← All Of It with Alison Stewart
All Of It with Alison Stewart
Recipes To 'Wow' Your Social Feed
00:27:54
The "phone eats first" trend is about cooking or ordering your food with an eye toward a visual presentation worth sharing on Instagram.
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- [00:00]
Alison Reedy
All of it is supported by Progressive Insurance. You chose to hit play on this podcast today. Smart Choice. Make another smart choice with Auto Quote Explorer to compare rates for multiple car insurance companies all at once. Try it@progressive.com Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Not available in all states or situations. Prices vary based on how you buy. Listener supported WNYC Studios.
- [00:39]
Alison Stewart
This is all of it on wnyc. I'm Alison Stewart. How many of us, when served a meal at a restaurant, whip out our phones and take a picture before we even eat? Welcome to the Phone Eats First Club. It started in Hong Kong around 2014 when people took pristine images of the food at their tables. People in dining called it the Camera Eats First. Some chefs, they balked at it. Now, 10 plus years later, social media and food images have influenced the way we cook at home, especially through viral recipes. There was the pandemic sourdough craze overnight oats, Marry Me Chicken, the Jennifer Aniston salad, and so on and so on. Allison Reedy is a food writer and restaurant critic in Colorado. She's written a new cookbook compiling some of her favorite viral recipes that she has come across. The book is called the Phone eats first cookbook. 50 of social media's best recipes to feed, your feed and then yourself. Allison is here and we will be taking your calls. Hi, Alison.
- [01:45]
Caller
Hi.
- [01:46]
Alison Stewart
So this book is a love letter to food and recipes on social media. But I read that initially as a food writer, you were a bit of a skeptic about joining social platforms. What were you concerned about?
- [02:00]
Alison Reedy
I'm just not a social media person. I think, you know, way back when with Facebook, a friend had to make my account for me. And then it was my editor at the Denver Post who was like, you need to join Instagram. People want to see where you're eating around town. You got to take pictures of what you're eating. Post on Instagram. And so, yeah, I was very reluctant to do that because I'm like, do people really want to see what I'm eating?
- [02:22]
Alison Stewart
Well, what changed your mind?
- [02:25]
Alison Reedy
Well, I mean, I was kind of forced to do it by my editor over there. But I mean, I quickly learned that, wow, this is a really amazing world. And I think it helped me do my job better, too.
- [02:38]
Alison Stewart
Well, how has food content on social media changed the way you think about your job?
- [02:44]
Alison Reedy
I mean, there's so many things out there. I mean, as you probably know, traditional media, we're not exactly growing right now, and so there's not a lot of us to cover all the amazing stories that are out there. And so having these influencers or recipe creators or content creators, whatever you want to call them, having them kind of help alert us to what's out there and what's good. I think it's really helpful for us in traditional media, too, to find out about these new spots. Listen and new trends to the recipe listeners.
- [03:18]
Caller
Are you someone out there who the phone eats first? Do you find yourself taking photos of your meals whenever you're at a restaurant or when you've made a great dish at home? Why do you think you like taking pictures of the food? Call us and text us. 2124-3396-9221-2433. WNYC. Are you someone who loves engaging with food content on social media? What is your favorite recipe that you have found online? Did it go viral or show up in your feed or how do you think social media has changed your diet or how you cook or discover new restaurants or the kind of foods you like? Call us 212-433-96922 WNYC. You can join us on air or you can text to us at those numbers. 2124-3396-9221-2433. WNYC. All right, Allison, you have 50 recipes in this book. Citing the creators who posted the recipe. How did you possibly narrow it down to 50 recipes?
- [04:19]
Alison Reedy
I made a lot of bad things. And I think that's kind of, I think that's part of why maybe people are a little skeptical of social media is some of the recipes that go viral, they're not really that great. So I actually enlisted my daughter. I let her sign up for TikTok just to help me with this book because she's obviously much younger than I am, much cooler than I am. And so she helped me find a lot of these, these food creators and recipe creators on TikTok. And then we just started cooking.
- [04:49]
Caller
How old is your daughter?
- [04:50]
Alison Reedy
She is now 13.
- [04:53]
Caller
Right on. You put her to work early. Let me ask you.
- [04:57]
Alison Reedy
It's funny because she actually, after the book, she is done with TikTok. So I'm kind of relieved about that.
- [05:02]
Caller
Even better. Let's talk about. I shouldn't say that Some people like TikTok a lot. What were some of the bad things you cooked?
- [05:11]
Alison Reedy
You know, probably the most viral recipe is that baked feta pasta. And it just was not my thing. I mean, I like feta, but I don't love feta. And so my entire family, none of us could eat that so there's no baked feta. There is no doing unthinkable things to peeps in this book. There's no using like a jar to cook a steak or a tampon to absorb excess liquid. None of that weird stuff.
- [05:39]
Caller
Listeners, are you someone who says the phone eats first? Do you find yourselves taking photos of meals at a restaurant? Or have you tried a recipe that you saw online and it turned out to be great? We wanna know. 2124-3396-9221-2433. WNYC. Our guest is Alison Reedy. She's been speaking about her new cookbook, the phone eats first cookbook. 50 of social media's best recipes to feed your feed and then yourself. What did you or your daughter, I should say both of you, what did you observe about which recipes caught your interest the most?
- [06:20]
Alison Reedy
I kind of think it's. It's a combination of three different things that can really make a recipe like, take off and go viral. I mean, the first is obvious. We are a looks first culture. You know, we want those aesthetics. So it has to be pretty. So the pretty things are going to do really, really well. The other thing is if it's clever, like, there are so many clever hacks that make cooking easier on, on TikTok that I was just so blown away by, like, for example, lasagna, but make it soup. So it takes this dish. We like the flavors, we love lasagna, but it's, you know, it's kind of a pain. It takes a while to make. It's much quicker and easier. In soup form. There's something called ice cube tray sushi. And so it helps you make sushi at home, like, perfectly formed because you use the ice cube tray as the mold, like for your rice and everything. And it just, it's so clever, it's so easy. So I think those things really take off. And then the third thing is, with a lot of social media users being millennials, Gen Z, it's like tapping into that nostalgia of maybe, you know, the 90s or the, depending on how old you are, maybe the early 2000s, where we're seeing things like, I have a recipe for cosmic brownies, which are like that Little Debbie treat that, you know, everybody wanted to have in their lunchbox in the 90s. And so it's tapping into that, like, where we're looking at, oh, the 90s, you know, such a better time.
- [07:47]
Alison Stewart
I wanted to ask you about that lasagna soup. It has received hundreds of millions of views. First of all, could you explain lasagna soup? Exactly.
- [07:59]
Alison Reedy
So I mean, it's, it's all those flavors that you would get in lasagna. In lasagna. So you can use, you know, pork or beef or sausage. You have the Italian seasoning, you have the tomato, like the paste, the sauce, you have the noodles, you have the ricotta that you're going to put on top, some basil, but it's in, it's in soup. So it's really the same thing. It's just instead of baking it forever and ever, you're just throwing everything into, you know, a giant pot or Dutch oven and cooking it all together in that one pot.
- [08:33]
Caller
It's so interesting because part of it is it took so long to make lasagna, we'll just make soup out of it.
- [08:41]
Alison Reedy
Yeah, it's like, I mean, that's one of the things is, that's so clever. It's like, you know, we're going to take, you know, French onion soup, but we're going to make it French onion pasta or we're going to make it French onion crostini bites. There's a lot of that where they're just taking flavors we already like and just presenting them in new and different ways.
- [08:59]
Caller
This is a great text we got. It's from Kyle from Stratford. I love taking photos of nearly everything in my life, but especially food because I like to post it in my TikTok or Instagram as a photo journal of my experiences. I'm a designer and recognize the artistry that goes into plating a lot of good meals. And that is really interesting to a point in your book where you have photo tips next to each recipe.
- [09:29]
Alison Reedy
I, we do have some photo tips and honestly those are probably more as reminders for me because I am a terrible photographer or they're kind of things that I've learned along the way from having to post what I eat so much. Yeah. Are you, are you interested in some of those?
- [09:45]
Caller
Sure.
- [09:47]
Alison Reedy
So I would say like, when in doubt, overhead it out. That's the easiest way to get a good shot of what you're eating is just, you know, take your phone, put it over what you're eating and overhead shot.
- [09:59]
Caller
You mean over the top?
- [10:01]
Alison Reedy
Yes, yes, over the top. So it's like facing down. That's just the easiest way to get, you know, a no brainer shot. If you can get some kind of cheese pull, the Internet loves a cheese pull, some kind of action. So if somebody's grabbing something, if you can get a drip like you're dipping that Birria taco into the consummate and you'd get a nice drip going. We like action shots or like throw some garnish on it so you have some different colors and you know, the colors popping against maybe a lighter background. And then you throw a little bit of parsley or something on top.
- [10:36]
Caller
So do the algorithm algorithms like these examples you've given us like a cheese pull and they push it forward.
- [10:45]
Alison Reedy
I have no idea the mysteries of the Instagram and TikTok algorithm, but it seems that way, like based on what it gives me, that's what they've figured out for me at least.
- [10:56]
Caller
Let's talk to. I think it's Jeanette on line one calling in from Murray Hill. Hi, Jeanette, thanks for making the time to call us today.
- [11:04]
Jeanette
Oh, thank you so much. I love food pictures. My sisters and I do food pictures all the time. My sister Justine lives in Indiana. My other sister Joanne lives in California. And last night I forwarded a picture of my corned beef and cabbage with carrots and caramelized onions. And it was great. So it was just that moment that I shared with them. We didn't have a chance to talk really at dinner time. The time difference is different. And my sister forwarded a picture of her corned beef and cabbage, which in California she got in the morning and she decided to have it for breakfast, which was really funny. So it's great sharing that moment of food with family. And we talk all the time, but it's just that instantaneous. This is what I'm having for dinner or something special. We don't do it every day. Like, I didn't send the picture of my ham sandwich right now, but if we go out to a restaurant and the food looks beautiful, we take a picture. I love that. I think it's a great connection with family. I don't do it really with friends, but it's a connection with my sister. So I really love doing that and I love your show too.
- [12:24]
Alison Stewart
Thank you, Jeanette. We appreciate that. A text says my husband and his sisters connected during the pandemic. Texting photos of each other's home cooked dinners. It was great fun. I saw them be cut much closer through sharing meals and recipes virtually. So Alison, what are your thoughts about that?
- [12:42]
Alison Reedy
On the pandemic specifically or just about.
- [12:45]
Alison Stewart
Families using it as a sharing tool?
- [12:48]
Alison Reedy
Yeah, I mean, I use it with my friends and family who I know are interested in food, which I think a lot of us, I mean, we need a distraction. We need some sort of joy Right now. And food, at least for me, is one of the loves of my life. And so, yeah, I love looking at what other people are eating. And I mean, besides the ideas it gives me, it's just like, oh, cool, that's, that's what you're doing over there. Like what the caller said, it connects you with people across the country, this text, and across the world too, which is actually one of the. My favorite parts of this is I've discovered so many new dishes that I wouldn't hear about, you know, here in Colorado, but so many dishes from people around the world because your iPhone and social media, it's like the great equalizer. Like anyone can just go take this great picture, post a recipe and it can go viral and you can share your family recipe or something from your culture with anyone around the world.
- [13:45]
Alison Stewart
We got a cranky text here that says, shame on all these people. Phones don't belong at the table. People need to think less about what other people think and what they're eating and more about spending time where they're.
- [13:57]
Caller
There with the people that there, that are there. After 27 years in the hospitality industry.
- [14:02]
Alison Stewart
I've seen people whole meal get cold.
- [14:04]
Caller
While they staged photographs for social media. I find it all really very sad. Did you talk to chefs, various people who worked in the industry who don't like this trend at all?
- [14:17]
Alison Reedy
I mean, I find social media, this book, it's, it both celebrates and pokes fun at our social media obsessed culture. So I totally understand that. And when I was researching this book, I came across a statistic. One out of three people orders food with no intention of eating it, but posting like the photo on their TikTok or on their Instagram. And so I, I do find that funny. As somebody who just loves to eat, like, I can't ever imagine not eating the food I'm photographing. But I think he has a point. Like there are a lot of people who, they're just using this as like an image building type tool. And, and that's fine. You know, who are we to judge what people are using social media for their relationship with food? But I think this book both celebrates and makes fun of that aspect of eating.
- [15:11]
Caller
We're talking to Allison Reedy, a food writer and restaurant critic. We're talking about her new cookbook, the phone eats first cookbook. 50 of social media's best recipes to feed, your feed and then yourself. We want to know, are you someone whose phone eats first? What have you taken a picture of? Do you take a picture of Your meals at home. Send them to friends. Let us know. 212-433-9621-2433, WNYC. If you tried any of the viral recipes, we want to know about those, too. 2124-3396-9221-2433, WNYC. Right after the break, we'll get into some recipes.
- [15:58]
Alison Stewart
This is all of it on wnyc. I'm Alison Stewart. My guest is Alison Reedy. She wrote a new cookbook called the phone eats first cookbook. 50 of social media's best recipes to feed your feed and then yourself. She's a food writer and a restaurant critic. Let's get into some recipes. Alison, you write the Internet loves a good salad. There's no other creator online who does it better than hesalad lab on TikTok. Her name is Darlene. What is her story?
- [16:29]
Alison Reedy
Yeah, the salad lab is. I mean, if you're into salad, you probably already know her. She has a take on every viral salad she did. You might have heard of the Jennifer Aniston salad, that it was rumored that Jennifer Aniston ate this every day on the set of Friends for Lunch. And of course, you know, who doesn't want to be Jennifer Aniston? So everybody rushed out to try to remake that salad. There was the Green Goddess salad. And the recipe in this book is from, from Darlene, the Salad Lab. It's a, it's a teriyaki salmon salad with crispy rice croutons. And I think it's better than both of those other ones.
- [17:05]
Alison Stewart
And it's interesting. She started it because her family lost their house in the California fires and she lost all of the recipes, and she just wanted to start to make them for her daughter.
- [17:20]
Alison Reedy
I didn't. I talked to her a few years ago, so I didn't know that.
- [17:24]
Alison Stewart
Oh, yeah, it was really interesting. It was the way that she sort of taught her daughter to think about the food and the family that they had lost some of the recipes for. That's very interesting. Let's talk to Christine on line one. Hey, Christine.
- [17:38]
Christine
Hi. Thanks for taking my call. I'm 52 now, but I will never forget my 25th birthday party. It was my first time ever making a big old table of food. And so I was taking all these photos of the table, and my friend Bill said, if you take one more photo of the food, I'm leaving. And so now we're friends on Facebook. And every time we post a photo of food, we tag each other. It's our Personal joke.
- [18:06]
Alison Stewart
That's a good story. Let's talk to Isaac from Brooklyn. Hi, Isaac, thanks for calling all of it.
- [18:13]
Isaac
Oh, yeah, hi. Let me see. I identified with one of your callers who didn't like the photos of food because I used to be like that. It used to drive me nuts. And a friend got cancer. It was far away. They beat it. But they wanted us to send pictures of food because it's the one thing that they couldn't enjoy while they were going through treatment. And so we all started sending photos of food and it became a kind of a daily check in of sorts. And I still take pictures of food and that's that.
- [18:45]
Caller
Like it, Isaac, let's talk to Ramey, calling in from Astoria. Thanks for calling all of it.
- [18:51]
Alison Stewart
You're on the air.
- [18:53]
Christine
Hi. Thanks. Yeah, I just wanted to share. We built a whole community around photos of food during the pandemic. So I found my way to a Facebook group of Yale alums. I'm a Yale alum and it was called Yale Food plus Drink. And initially it was just everyone sharing photos of their sourdough bread and their meal and meals. Even in the past when we could all travel. And then eventually as the world opened up, we continued to share recipes, but also restaurant recommendations. And then eventually, actually a lot of people who had only met online met in person in different cities for meals. And that's still going on really strong. And it's sort of the one happy place on the Internet right now with all the turmoil. So food photos and food sharing has been really a way to build community.
- [19:39]
Caller
Thanks for calling in. Alison. Let's talk about some more recipes in your book. And by the way, I want to let you know that you, you actually identify them with the site that you got them from. So we should say that, that you do share all the credit. Birria tacos. What's interesting about Birria tacos, why are they so popular?
- [19:59]
Alison Reedy
So that one, whenever people ask me about these viral recipes and how, how the Internet has actually changed how we eat, that's kind of my go to example. I think it was in 2018 when there was an L A influencer and he took a picture of these Birria tacos he got at a taco truck. And you know, they're gorgeous. They're, they're red and glistening and you're, they're cheesy and oozing out and you're dipping it into the consummate. And Birria Tacos, if you think about it before that post A lot of people in America, we had never heard of them. And now, you know, seven years later, they're on almost every menu of every Mexican restaurant. So that's just a really great example of how, yeah, Instagram kind of took this dish that in Mexico is probably pretty well known, but not in America, and made it just ubiquitous everywhere.
- [20:51]
Caller
What recipe in the book do you think takes us somewhere else? Something, someplace in the world that we haven't been before?
- [21:01]
Alison Reedy
Oh, I mean, there are. There are a few that take us, like, all over the place. So the Birria tacos, that's going to be Mexico. We have. So there's a creator. And I actually had to talk with him through his publisher because he's Italian. His name is Ruben Bondi. It's cucina Cone Rubin. He has his own cookbook in Italian. In Italy. He's an amazing Italian chef. So we have his cacio e pepe pasta recipe in the book, which is like the legit Italian cacio e pepe. Not no cream, nothing like that. Reuben would die if you put that in yours. And then a lot of. A lot of Asian recipes. Like, we have a bubble tea recipe. We have rice paper dumplings, which is one of those genius hacks where you can make dumplings, but just so much easier than, like, the perfectly pleated, intricate, folded. Instead of using, you know, the actual dumpling wrapper, you just use rice paper and you fold it. So it's just a way easier way of making dumplings.
- [22:03]
Alison Stewart
This is a good text. I don't usually take pictures of food, but I am making a family cookbook for Christmas gift this year. I've been photographing family recipes and adding photos of my family at the table, at picnics, eating while traveling. It's a lot of fun. This says talking about pictures of food for social media. I have a friend who teaches at an iv. Most of our texts are pictures of beer we're drinking. Intelligent conversation among highly educated friends. My guest is Alison Reedy. We're talking about her book, the Phone eats first cookbook. 50 of social media's best recipes to feed your feed and then feed your yourself Hot chicken. Hot chicken is popping up on New York City corners nowadays, everywhere. But the origins in this book, anyway, say they come from Nashville. Tell us a little bit about Nashville hot chicken.
- [22:53]
Alison Reedy
So, yeah, Nashville hot chicken is delicious. It's, you know, it gets the red. I think it's the red glistening that made it so popular on social media. And it gets that from, like, you dip it, you take the oil that you fry the chicken in and then you mix in some seasoning, some spices in there. Like you get the, the cayenne and the paprika, and that's where you're getting that, that red, the red coloring. But also you're getting, of course, the spice from the cayenne. And yeah, it turns out Nashville totally knew what they were doing. I think that the, the hot chicken for me, because I like spice, I like that I'll pick that over regular fried chicken any day. But it also just looks so pretty because it's like, let's take brown fried chicken and let's make it red.
- [23:39]
Alison Stewart
Somebody sent us a text about that.
- [23:41]
Caller
Hang on.
- [23:42]
Alison Stewart
It's about brown. Food doesn't necessarily good for pictures, but it's good for.
- [23:47]
Caller
Here it goes.
- [23:48]
Alison Stewart
Food is just as much of a.
- [23:50]
Caller
Visual medium as it is a taste medium. If something is a vibrant color and beautiful to look at, it makes the flavor that much more satisfying when it tastes good. I have had a delicious all brown food, but it isn't nearly as satisfying. Did you find that as you were putting together your cookbook, that some recipes might have been great, but they didn't take a good looking picture?
- [24:13]
Alison Reedy
I mean, yeah, you definitely want something photogenic, especially if you're thinking about if your medium is your Instagram grid or a TikTok video. Like, yeah, you're definitely thinking about those colors. But I do feel like, I mean, like the, the hot chicken, the, the toast, just like that can be a totally boring food that you can make prettier and the Internet has done it. Like these people who make toasts into these work, it's, it's stunning. It's amazing.
- [24:44]
Caller
Listeners, are you someone who says the phone eats first? What did you recently take a picture of something that came to the table? We also want to know, have you tried any of the viral videos out there for recipes? How did it turn out? Our number is 2124-3396-9221-2433. WNY is Alison Reedy. She's a food writer and restaurant critic. She wrote a new cookbook called the phone eats first cookbook. 50 of social media's best recipes to feed your feed and then feed yourself. I'm noticing from a lot of the texts that have come in and what people have been describing, a lot of people said this image of taking pictures, their own taking pictures, happened during COVID That's also when TikTok really took off. What did you deserve? What did you observe, I should say, about how our Relationship with food and social media really evolved during COVID I.
- [25:40]
Alison Reedy
Think it kind of became the norm that you, you could, you know, before it was kind of maybe a little strange unless you were in certain circles that were food obsessed. Like, maybe it was kind of weird to take pictures of your food and share it. But during COVID it was a couple of things. One, it was like people who've called in or texted have said it's a way to connect with people that you're not immediately with. And so it's a way to show them, like, hey, look what I made today. Look what I did during COVID And then another part of that, that Covid piece is, I think it was like the best possible free advertisement for TikTok, which was just getting started then is like, you know, you're, you're at home, you don't have a lot of in person connection, but you have your phone, you have social media, you have, you might have time depending on, you know, do you have kids at home that you're trying to figure out the online schooling or whatnot. But you might have some extra time. You might be doing the sourdough thing and yeah, you're gonna, you're gonna scroll through and get some ideas. And it was like such a it. Everybody seemed to get on at least Instagram at that point in time. In my circle, for I'm a millennial, so my generation is more Instagram than TikTok. But I'm sure for younger people, they were all, you know, signing up for TikTok to feel that connection.
- [26:57]
Caller
You have one recipe that recalls a Covid era food trend. It is for a coffee chocolate cake. Tell us more about it.
- [27:05]
Alison Reedy
Oh my gosh, that one's so good.
- [27:08]
Caller
Tell us more.
- [27:09]
Alison Reedy
Okay, so that one. Yeah, I mean, that's one of the things. So I was one of those parents. I was a single mom with a six and a seven year old who were, you know, home from school during COVID So I didn't have a whole lot of extra time. I wasn't baking the sourdough dough, but I definitely made the, the Dalgona coffee because, you know, that's easy. You just whip it up. And this recipe like kind of combines two of my favorite things because I am, I go hard on the sugar. I'm very into dessert. And this is from. I don't know if I can say her name on the nopity.
- [27:43]
Caller
Nope, nope, nope.
- [27:43]
Alison Reedy
Okay, we'll just say it's Kimberly Ho. We'll call it Kick Butt Baker. And she made a Dalgona coffee chocolate cake and oh my gosh, it's the best chocolate cake that I've ever had. You use like that, that coffee to kind of add moisture to the cake, but then also you're whipping it up for the frosting so you get that frothiness and that like slightly coffee flavor in the frosting that plays so well with the cake.
- [28:10]
Alison Stewart
They can figure out what her name is. They got it. Our listeners, thanks so much for calling in and sharing your thoughts. And thanks to Allison Reedy. The book is called the Phone Eats First Cookbook. Thanks.
- [28:23]
Alison Reedy
Thank you.
- [28:25]
Isaac
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- [28:55]
Alison Reedy
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- [28:58]
Caller
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Alison Reedy
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Alison Stewart
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Alison Reedy
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Alison Stewart
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Alison Reedy
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Alison Stewart
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