blogger whose mantra is “🏳️🌈 Let’s make the 🌎 a better place with food” and, he is doing just that.
Hayden was born and raised in North Dakota’s Red River Valley; a wonderfully fertile part of the world known for its farms and fields of sugar beets, potatoes, golden wheat, sunflowers, and corn. His love and appreciation of food and midwestern-inspired cooking has its roots in church picnics, church basements, and long, cold winters spent gathered around the fireplace. He is also inspired by his Mother and Grandmothers who instilled in him the power of food to bring people together and the importance of celebrating the simple things in life. Summers spent in Northern Wisconsin at his Grandma Geneva’s cabin on the lake and at his Grandma Mary’s small family-owned butcher shop and general store, created many core memories with his fun and loving family, friends and loved ones: often gathered around the kitchen table filled with wonderful food.
Hayden graduated with a degree in Architectural Drafting and Interior Design (and was voted the best smile and class clown!) but in 2020, he decided to focus on his love of cooking and his social media passion project, @Delishaas, on both TikTok and Instagram, by posting recipes for some of his favorite, midwestern inspired foods. This was at the start of the covid19 pandemic and Hayden wanted to make a difference in his community by volunteering his time and resources with bake sale fundraisers and partnering with his favorite local nonprofits to raise money to feed those affected in his community. @Delishaas has helped him accomplish that.
When not in the kitchen or at the grocery store, Hayden can be found out in the garden or camping out with his dog and kitchen assistant, Max.
JARED STEARNS
PURE: The Sexual Revolutions of Marilyn Chambers
Published spring of 2024 from Headpress.
Marilyn’s story is both timely and of its time. For Jared Stearns, Marilyn Chambers is the nexus of sexual presentation; media; performance; and, more importantly, a projection of sexual purity. What began as a passion project more than a decade ago has evolved into a deep desire to tell the story of an often maligned woman whose rightful place in pop culture history is almost always ignored.
Like many gay men, Jared is drawn to women who project strength and vulnerability, and feels a bond to a woman who so willingly and publicly explored her sexuality—and offered a sense of decadent freedom—in the face of relentless oppression from the patriarchy in a heteronormative society. As someone who was born in the twentieth century, but spent his entire adult life in the twenty-first century, Jared offers distinctive generational insight on a woman so closely identified with late twentieth-century culture. Through his decade-long research, Jared has gained access to many of the high profile people with whom Marilyn worked, as well as exclusive access to never-before-seen documents and photos.
Jared has worked in B2B marketing for more than fifteen years. Previously, he worked for The Boston Globe and his work has appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle, among other publications. His work has been featured in Cineaste, The Dark Side, and The San Franciscan. He is a member of the Biographers International Organization (BIO) and the Nonfiction Authors Association. Jared is currently the Director of Demand Generation at Future, a global multi-platform media company and serves on Future's Inclusiveness & Diversity and LGBTQ+ committees. He earned a Bachelor of Science degree in print journalism from Emerson College in 2004.
SARAH THRUSH
PRESERVATION WITH A PURPOSE: A Guide to Home Canning and Food Self-Sufficiency
Published! Spring of 2024 quarto.com
Sarah Thrush of the popular Sarah Plain & Tall @peeliesnpetals is a homesteading economist, teacher and naturalist whose mission it is to help others achieve a lifestyle of self-sufficiency through subsistence agriculture, home food preservation techniques, animal husbandry and naturalism. Sarah teaches millions of followers back to the basics lifestyles with a concentration in home canning & food preservation. Sarah teaches canning classes nationally and internationally from novice to experienced canners. Sarah lives on her 20 acre homestead in Michigan's Upper Peninsula with her husband & children. Sarah's goal is to feed the world and believes "food makes friends of us all."
ERIKA DIBBLE
Erika Dibble is the bold personality and creator behind the account @saratogagrazingco on social media. Erika creates artistic charcuterie spreads for her customers for events both big and small. Her business has grown in a large way, both through her customers, as well as her social media presence, with her account cresting 100K followers in 2022.
Erika’s passion for food started long before her instagram account and cheese board businesses were created. Erika grew up on Long Island–her father from Switzerland, and her mother from the Midwest. This combination of cultures sparked her love for both delicious and aesthetically pleasing food (especially cheese!). The main event at holidays and gatherings was always the food–the menu would be planned well in advance and all members of the family would participate in the creation of the meals.
Erika graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in Elementary Education from SUNY Oswego in 2007, and a Master’s degree in Curriculum and Instruction from The College of Saint Rose in 2014. After teaching elementary school for 10 years in Florida, Virginia, and Upstate NY, Erika decided to take a pause when she welcomed her first child with her husband, Justin. To fill the space that teaching had in her heart, Erika pursued a job in fitness instruction (with no experience) and was appointed the position of Lead Teacher at her local Pure Barre studio. During this transition from being a full time teacher to being a stay at home mom, Erika found her passion for recipe and food-spread creation, and Saratoga Grazing Co was formed in March of 2020.
Saratoga Grazing Co started as a creative outlet to share photos of the cheese and charcuterie boards she was making during quarantine, but exploded in popularity around May 2020. Soon, Erika was sharing tutorials with her now more than 100K followers.
Her personality is a major part of her work–this can be seen on her social media account, @saratogagrazingco. All of her grazing table set ups end with her signature “graze dance” that her followers have come to know and love (and her clients have come to expect and look forward to!!). Erika is not afraid to act silly–her aunt once said “Erika will do ANYTHING for a laugh!” This lightheartedness and passion for life translates directly into her recipes and board spreads.
Erika lives in Upstate New York with her husband and two children. When she is not creating in the kitchen, you can find her teaching classes at Pure Barre, spending time outdoors with her family (skiing and hiking!!), cooking with her mom and sisters, or reading a good book.
DR. RILEY KIRK
THE PRACTICAL SCIENCE OF WEED
To publish in the Spring of 2025 from DK Penguin Random House
Dr. Riley Kirk is a Cannabis research scientist and scientific communicator. With a Ph.D. in Pharmaceutical Sciences from the University of Rhode Island, specializing in natural product chemistry, she has studied and published literature in various realms of nature including cyanobacteria, plants, and fungi.
During her time as a graduate student, she started a very successful educational Cannabis social media page on TikTok under the name @cannabichem. The account has grown to over 420 K followers and over 3.7 million views since its launch in January of 2021. Her goal is to provide much needed, reputable scientific information about all aspects of Cannabis for free, and to present it in an intriguing and informative way. She also has a large and growing following on Instagram and has a successful podcast called SmokeN’Science that has been ranked in the top 10 natural resource podcasts in the United States. Dr. Kirk’s videos explain a multitude of subjects of the Cannabis plant: from the chemistry and pharmacology of Cannabis to how to take a tolerance break. In addition, she answers questions from her many followers who range from those who are completely new to Cannabis to seasoned Cannabis enthusiasts, entrepreneurs, and medical professionals.
Dr. Kirk offers both the perspective of a Cannabis researcher and as a Cannabis user and is a strong advocate for Cannabis education; she believes that education is harm reduction and everyone deserves to have access to this information. She is hopeful that her work will open doors for more Cannabis research and federal legalization.
Dr. Kirk lives in the mountains of New Hampshire and strives to live a sustainable lifestyle, she enjoys spending all her free time outdoors. Her favorite pastime is foraging for ingredients to make various medicinal teas and tinctures from the plants and fungi of her surroundings.
SNEJANA ANDREVA aka "THE MODERN NONNA"
Snejana Adreeva, aka The Modern Nonna, was born and raised in Sofia, Bulgaria and learned how to cook at the best culinary school in the world – her grandmother’s kitchen. Snejana also spent part of her childhood in Greece on the Island of Crete with her family and then moved to Toronto, Canada where she now lives with her Italian husband. Snejana has been cooking and experimenting with food for over a decade and each dish is a reflection of her life experiences and love of food and culture. The Modern Nonna’s recipes are loved by millions all over the world. Since beginning her work as The Modern Nonna in 2017, she has amassed a large and growing, loyal following of over 3 million followers collectively with many of her recipes going viral and reaching millions.
TASHIA HART
Tashia Hart is a citizen of the Red Lake Band of Chippewa Indians and resides in Duluth, MN near the shore of Gichigami. She is an author, culinary ethnobotanist, photographer, artist and cook. Her education in the field and in the kitchen began with a father who fishes, hunts, and harvests, a mom who cherishes plants, and a grandmother who was a career cook and baker.
Hart's love for the environment and a desire to write science-fiction led her to study biology at Bemidji State University and earn a BA in 2012. Soon after graduating, she worked with the Red Lake Traditional Foods Program where she worked in community gardens, developed surveys about food and health relationships, and located wild food plants. In 2016, she moved to Minneapolis where she became part of the Tatanka Truck team and culinary ethnobotanist for the Sioux Chef Catering company. Hart has led foraging expeditions and cooking workshops with youth and continues to develop recipes with a wild foods focus.
Her passion for culture, wild foods, the environment, and their intersection with consciousness has led her to create works in various mediums: books, essays, poetry, digital art, and photography. She is the illustrator of Gidjie and the Wolves, 3 children’s books in the Minnesota Native American Lives series, and was assistant illustrator for Gaa-pi-izhiwebak. Her short works include recipes, essays, poetry, and short stories for various programs and publications. As a visual artist, her illustrations and beadwork have been shown publicly in group exhibits.
Hart published her first book in 2015, titled Girl Unreserved, a genre-bending re-telling of her own coming of age tale. Other works include the middle grade illustrated book Gidjie and the Wolves, which won a Moonbeam Children's Book Awards Gold Medal in 2020. Gidjie was soon followed by The Good Berry Cookbook: Harvesting and Cooking Wild Rice and Other Wild Foods in 2021. Her most recently published work, Native Love Jams, was a finalist for the 2024 Minnesota Book Awards in the Genre Fiction category.
JEN ALLEN
A recent transplant to upstate New York, Jen Allen hails from Las Vegas where she graduated from UNLV with a Bachelor’s in Art and Illustration.
A lifelong artist, she spent her career as a graphic designer and freelance artist, but also loves to write stories and has self-published a few of her works (laying out the books and designing the covers, of course.)Though her strong suits are portraiture and illustration, she’s been known to do a lot of things in almost every medium. She just likes to create stuff. And her creations, whether in art or writing, are always infused with humor and a touch of whimsy.
Birds with Hats, her first coloring book, is a testament to that. Because what could be more whimsically funny than birds with their alliterative hats? Her latest art series, Easel Goer (a mash up of famous racehorses and classic art) is currently showing in the Wood Hill Gallery in Saratoga Springs, NY, and has been a popular storefront window display on Saratoga’s historic Broadway Street.
LUCINDA R. ZOE & MARINA U. McCULLOCH
Marina Ubaldi McCulloch began work at an alternative, community-based restaurant in the fall of 1973 and within a short time transitioned from the wait staff to the kitchen, and became one of the owners in 1974. Together with her partners, she oversaw the evolution of the first Whole Foods, farm-to-table restaurant from a simple two entrée food service establishment, to one that offered unique vegetarian and meat dishes and rotating specials, International and tribute nights, weekend brunches and a complete beer and wine service. She was highly supportive of the cultural arts—fine art, music and poetry—and recruited musicians to play for nighttime diners, artists to display their creative works on the restaurant walls, and poet-authors to mesmerize loyal customers with their words. She remained at the restaurant until 1987 when she sold her shares of the restaurant to a group of employees and their friends. They continued to guide the restaurant until it closed in 2021 after a 47 year run. Ms. McCulloch is a graduate of the University of Kentucky with two degrees, a Bachelor of Arts in Cultural Anthropology, 1972, and a Bachelor of Science in Physical Therapy, 1986. She enjoyed a professional career in orthopedic physical therapy that lasted 30 years. During that time, she guided her patients in the physical rehabilitation of sports and work-related injuries.
Lucinda Zoe is an Eastern Kentucky native who moved to NYC in 1989. She arrived at a small collective-run, community-based restaurant in the summer of 1977 and worked first as wait staff and then exclusively as a cook until 1987. While cooking at the restaurant she earned two degrees from the University of Kentucky, a Master’s in Library and Information Science (MLIS) as well as a B.A. in Philosophy. Before leaving Kentucky to accept a doctoral fellowship at Columbia University in New York, Zoe served as Assistant Director and Research Associate for the Center for Business and Economic Research in the College of Business and Economics at the University of Kentucky. She has written and produced several plays, both in Kentucky and New York, and recently completed a chapbook of poetry. She received her doctorate from Columbia in Library Science and Archival Management, studying oral history and public policy development and sustainability of community-based nonprofit organizations and special libraries. After a thirty-year career at the City University of New York as a professor at Hunter College while serving in numerous executive management and leadership positions, the last being Senior University Dean and Vice Provost of Academic Programs and Policy, she retired in 2022. She has returned to her first loves and great passions -- cooking, travel and writing.
Marina and Lucinda are working on a 1970s/80s social history monograph that documents the era and recovers seminal recipes from a community-based, whole foods collective restaurant that survived for 47 years. The origins and evolution of the restaurant provides the backdrop and lens through which they present an era of social change and community organizing that features an employee-empowered egalitarian workplace, a home for artistic expression and activism and innovations in farm-to-table food delivery and sustainability.
Dr. ELIZABETH COHEN
Dr. Cohen is a clinical psychologist and the owner and CEO of the psychotherapy group practice Center for CBT in NYC. The practice provides therapeutic treatment to over 200 children, adolescents and adult clients struggling with a variety of mental health issues.
She is also the author of, Light at The Other Side of Divorce: Discovering the New You which debuted at #1 on Amazon in popular psychology.
In addition, Dr. Cohen is the CEO and founder of the online divorce course Afterglow: The Light at the Other Side of Divorce. Her online course teaches women how to heal, grow and thrive after divorce no matter how difficult the process has been.
Dr. Cohen received her PhD in clinical psychology from Boston University. She was the recipient of the prestigious American Psychological Foundation Research Award for her research on the emotional effects of 9/11 on students enrolled in school near the Twin Towers. She has been featured on the Tamron Hall Show, the New York Times, New York Post, Wall Street Journal, NBC News, Women’s Health, Huff Post, Thrive Global, Daily Beast and Good Housekeeping and is a contributor to Psychology Today with her “Divorce Course” column.
Dr. Cohen’s Divorce Doctor podcast which shares people’s divorce stories hit 10,000 downloads in only 3 months.
Dr. Cohen is currently working on a new book about how parents can manage and cope when their children are struggling emotionally. She is hoping it will fill a much needed gap in how to apply mindful parenting to the challenges of letting kids become independent.
Dr. Cohen is a native New Yorker which is probably why her favorite meal is bagel, lox and cream cheese. She loves swimming and walking on the beach. During her free time, she always has a mystery book in her hands. As a super fast reader, she needs a lot by my bedside. She’s a sucker for mugs and tote bags with inspirational quotes – her closets are full of them!
MEAGAN LLOYD
Meagan Lloyd is a gardening enthusiast and educator based in North Carolina. She leads a vibrant and growing online community, under the account @meggrowsplants. With her journey of transforming her small suburban backyard into a garden oasis, she inspires others to reconnect with nature and to cultivate their own thriving gardens.
Although gardening wasn’t initially a part of her life, Meagan’s interest in agriculture blossomed during her high school years. Despite this, she went on to obtain a degree in Cellular and Molecular Biology, initially envisioning a career in medicine. However, she eventually realized that the fast-paced medical field wasn’t her true calling. Seeking solace from the challenges of daily life, she turned to gardening , gradually uncovering her true passion. Sharing her experiences on social media, she ignited a spark in others to embark on their own gardening journeys.
Meagans gardening philosophy centers around embracing the chaotic nature of gardening while advocating for practical, low-maintenance solutions. Her personal growth through gardening has given her valuable lessons in patience, resilience, and the intrinsic connection between humans and nature. Her garden has also taught her how to get creative in the kitchen, and how to make wonderful garden-to-table dishes with her bountiful harvests.
With a thriving social media presence, Meagan invites fellow gardening enthusiasts to join her on this adventure of growth, discovery, and sustainable living. Through her website and social media platforms, she shares tips, tutorials, and inspiration about “how to grow, preserve and cook your own food”, empowering others to cultivate their own green spaces and reconnect with the origins of food.
When she's not tending to her garden or engaging with her online community, Meagan enjoys spending time with her two mischievous cats and her lively flock of nine chickens, crocheting, and exploring the great outdoors through hiking and traveling. something interesting about your business here.
MADDIE GARTMAN
Maddie Gartmann of @Garty’s Goodies sees the world in cookies. As a cookie artist and royal icing educator, she believes everyone has the power to unlock their creative potential through this delicious medium. With over 1 million followers across TikTok and Instagram, she has built a community of cookie art admirers who agree.
Gartmann’s path to cookie decorating fame was unexpected, as it began in 2018 when she left her job as a high school English teacher in order to stay at home with her newborn son. Needing to make ends meet, she began selling the ornately decorated cookies she had previously been creating as a hobby. Her business quickly gained traction amongst the Twin Cities, Minnesota metro, and flourished when she added cookie decorating classes to her repertoire—combining her love for cookie art with her skills as an educator.
During her maternity leave with her second child in 2021, and feeling the urge to be creative, Maddie began posting cookie decorating videos to TikTok with her Garty Goodies account. The account quickly grew to over 900,000 followers, as people were captivated not only by the mesmerizing royal icing but by her unique and entertaining storytelling. Today she continues to capture the attention of audiences young and old through social media and in-person classes, offering royal icing tips and tricks and sharing her original and creative designs.
She hopes her creativity inspires all ages to view the world from a creative, and sweet, lens.
KRISTIN HOFFMAN
Kristin “Baker Bettie” Hoffman is a trained chef, baking educator, cookbook author, and owner of Bettie’s Chicago, a 1950’s styled event space and recreational cooking/baking school in downtown Chicago.
In 2011, Kristin created the popular Baker Bettie website which contains hundreds of original recipes and baking tutorials and now amasses over 5M visitors a year. Additionally, she creates educational video content on her YouTube channel (256K followers), Tiktok (470k followers), and Instagram (43K followers) accounts and is known for her approach to breaking down baking science in an approachable way to help build baking confidence.
Her online baking school, The Better Baking School, hosts e-courses on a wide variety of baking topics. It grew in popularity during the pandemic as teachers across the US began using the courses as resources in their virtual classrooms. The online school how hosts over 27,000 students across the world.
Kristin's debut cookbook, Baker Bettie’s Better Baking Book, was published in 2021 and quickly became an Amazon bestseller in the categories of Professional Cooking, Pastry Baking, Pies, Desserts, and Cookies. Additionally, it was named by Food Network as one of the top 10 baking books of the year. It has since been adopted by many middle and high school culinary programs as part of their curriculum.
ALICIA HEBER
Alicia Heber, founder of Seednest, a woman-owned business that proudly sources cannabis seeds exclusively from small-scale, craft breeders in the US that focus on ethical and sustainable breeding practices.
Alicia got her professional start in cannabis while working at a medical and recreational dispensary in Pagoas Springs during Colorado’s "Great Experiment." There, she witnessed how cannabis changed the lives of patients, but her true passion for the plant developed when she began working hands-on in a grow facility and became hooked with learning about all aspect of the plant. With no prior gardening experience, Alicia started growing cannabis at home from seed and quickly realized that while growing is a skill, it’s not as difficult as many believe—success comes with a growth mindset and a willingness to learn.
As more states began allowing home cultivation and as people wanted to grow their own plants instead of depending on other sources, Alicia saw the need for accessible resources to help people get started. She launched Seednest with women in mind, recognizing that many seed banks catered primarily to experienced growers and often overlooked the growing interest from women in home cultivation. Through Seednest and her platform She Grows At Home, Alicia seeks to make cannabis growing accessible to everyone by sharing her journey, expertise and joy in working with this miraculous plant.
Alicia is looking forward to continuing this mission by offering inclusive, approachable guidance for anyone interested in cultivating cannabis at home - experienced or not - and is excited to share her work with the world.
IAN RIVIERO
Ian Rivero, better known as Iankewks online, is a first-generation Filipino-Canadian with a deep-rooted passion for food. Sharing the same dream as other immigrants to the West, Ian set out with his family for a new life, and with him, he brought along memories and cultural experiences of his old home in the Philippines.
It’s almost a universal experience to prepare something that instantly transports you elsewhere. Whether it be a dish reminiscent of mom’s cooking, or one that reminds you of your first date, Ian’s parents cooked for the sole purpose of transporting themselves home. It’s no wonder that so many immigrants cooked their traditional dishes whenever they felt homesick - it’s instinctual.
Filipino food can be described as a unique melting pot of cuisines and cultures. Mixing the Indigenous food along with trade influences from East and Southeast Asia, as well as Spain, Filipino food had evolved into a diverse, bold, and rich cuisine.
Take Adobo for example, which is arguably one of the most famous and unofficial national dishes of the Philippines. It refers to any protein that’s slowly braised in a savory, tangy, and lightly sweet sauce composed of vinegar and salt. Adobo can be traced long before Philippine colonialism and contact with other Asian countries, as historians believed that the Indigenous Filipinos traditionally used the method of soaking proteins in vinegar and salt as means to further preserve their food in such a hot and humid climate. Only then when contact was made with Chinese traders that adobo began to include the use of soy sauce as a flavor enhancement. It’s become an iconic dish, one that reflects the Philippine’s diverse culinary history.
In March of 2020, Ian began his @Iankewks social accounts as a way to document his everyday meals and to share his love for Asian cuisines. Quickly growing a following, Ian found himself with a similar audience of home cooks and foodies who shared his same passion for the joy of food. Throughout his journey, he began to see a lack of representation of Filipino cuisine in the West.
Yes, many know and love Jollibee, but he couldn’t help but think how there’s so much more to Filipino food outside of spaghetti and fried chicken. And so with that thought in mind, Ian’s mission to promote Filipino culture and food began and rekindled a newfound appreciation towards his original roots. With that, emerged a community of other cooks and creators who are also rediscovering the beauty of their own culture through the medium of food.
Ian’s hope is that through his videos and travels that he will inspire others to expand their culinary universe and come to appreciate and enjoy the unique and flavorful cuisine of the Philippines.
When not in the kitchen, traveling, or trying new restaurants, Ian can be found in the hospital in his double life of being a cardiac nurse. He had also since formed a film and photo creative group which aims in capturing life’s special moments.