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Dishing with Stephanie's Dish

Dishing with Stephanie's Dish

By: Stephanie Hansen - @StephaniesDish
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 I talk with Cookbook authors and Makers obsessed with food

stephaniehansen.substack.comStephanie Hansen Art Cooking Food & Wine
Episodes
  • Maggie Hoffman is a Host of the Podcast and Substack, "The Dinner Plan"

    Maggie Hoffman is a Host of the Podcast and Substack, "The Dinner Plan"
    Jun 27 2025
    Stephanie Hansen:Hello everybody, and welcome to Dishing with Stephanie's Dish, the podcast where we talk to people that are obsessed with food and they come across their obsessions through cookbooks, podcasts, content writers, and today we're talking with Maggie Hoffman. And I was excited because I said I don't get to talk to fellow podcasters very often. Congratulations on your podcast. It is the Dinner Plan podcast. Maggie is the former digital director of Epicurious. She also has many newsletters. So I'm excited to talk to you about that. The Dinner Plan plus What to Drink , plus The Vintage Table Maggie Hoffman - You are my person.Maggie Hoffman:Maybe too many newsletters. We'll see.Stephanie Hansen:Yeah, I'm sure it's a lot. So where should we jump in first? Let's just, let's talk about your newsletters because you already commented on my background. I have a lot of vintage pieces in the background. How did you start the Vintage Table or what was your first newsletter?Maggie Hoffman:Well, it's a little bit complicated, but I actually started with what to drink. In sort of a previous life, I was mostly a cocktail writer. I used to review bars for the San Francisco Chronicle. And I've written two books about cocktails that were published by Ten Speed. The One-Bottle Cocktail: More than 80 Recipes with Fresh Ingredients and a Single SpiritBatch Cocktails: Make-Ahead Pitcher Drinks for Every OccasionAnd so that's like a whole side of my life. And I was running a drinks newsletter for Epicurious when I was there. And when I left, that was sort of the, the going independent. I was able to send one newsletter to that audience and say this is where I'll be.So, you know, I don't update that one as often, but I do have. I like to talk about what I'm drinking, you know, when I'm trying new non alcoholic beers, or sometimes I'll share cocktail recipes from new books I'm reading. So that one was actually first. My main gig is the Dinner plan, which is a podcast and substack. It's sort of a living, breathing system. So the podcast goes Every week I interview a cookbook author every week. We talk about inspiration and where they find dinner ideas and the books they love. And then at the end of every show, someone calls in and shares what's in their fridge and the cookbook author guest comes up with a dinner idea for them.And usually these folks are people with cookbooks, often new cookbooks. And so in the substack each week, we share all of the links to all the recipes that they have talked about so people don't have to like, take notes. Anything they've recommended, it's all there in the newsletter. And then we reprint a recipe from Their books. You can get a little preview of the book, and that's why you should sign up for the newsletter. Someone told me they were taking notes on the show, and I was like, oh, no, no, no, you don't have to do that.Stephanie Hansen:You have such good notes on the episodes.Maggie Hoffman:And, I mean, I listen to these things over and over.Stephanie Hansen:You have, like, attached and linked every single recipe idea anyone's ever discussed in the pod. I mean, it's extensive, you guys, you gotta follow.Maggie Hoffman:And then I have a big list, which I think is really fun, of every book that has gotten recommended. So each person comes with, like, two or three ideas. Well, that has become a very big list. We're getting close to 50 episodes, and each person. I mean, you do the math. So, yeah, that's the main project, and then the vintage table is a little side project, and maybe they'll get merged at some point, but I just cannot buy every piece of vintage tableware that I love. And so I thought I should probably start sharing the links so that I get. Maybe other people will take them off the market.Stephanie Hansen:That is smart, because once you start, like, in that Facebook marketplace or Etsy channel of looking for vintage things, ebay, they find you. Yeah, yeah.Maggie Hoffman:So there's usually, like, a theme, you know, sort of beachy things for summer or, you know, whatever is the thing that I'm sort of obsessing over. And that's just for fun, but it's a lot of fun.Stephanie Hansen:Yeah, I. I find it very fun. When you were so how long were you the digital director at Epicurious?Maggie Hoffman:I think I was there a total of four years. I started as the senior editor under David to Markin, who's at King Arthur Flour now, and I took over running it when he left.Stephanie Hansen:And we're probably better off now because we have so many different avenues for creators. Right. Substack has really, like, democratized the creating world. From podcasting, did you find, like, you know, when you work for a big company, there's resources and podcast studios, and then all of a sudden you're on your own and you have to figure it all out. Substack makes it so easy.Maggie Hoffman:Yeah, substack and all the other ways. You know, I think everyone's ability to sort of launch their own ...
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    30 mins
  • Sally Ekus is the "Not So Secret Agent"

    Sally Ekus is the "Not So Secret Agent"
    Jun 13 2025
    Stephanie:Hello, everybody, and welcome to Dishing with Stephanie's Dish, the podcast where we talk to cool people in the food space. We talk to a lot of cookbook authors, and today I'm excited to talk to Sally Ekus. She is a literary agent, which, if you've written books or you're trying to get a book published, you know how important the agent process is. She leads a boutique culinary and lifestyle division via @JVNLA and is the lead agent at the Ekus Group. Did I get it right?Follow Sally’s Substack Newsletter Not So Secret Agent Sally Ekus:Oh, I was just gonna say, yeah, I lead the Ekus Group. So we're a culinary and lifestyle division within a broader agency.Stephanie:And the Ekus Group was started by your mom.Sally Ekus:Yeah.Stephanie:A legend. Your mom has, like, one of the largest cookbook collections that I'm aware of.Sally Ekus:In fact, the largest, according to Guinness. Yes.Stephanie:A couple of months ago, I think maybe it was on your Instagram page, someone posted a picture of her library of her home that is literally looks like a library that you would see in New York city or Washington, D.C. or somewhere fancy with just walls and walls of books. It was so gorgeous.Sally Ekus:Yeah, It's a two store, all cherry wood, gorgeous library. She built the edition. It was a dream edition. It took a lifetime to build. And it is filled with cookbooks, almost exclusively cookbooks. Her fiction and children's books and other personal books are scattered elsewhere around the house. But the library is almost entirely culinary with over 6000 titles. It's really cool.Stephanie:It's amazing. And your mom's name is? Lisa. Please, can I ask you a question? I'm going to go all over the place here, but sure, please. I have a daughter and only one daughter and no sons. So my only child. And there are things that we have in common about cooking and about food, and I always think, like, oh, maybe she'll follow in my footsteps. But then she is quick to point out, like, no, I'm never doing that. But then she's sort of leaning sort of my way.Stephanie:How did that work with you and being in the publishing space?Sally Ekus:Yeah. So how old is your daughter now?Stephanie:26.Sally Ekus:Okay. Yeah. So growing up, my mom had this vibrant culinary business. At the time, it was a PR agency before we did agenting, and it was never supposed to be a family business. She never pressured me or said, you know, maybe one day. In fact, it was just like. If you had asked me before I started working with her, what does Lisa do for a living? I would have said something with books and something in food. So I was like, growing up in this.Sally Ekus:And I was immersed and sort of absorbing by osmosis. And, you know, in the, in my younger years, I would be like, collating press kits for PR campaigns and, you know, I was like earning a allowance, mailing catalogs and whatnot. But it wasn't, it wasn't something she was really like, whatever you want to do, follow your heart. I was on a different path. I went to school for counseling and I was about to go for a master's in social work. And I deferred. I broke up with a bad decision, moved home, started helping out at the agency and realized that I'd been informally training for this my whole life. I really fell in love with it.And I was very fortunate to step into the legacy of her reputation. And then also, once we decided this is something I wanted to do, talk about what the succession plan would look like and really carve out my own, you know, vibe and skill set and cultivate my own list, supporting her list. And so it was really a unintentional natural progression that then became quite intentional and, you know, quite effortful. So I think that's kind of why it worked out. And if, you know, but it's hard to say in hindsight.Stephanie:It's funny too. You talk about this like being in training of knowing this thing and you not even really realizing that until you've left and gone to do something else. And also, it does track that you were going to be a social worker.Sally Ekus:Absolutely.Stephanie:And now you're an agent.Sally Ekus:Yeah. I somewhat sarcastically but realistically acknowledge that I was trained in crisis counseling, active listening, and negotiation. So all of those things play a very big role in the work that I do as a literary agent working with books. But, you know, at the end of the day, it is a book. It is you know, not somebody's. Well, it is somebody's mental well being, but in a. In a different light. So I get to utilize those skills all the time.Sally Ekus:And it feels, it feels quite, quite lucky. And, you know, it's really the client management and author care and author advocacy that I love so much. And that has kept me, kept me in this, in this business for as long as it has.Stephanie:What is it about cookbooks in particular that makes you solely focus on that?Sally Ekus:Well, that I stepped into, you know, that was Lisa's area of expertise. She was one of...
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    27 mins
  • Beth Le Manach has the delightful new cookbook "Entertaining 101"

    Beth Le Manach has the delightful new cookbook "Entertaining 101"
    May 30 2025
    I had a real fun time chatting with Beth La Manach, whose new cookbook, “Entertaining 101” just released. Beth’s YouTube channel is wildy entertaining and she is also on Substack so you can follow her Entertaining with Beth Now since Beth makes it so easy lets all get to Entertianing!EPISODE TRANSCRIPT:Stephanie Hansen:Hello, everybody. Welcome to Dishing with Stephanie's Dish. I'm Stephanie Hansen and I like to talk to people obsessed with food. In particular, I enjoy cookbook authors and today I'm with Beth Lamonic and she is the author of a cookbook that just the title alone, I feel like holy cats. That's so intimidating. It is called entertaining one zero one. Beth, that just makes you, like, right on the level of Martha Stewart in my brain. Were you nervous about calling it one zero one?Beth Le Manach:No. Because the way that I'm thinking about the title is it's really targeted towards beginners or veterans who just need it to be easier and quicker. And I think everybody loves a one zero one entry point because they know it's not gonna be intimidating. It's gonna be accessible.Stephanie Hansen:Well, you are not a one zero one in your chops. You have over 662,000 followers on YouTube. They were like, oh, she has a a YouTube channel. And I went to look. I was like, holy cats. Tell me the name of your YouTube channel because I forgot to write it down. Recipes for entertaining. Was that what it was called?Beth Le Manach:No. It's called Entertaining with Beth.Stephanie Hansen:Got it. Okay. So you also are very fascinating, but I'm gonna get to that part in just a second. Take me through, like, your journey of, like, the how you started the YouTube and how we are that you're just is this your first book?Beth Le Manach:Yes. It isn't my first book. I know. I've been in a long time. I know exactly. Yeah. So it's kind of a long story, but I'll give you the highlights. I started my YouTube channel because I was by trade a producer for television, lifestyle television, and I got my start with the Scripps network.Beth Le Manach:So Food Network, HGTV, Fine Living, I was producing a bunch of content for them. I saw everything going online, digital. So I was like, I wanna produce digital content for the web. I got a job at a company that had a huge order for YouTube. So this was right around 2011 when YouTube started getting grants to media companies to produce quality content so they could get the advertisers to actually advertise against it. Because up into that point, it was a lot of, you know, skate board tricks and cat videos and stuff like that. Yeah. And so since I had come up with all of this kind of lifestyle content, my boss was like, okay. Create a YouTube channel that women will love. And I was a new mom. I had two small kids, and I was into all this lifestyle content, but I knew nothing about YouTube. So I had to really learn what it was, and little by little, we started to just create content. That was food content, fashion, beauty, all the things that I thought, like, women would be interested in.And then one day, my boss came to me and said, you know what? We are, like, really behind on the hours here that we have to deliver. We gotta pep this up a bit. What do you got? And I was like, I think we should do, like, entertaining shows, like, thirty minute shows, like what we used to do for TV. Like, let's do the perfect dinner party. He's like he was like, well, who are we gonna get to do that? And I was like, me. I love to cook, and I have a lot of recipes. And at the time, I just bought a house, and I was like, you know, come to my house. You don't have to pay me.You're already paying me, and let's knock off a few of these episodes. So we did about 16 of them, and then my boss was like, you know, this is really resonating with people. Like and and it really hit me at that point that I thought, how is this new information for people? Because I had grown up with Martha Stewart and Ina Garten, and I just thought that everybody was watching this. But people at the time on YouTube were just getting into, like, all the beauty gurus, and those girls were now aging up and sort of, like, having their first apartment and getting married. And they weren't suddenly gonna go offline and go look at magazines and books. They were staying online.Stephanie Hansen:Yeah.Beth Le Manach:And I think that's where it really resonated. And so long story short, I did that until I started to do it full time, and now the channel is mine, and I just do it full time.Stephanie Hansen:It explains lots of things. One, how prescient of you to see this digital age coming. So very smart.Beth Le Manach:Yeah.Stephanie Hansen:Two, I always talk about first mover advantage. And whenever there's a new platform or something, I always make sure that I log on. I save my handle. Even if I don't know if I'm gonna use it or do anything with it, I I believe that being the first in a space or in in a being a handful of first in a space is ...
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    26 mins

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