257: Where Do We Go From Here - Pinch of Yum Post Recap

Foreign. Hello. Hello. You are listening to the Food Blogger Pro podcast. I'm Alexa from the team here at Food Blogger Pro and we are so happy, honored and excited that you're tuning into the podcast. Today, after a two week hiatus from the podcast, we're back with an incredibly important episode from our fearless leaders, Bjork and Lindsay Ostrom.

These.

These past few weeks have been complicated, sad, frustrating, difficult and unjust. But also in these past few weeks, we've listened to powerful conversations, participated in important discussions with our team, and are holding ourselves accountable to being actively anti racist, challenging injustice, and using our platform to amplify messages of hope and change. In this episode, Bjork and Lindsey share some resources for supporting black owned businesses and learning more about being actively anti racist. So, without any further ado, Bjork, Lindsay, take it away.

Hey, Linds.

Hi.

Welcome to the podcast.

Thanks.

Always nice to be sitting in the same room as somebody. It is also nice to be putting on kind of my podcast personality. Do you feel like I have a different personality? Like I do a little countdown, I go, three, two, one. Do you feel like I change when I go into podcast mode?

No, not really. Maybe once you get going, but yeah, it's not like the immediate switch. It's not like a different voice, like a broadcasting voice or something. Your voice is pretty consistent.

Okay, great. Well, here's the plan for today's podcast. It's going to be a shorter podcast. We're in the middle of a really unique season of content where we have a content calendar, we have podcasts that we've recorded, and we kind of press pause on those in order to give space and time to talk through some of these really important things that are happening. As I talked about on the last podcast, as people know globally, nationally, and then especially here in the Twin Cities, we are as a community reeling from the death, the murder of George Floyd and the ripple effects of what that means, and a movement around anti racism and talking about race in a way that we haven't before in the best way possible. And so what we're doing on the podcast is also pausing our normal content calendar, the episodes that we had planned to publish right now to do what we can to be a part of a movement that is really important. And so for today's episode, kind of as a stand in, as we build out the queue to have other conversations and interviews, we're going to talk through a post that you published on Pinch of Yum called Where Do We Go From Here? And talking about some really concrete Action items. And I think that's really important. Conversation is important, but action is also really important. And one of the things that I love about this post is the Pinterevum team worked to kind of break it out into different categories. What can I do today? What can I do this month? And then what can I do for the long term? So I think that's a question that a lot of people have. They're. They're wondering, what can I do? And for this episode, we're going to talk through a few of those things that, as a team, personally, that we're. That we're doing. Does that sound okay?

Sounds great.

Okay.

And I mean, I would just add. I mean, we haven't pre scripted what these questions will be, but I feel like it's important to just lay out right at the beginning that, like, you know, I like having two white people on a podcast to talk about race. I feel like neither of us is here to share expertise as much as to share the places that we're learning and point people to the resources that are helping us personally as a company that are helping others on our team. That's what I just want to establish as, like, the ground, like, foundation for this podcast is. That's my hope. That's my hope for it at the outset is that we're. What we're doing is we're pointing you to the people that we learn from.

Yeah, there's a movement. I was talking about this before and you had talked about on Instagram, there's these different movements. Maybe I'm just not a part of the podcast community in a way that I need to be, but I don't know of podcast movements that happen at the same time. And one of the. Well, like, some of the movements, you'd know better than I would. I'm not on Instagram.

Like on Instagram, last, or I think it was last week, there was kind of a, like a movement. The hashtag was amplifymelanated voices. So the idea with that being that something that we can do is kind of like, share the mic and pass, like, lift up black influencers, black teachers, and yeah, point people in the direction that they can learn, as opposed to saying, like, here, I'm the expert. Let me, let me teach you. That's. That's not, I don't think, fitting for this moment. And I'm not just talking about this podcast. I'm talking about, like, just this moment in time. So, yeah, I don't know if that exists. I'm sure that Exists in some way on podcast. But with Instagram, like hashtags allow you.

To do that in a way that.

And tagging people. So like a lot of people I saw last week, and I mean, I think from the outside to me it was really helpful and valuable to see, you know, white or non black influencers basically using their platform to say, hey, these are the black creators, the black teachers that we follow, that we learn from. And because of how Instagram is set up with tags and with, you know, easy click arounds and follows like you can 1, 2, 3, boom, boom, boom. And you can, you know, be finding whole new worlds of information that's maybe not. Doesn't work quite the same way in a podcast, but hopefully we can replicate that, the spirit of that in this podcast.

Love that. Let's actually start by doing that in the section of what can I do today. There's a couple areas where you've highlighted black leaders on Instagram. These are actually, you know, I'm not on Instagram, so it ends up happening is you will Send me like 3 to 15 emails a day on like articles or Instagram posts. And so I recognize a lot of these that you've outlined in the post. But can you share maybe one or two that you have found to be especially helpful in this season? One that I recognize right away is the conscious kid.

Yeah.

But are there a couple others that you want to talk to? And as a note, we will link to all of these in the show notes as well. And we'll link to this blog post as well.

Yeah, so from this blog post and I have this, we both have this pulled up in front of us. I have it on my phone from the chair I'm sitting in and you have it on your computer. So we're all looking at the same thing here. But this post came together by way of team effort. So a lot of the things that are listed on this post aren't even me, Lindsay personally, you know, my resources or recommendations. But there are some of them on the list that, that are from me. And so I feel like that's what makes sense is for me to highlight the ones that really like have meant the most to me. At the top of the list is Osheda Moore. And we were introduced to Osheda Moore actually at our church. So she's local to Minneapolis and she has spoken at our church. I mean, probably I've been following her for a couple years and listening to her podcast for a couple years. But she, she, I really appreciate her voice as A person of faith.

She.

Her. Her like, initiative that she. She has a hashtag and kind of a series on Instagram. She calls it Dear White Peacemakers. And she kind of her life mission or her, you know, like her ethos and things is around peacemaking. Not peacekeeping necessarily, but peacemaking. And I just have really appreciated her perspective in all this and learning from her, especially because we did have the chance to hear her speak a few times at our church and feel like we have, like, a little bit, you know, she has no idea who we are, but I feel like we have a little bit of a personal connection to her. She does these, I think, for people who have faith as a. As a part of their life or, you know, I guess consider them self spiritual in some way. She does these daily breath prayer, Instagrams, Instagram Live, ig or wait, what is it called? Igtv. IGTV videos. So she does them live and then she puts them on her feed. Anyways, I've just really appreciated her. I know a lot of my friends have appreciated her, and that's probably more than. I can't say that much about every. I mean, sure, this is gonna get too long if I say that much about every person.

But anyway, Oshida, you get the spotlight.

Okay. Oshita. Austin Channing Brown would be another one I would pull out. I haven't read her book, but I really would like to. It's called I'm Still Here. And actually I just saw that the Reese Witherspoon Book club just picked her book as their. One of their reads for June. And last night I just listened to a podcast that she did on Brene Brown's podcast. It was so good. It was really good. I know we're not talking about podcasts right now, but if you want to hear, if you want to, like, really get to know her heart and learn from her. Wow. I just feel like the whole time, like, I'm gonna go back and listen to it again for sure. And that's the hard thing about podcasts, is I feel like you want to highlight something and how do you. Yeah, how do you do that on a podcast? Like, I need to, like, maybe there's a transcription of it somewhere that I should go find.

Yeah.

But it is a really powerful podcast. So the podcast itself is called Unlocking Us, and it would be the most recent episode where Brene interviews Austin Channing Brown.

Awesome. Speaking of podcasts, there's a few that we list here. And because people are listening to a podcast, I feel like it makes it easier for people then to pull up another podcast. And I was actually just talking to one of our team members yesterday and she's talking about a episode that she listened to on Terrible. Thanks for asking. Recently, I don't remember what it was, but it was like Twin Cities leaders, black Twin Cities leaders, thought leaders, business leaders, reflecting on what it's been like for them to grow up in Minnesota and the contrast between what it looks like to be white growing up in Minnesota, what it looks versus what it looks like to be black growing up in Minnesota, and just how different that experience is. So that's the most recent episode of Terrible. Thanks for asking. I'll highlight that as one that I've added to my queue. Haven't listened to it yet, but are there any that from this section that you want to highlight? Podcast? Yeah.

Of the three that we have mentioned on Pinch of Yum, 74 seconds is the only one that I've listened to. And that 74 seconds was about Philando Castile and gosh, was it, I don't remember how long ago, three years ago, Philando Castile was a black man that was killed actually in our neighborhood where we lived at the time. So that felt like an important one for us to listen to at the time. And yeah, it's powerful. It's hard. It's really hard to listen to. But that would be the one that I would recommend just because personally that's the one that, that I've listened to. Of the three, I'm not a huge podcast listener right now, but that one I can definitely vouch for. And then obviously what I just mentioned about Brene Brown's podcast where she interviews Austin Channing Brown. I also recently listened to her podcast where she interviewed. I think you pronounce this Ibram X Candy. This is he's the author of how to Be an Anti Racist and and also Stamped from the Beginning and several other anti racist and educational books around racial justice. And he's amazing, super smart. And that was also a really great interview. So she. Two of her most recent interviews have also been impactful.

Awesome. And then the last section here that is important to point out is making donations is something that you can do right away. And we wanted to highlight that as I talked about on the last episode. Two weeks ago, the team here in Food Blocker Pro made a donation to naacp and we love Lake Street, Lake street being one of the areas that was hardest hit from some of the rioting. So supporting those businesses and the cleanup effort there and then NAACP as well. And Then highlighting also a couple of these Minnesota organizations, Black Visions Collective North Minneapolis, Business Community Relief as well. So we'll link to those in the show notes. So that's all things that we can do pretty quickly. We can follow Instagram accounts, we can listen to podcasts, we can make donations that could be today, that could be this week. There's also things that are kind of in that middle ground, things that we can do this month. And this would be courses, it would be books, it would be areas of kind of education, whether that be movies, TV shows. So is there anything from this list, Lindsay, that you feel like would be worth highlighting that we want to shine a light on and make sure that people are aware of as they're kind of processing through this stuff along with us?

I think when I think of that first section of the list, things I can do today, it's kind of like, how can I quickly take action? How can I quickly like jump start my, my learning and my. Yeah, just my learning around almost like learning what I don't know, I don't know what I don't know. And those are kind of the quick things. And this part of the list of what can I do this month are the things that are a little bit longer work. It's not something that you're gonna, you know, immediately sit down and then finish by the end of the day necessarily, but things that take a little more digging in. And I feel like it's helpful to different differentiate the mindset for that. So for me it would be things like reading books. Like this is what you said, Bjork, like reading books. And these are the two that stand out for me because this is just personally what's happening in my life. Reading books. I'm, I'm reading right now how to be an anti racist. And we're doing that as like a part of a. I'm doing that as a part of a book club with my friends. And you know, that's, that's a long, longer learning because it's a heady. It's a heady book. It's not like follow someone on social media and learn a quick thing from a post that they did. And that's not at all to downplay the learning that can happen on social media or on those quicker consumption formats. But with a book, it's like, oh man, already have so many questions, have so many things. I'm on chapter two and it's like, it's just a little bit digging a little bit deeper. So that's the book that I'm reading right now, and I'm. That's a good format for me, is reading books. So on my list, we don't have this linked, but on my list, I think I mentioned also I'd like to read Austin Channing Brown's book I'm Still Here, and there are so many book lists out there. I would highly encourage anybody listening who is a reader who likes to read and who wants to kind of dig a little bit deeper. I. One thing that's interesting, Austin shared on her Instagram that her book is on was on the. I feel like it was the New York Times bestseller list for nonfiction. And almost the entire list are books about racism, books about white privilege, books to teach people about racial justice. And I just. And there were like 15 of them. And I just thought, like, wow, that's really amazing. Yeah.

So, yeah, I think, I think this is stepping into the. One of the things that I've been a visual that I've been trying to apply in this period of time as I think about, like, what am I doing about this? You know, there's conversations, but then there's also action. I feel like it's the pursuit of filling in the picture. And. And I feel like a book like if an Instagram account and a concept helps to like, color a little bit of the picture. Like if you imagine, you know, Solvi has her coloring books and you flip through them and they're. They're not filled in like an Instagram maybe fills in a little piece of it. And I feel like a book helps to fill in even more. And my realization is that I'm never fully going to be able to complete that picture and have a perfect understanding, but to commit to the continual and forever pursuit of filling that in as much as possible. And I feel like some of these. What can I do this month? In between pieces are commitment to maybe slower but more thorough job of filling that in reading a book being an example.

Another example that I would mention. And we have a category called Explicitly Teaching kids about anti Racism. But I have found. So the conscious kid is they have an Instagram account, which is probably how most people know them. But they also have a Patreon. I don't know how you say that Page account. Sure, they're on Patreon and I signed up to be. Gosh, I don't even know what it's called. It's called like the. It's like where you. They have different levels of membership and you get different things depending on you can, you know, Level one, you get book lists. Level two, you get these more in depth emails and articles with like researched ideas around, specifically around kids and around teaching kids and like anti racist parenting. And those have been so, so helpful for me. And that's deeper learning because that's like long form content that's more than what they're packing into their Instagram posts. That's like this is going to take me five to 10 minutes when I sit down and read it. But I have found the information and that just totally invaluable. It's been, it's so well put together. The, the researchers and the writers that they have putting the materials together are just like so smart and able to communicate a lot of really helpful information. So I would highly recommend that if you have kids or if you're an educator in any capacity, I found that really helpful. That's the conscious kid. And then they, it would be just finding them on Patreon and maybe we can link directly to their Patreon PA page.

That's awesome. So we talked about things that you can do right away, things that would maybe be that kind of middle ground, things you could be doing this month. And then we have this section of long term and the first thing that is highlighted there is this idea of supporting black owned businesses. And there are a few here that I recognize as Minneapolis St. Paul restaurants or businesses. Do you want to highlight some of those for people who are here in the Twin Cities or if you people ever come and do a trip here and want to make sure that they're intentional about that?

Yeah, my favorite actually was probably the fits which recently, I think we heard recently closed and they're. And so the. That's Justin Sutherland, he's the chef and he also does Handsome Hog which we have on our list. And I think they're moving the Handsome Hog into the Fitz location. That's what you told me. But yeah, that's one of my favorites. And then the rest on the, on the list I actually haven't been to. But those come highly, highly recommended by our team members and I think several of them, at least one. I know that trio plant based but I feel like there was another one that is. That were like vegan friendly and just. Yeah, just if you come, if you're coming to Minneapolis and you need a little list.

Love it.

Yep.

Our team can Pimento Jamaican Kitchen. Handsome Hog.

Yes.

Do Nord Craft Spirits Afrodelli. We'll link to all of those. One of the sections here that I think is important to highlight is kind of a commitment. And I've been thinking about these and reflecting on these different statements that we made. It's commitments you can make to yourself and to your family. And are there any in this list that you want to highlight or talk through as they're all very important.

So let me see which one would best fit this. I guess maybe we will intervene. That last one says we will intervene when we see. When we see racism, or the first one says we will not be silent about racism. These are just commitments. Example commitments that I wrote out that, you know, I think I or we in our family would try to live out. And one learning that I had this week was that we did the post on Pinch of Yum, and, you know, people have all kinds of different opinions about this and had some emails come in from people who were in disagreement about certain things or. Yeah, there were some emails that came in that had the potential to fall kind of in that category of things we wouldn't want to stay silent on. And my initial reaction was, well, these are just, you know, in some cases it was so extreme and so hateful that it was like, we're not even gonna respond to this. But someone on our team pointed out and this is helpful to, you know, get feedback and to learn and to do better. Someone on our team had pointed out, hey, you know, if. If we're. If you or we are making commitments, we're not going to be silent. We're not going to, you know, we're going to intervene. When we see things that aren't right, when we hear things that aren't right, then isn't not responding to those emails kind of breaking on that commitment? Like, you're not actually following through on that. And that was like kind of a learning moment for me where I just wasn't thinking about it in the right way. And I was like, yeah, you know, that does make sense. And I do think we need to address those and respond to those. And I think that's where something like a commitment that in my mind, that's where that comes in. And I feel like it's really important to note here that, like, I needed help in order to really live that out. Like, sometimes accountability, accountability, like, sometimes we can't even see our own. Yeah, we can make those commitments and then not even realize the ways that we're not upholding them. And so anyways, that was kind of the thought with that is like, you see a lot of people saying, like, oh, you know, I'm going to do this. I'm going to do this. And these are things that don't have one single tangible thing with them, but kind of an overarching, like a lifelong. This is lifelong work, as I'm learning and this is a marathon. And so what are like some guiding principles, some guiding commitments that can be a filter for the decisions I'm making?

Yeah. And it's interesting. I feel like people can relate to this who listen to the podcast. I think potentially one of the muscles you build over time as you create more content online is like ignoring people who are really like outspokenly negative or have a super strong opinion or come.

After you outwardly racist.

Specifically talking about it in regards to like recipes or content. And it's like it's easy to archive those and have kind of learned like maybe in a lot of ways it's best to just not engage. But point being making a commitment in this category, you're having to go, you're having to undo that and say no instead of ignoring, which, you know, if it was a super mean comment about a recipe, probably best to ignore because it's a difficult conversation. It kicks off so many different interactions then. But in this case it's saying no. This is something that we have committed to engage with. It's the opposite. We're going to lean into this, we are going to have this conversation and to flip that and instead of saying not engage, we're saying we are going to engage. We're going to make a commitment to have those conversations and those interactions which enneagram9 for me, strengths, quest, strengths, finder, harmony. Those are two, two categories for me that I always seek. So not an easy thing. But it's helpful to have that commitment to do that. Anything else that you want to highlight in this section of long term considerations, what that looks like?

No, I don't think so. But the one thing that I was gonna. This is kind of going, this is kind of going off script from the post and more to back to this idea of amplify melanated voices, amplifying other people in the space and introducing, you know, our audience to people. We have on Pinch of Yum Instagram, we didn't include this in the blog post but because the blog post is specifically more focused on like anti racism resources. But on Pinch of Yum Instagram we have a list of food bloggers, black food bloggers, men and women, vegan, not vegan baking, all different kinds of content.

And can you highlight some of those?

Yes, I would love to. So there's a list. I'm just Looking here, there's looks like there's about 10 people listed on the list. And then we also had mentioned several in Stories. So again I would highly recommend you to view the. Com complete list. But for sure one of my favorites is I'm just looking for her on the list. Make sure she's on here. There she is. Sweet Potato Soul. And I've mentioned her a lot on my personal account on Pinch of Yam. But Janae is the creator behind the account and I think I feel like I'm always just inspired by vegan food. And she's a vegan chef, she's a YouTuber, she's a cookbook author. But I also personally just really appreciate her. She has a daughter that's about the same age as Solvi, so it's fun to follow her. And she's just a super talented creator, so I really like and appreciate her. And then Confessions of a Clean Foodie is a fellow Minnesotan and I think we've maybe or I don't think I've mentioned her on the podcast before. I think I've mentioned her on the blog before. But she does a lot of I would call it healthy ish food. Like well healthy food. It just it sometimes it's specific to particular diets. So she'll do some keto recipes or low carb things like that. And then she also does clean makeup so are like clean beauty. So she does these beauty tutorials and she's just a super fun personality. And also because she's local, I feel a little extra poll to recommend her. And the last one that I would recommend is something that someone on our team actually introduced me to. It's called Whetstone Magazine. Whet Whetstone Magazine and it is a multimedia company. So it's a magazine and they do videos and they do online content, but they highlight the origins of food and the culture behind the food. And it is so not all of their stories are focused on the black community or anything like that. But the creators of the agency, I guess the magazine, the agency, the company are are black and they are extremely talented. Like the videos are some of them if you look at their Vimeo, you could just get lost in the food videos that they have. So those are just three that stand out to me. But again that list has a bunch of recommendations and as do our pitch of Yum stories.

Awesome. Linds, thanks so much for jumping in on this. We were as a team like you talked about before, we're kind of in a holding pattern for the podcast Figuring out what does it look like to essentially rebuild our queue so we can be a part of the momentum that's happening around conversations around anti racism and amplifying black voices and creators. And as you said, we are two white people sitting here in Minnesota, having grown up in rural Minnesota and want to point that out and so acknowledging that and also thanks for coming on to talk through that as we rebuild that queue in this kind of holding pattern that we're in for the podcast. Anything else that you want to say or talk through in regards to kind of how you as a creator are trying to be intentional to, even though Food Pinch of Yam is a food site, how you are trying to be intentional to use the platform or the audience or the following that you have to, whatever the analogy is that you want to use, amplify, shine a light, give exposure to have the conversation. Kind of Last thoughts as we wrap up the podcast.

I have I so many things swirling in my head, like things that have been impactful for me, but there was this like meme floating or not. It's not a meme. It's like a, it's like a non funny meme. It's like a text only little graphic. Do you know what I'm talking about? That like floats around, makes the rounds on social media and, and I hope somebody, maybe there's an original source for this and we can find it after and link it because I don't know what the original source was or who it was, but the idea with it was that everybody has, everybody has different work to do in this, you know, in this greater puzzle of like, how do we work towards racial justice and equity and how do we do the work? We hear that phrase a lot. And this little graphic just talks about how everyone has a different place in that. And I think that idea has been impactful for me in like, you know, I'm, I can, I can do a variety of different things and I should be challenging myself to do those things. And also we each have areas where we're more connected and more resourced and more, you know, for some of us it's like, oh, we have a ton of time, so how can we use that time? For some of us it's like, you know, we have, we're able to financially support. For some of us it might be industry specific. And so I think I'm just. That's a thought that I'm having as, as I'm. I think all of us are feeling so grateful and I should say all of us like white people or, you know, people who are interested in working towards justice for the black community. Like, we are absorbing a ton of information, taking in a ton of ideas, and being challenged to a lot of new things. And for myself, I'm just asking myself, like, where is my. Where is my most effective place in this? Where is my. I hesitate to say lane, because I don't. You and I were talking about this yesterday. Like, I don't want to have it. I don't want to present the idea of, like, then you are in your lane and you're locked in there and you never go outside of it. But finding the place area of greatest impact, potentially, yes. Like, where can I put in the effort that's going to be the most impactful? And so that's just something I've been thinking about. I don't know that I have an answer for it at this point, but I think it's something that we can all be thinking about. And those of us in food, those of us in the Internet world. Yeah. Just thinking about that corner of the picture specifically, and how do we do our part especially well in that space.

That's awesome. We are coming up to a hard stop on your calendar. I need to be respectful of your schedule.

We have one minute.

And thanks for talking through this. And for those of you who are listening, appreciate you being a part of this conversation. We obviously wouldn't do the podcast if there wasn't anybody who listened. And we are so grateful for this community that has been a part of this journey along the way. So we are excited to continue this conversation and feel honored to be a part of it, and honored to you who are following along and listening. And stay tuned because we're going to continue to publish content here in the weeks and months to come. So signing off. Thanks, Lindsay.

Yep, thank you. And that's a wrap for this episode of the Food Blogger Pro Podcast. Bjork and Lindsay mentioned a lot of great resources, organizations and links in this episode, so be sure to hop on over to our show Notes for this episode, foodbloggerpro.com 257 to find the full list. We appreciate you being here and for listening and for being part of this community. And we hope that this episode gave you some ideas for some ways that you can learn, grow, and help make change. Make it a great week.