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HereInMyKitchen - The Road Ahead

Tanya Cauren

Dish – All Of Them

Themes - Gracious and Good

Food/Tech Tie In – All The Things

Homage – Every Cook, Chef, Foodie & Friend


Hey my foodie friends. Its Nov 2022, and as we begin to wrap up the year, it felt like a good time to reflect and share with you what’s next for HereInMyKitchen.


But first, let me not bury the lead...You asked, I listened and the COOK BOOK has been created! It is available for purchase on Amazon and you have your choice of a print on demand paperback or an e-book. It’s titled...drumroll please...

“HereInMyKitchen – Just Good Food”


A curated collection of 25 recipes that includes 8 BRAND NEW RECIPIES that will not be published as stand alone recipes on my website until after the new year.(A blurry draft of the cover 🤣 a sneak peek photo collage of the new dishes and a little mode photo reflecting my other passion are below🤗),


“HereInMyKitchen – Just Good Food” is a down and dirty cookbook with “one” photo of the finished dish and the recipe. The recipes include Ingredients, Tools, Method of Production and Tips. No stories, or the likes this time around (perhaps Ill include that for the next one).


I hope you buy a copy for yourself and everyone you know! I thank you on the front side.



On to the sharing...


Its been almost two years ambling on this journey. Creating a brand, website and social media presence is...a lot of work and to no ones surprise, the work has been on occasion...hard. It started out as an answer to the question in the early days of the pandemic of “how do I use my gifts, skills and talent, in these times?”. Lock down was for real, we didn’t know a lot about what was to come, there was no vaccine and the world seem to be at a standstill. Restaurants closed. Not For Profits, (where I saw myself embedded, as that’s why I went to Culinary school), that weren’t closed, were not bringing in new hands, but trying to survive and serve on the few they had.


I was fortunate to have a strong friend group IRL that I stayed connected to virtually as we navigated the unknown. Even if we couldn’t see each other in person we consistently checked in on each other, lending words of encouragement and often just an ear, as we were all in the same boat no matter where we were in the world. I also had access to Barb Pellegrino @barberic_design. A former colleague with a wonderful marketing background, Barb helped me put into words the who, what and why of my brand (marketing people are deep y’all), helped build my website and later in the year, partnered the caption creation process.


In trying to understand the algorithms of various platforms, what time to post, do hashtags really bring the foodies to the yard, the monthly stats etc...we have laughed, learned, stumbled, got back up, cheering on each other and our efforts, as we mapped out each months theme, featured products, new dish, all the things...Y’all get it. How fortunate was I to have her oaths ride!




As I sit typing this BLOG, to date...I have published 40 recipes, all produced HereInMyKicthen FOR REAL. I have tapped friends and family to test the recipes, getting feedback on flavor, texture, reproduce-ability in someone elses kitchen and proofing them for errors I cant see, even after reviewing it more times that one can imagine...eeek! I even have a few customers that I have connected with over the past year, that have tested a recipe or two. Im sharing all this to say...it took and takes a virtual village to move this brand forward and the biggest contributor that fueled me on the regular, was the belief from all, most importantly myself, that there was a need and the unwavering belief that I could meet that need. It helped that many were already fans of my food😉


Onward I pressed and let me tell you, it is much easier coming into the kitchen and just cooking, than it is to do so with the intention of writing a recipe. The typing minus my typos, wasn’t so bad, but capturing the exact measurements for dishes I intuitively made year after year, was quite the thing. Shooting the photos that go with each recipe, trying to understand why two shots taken one after the other in the same light like look different. Do I use the big photo lights or get up early and just try and shoot everything on a sunny day? Ugh!


Writing and approving captions for social media, creating cleaver descriptions for the website, capturing keywords in hopes that it comes up in a search, the same for Newsletter’s and BLOGS. Ugh again!. Do I luv learning new things? YES! Do I luv sharing? YES! Do I like walking my talk that Good Ingredients and Good Technique come together to product Good Food? YES! Does it take a lot of time and energy to keep this going? YES. Why do I continue to do it? Ummmm.


So here’s the skinny. I did it as the answer to the question cited in earlier in this BLOG, and Il’l continue to do it as it brings me joy. I believe through food we can heal and I remain dedicated to helping to move humanity forward through food. What will change as we ease into the new year...is the pace that Im doing it.


I am consciously making a shift to get off of the social media hamster wheel where I try and influence algorithms to come the dance, and will now, post, BLOG and create recipes, as Im moved to do so versus on a defined schedule. Ill revisit recipes currently published as it make sense, devote more time to volunteering, connecting with other Chefs and closest to my heart, connecting with Not For Profits in ways that help and support them.


So that’s whats up Y’all. That’s where Im going with the brand and hope you will continue join me on the journey. Know I remain thankful and standing...in a state of grace.


PS. Please Buy the Cookbook👩🏽‍🍳

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