Monthly Archives: October 2014

Jane West: Queen of Cannabis

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Taboo Issue Topic: Drugs
Words by Robbie Clark
Photography by Rebecca Stumpf

For a long time cannabis has been considered a societal scourge, a gateway drug that leads to harder substance abuse―or, at the very least, a detriment that leads to cotton mouth, an empty bag of Doritos, and a wasted afternoon on the couch in front of the television. But slowly the plant and its use have been gaining some credibility, especially in the medical and creative fields, and as states are easing their laws regarding cannabis, businesses are starting to envision the possibility of an entirely new, multi-faceted industry opening up in the country.

Jane West thinks it’s more than a possibility; she thinks it will become a reality in the near future. She’s so sure, she made a complete professional about-face.

To read more about Jane West and her mission, subscribe to CAKE&WHISKEY magazine or purchase the single issue here.

Dawn Weleski: Conflict Kitchen

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Taboo Issue Topic: Politics
Words by Melaina Balbo Phipps
Photography by Conflict Kitchen

Pulling into a parking spot, I wasn’t surprised when my stomach started to growl. It was, after all, the first time I’d driven seven hours for Venezuelan food…okay, for any food, really. But I’d made the day-long trek to Pittsburgh from NYC to find Conflict Kitchen, and Venezuelan cuisine was what they’d be serving me.

At the takeout window Quinton, a native of Arkansas with a background in food and editing, pointed me to the Chivo al Coco con Mofongo (slow cooked goat with fried green banana mash), Jugo Naturale (a papaya), and, for dessert, some Besitos de Coco (“Coconut Kisses” or sweet coconut cookies—a bit like mini macaroons). While I waited, we talked about the food, the project, and the biggest surprise he’s encountered while being a Conflict Kitchen employee: “It’s amazing how many people just don’t read the news.”

My order ready, I collected a menagerie of colorful pamphlets offered to educate me—the diner—about hot-button issues in Venezuela: crime, oil, internal polarization, race/class, and the perception of the U.S. government and U.S. citizens.

And just like that I became part of the project.

To read more about Conflict Kitchen, subscribe to CAKE&WHISKEY magazine or purchase the single issue here.

Artist Profile: Clare West

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I think deep down I always knew that I would have a career in which I was creative. I never dreamed it would be photography. A degree in ceramics, numerous temporary office jobs, a year spent travelling, an adult education course in photography, a stint working for a photography studio and a teaching qualification later, I have finally landed in my happy place. I realized that I simply can’t not take photographs. I thrive on capturing people in an honest and true way so that the viewer sees them as they would if they were to sit and have a conversation with that person. I guess you could say I like to capture their essence as well as their presence.

The variety of things that my job allows me to photograph keeps me constantly interested and focused on producing the best work I possibly can in any given situation. It’s such a privilege to be invited into so many people’s lives; learn new things every day; encounter new cultures and thought processes and open myself up to new experiences.

To see more of Clare’s photos, subscribe to CAKE&WHISKEY magazine or purchase the single issue here.

Camelle Daley: The Clergy Couturiere

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Taboo Issue Topic: Religion
Words by Linnea Zielinski
Photography by Clare West

After finishing her degree at the London College of Fashion, Camelle threw herself entirely into the label she started with a family friend. For more than two years, she knew she was draining herself, taking on not only design but marketing and finances for the infant company. Gone were the university days when she had time to flex her creative muscles, to cut a pocket differently and just see where the design led her. It was only after the pending arrival of a second child that she found the impetus she needed to let go of the company that had swallowed her.

Despite the opportunity to rest her strained creativity, letting go of that first business wasn’t easy. She wasn’t just freeing up her time; she was losing her business mentor.

The transition was eased with a humble request. She was asked to design a clerical dress for a  recently ordained youth pastor who was excited by her new job but underwhelmed by the boxy clerical shirt. She hadn’t been wearing her collar. Desperate to reconcile style with career, she turned to her friend for help. It couldn’t be too fussy, so Camelle focused on making small design changes. People raved about the result, an elegant A-line dress. The positive reaction illustrated just how long women of the church had been ready for a change. Not everyone was happy, though, and many were quick to voice their disproval.

In spite of the controversy, Camelle’s clothing line for female members of the clergy, House of ilona, was launched.

Want more on ilona? Subscribe to CAKE&WHISKEY magazine or purchase the single issue here.

Brian Hersch: The Guy Feature

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Interview by Molly Hays
Photography by Mariah Shope

Hersch, whose wildly entertaining word game Taboo has sold 20 million copies (and counting) is founder and General Partner—and chief game guru—of Hersch and Company. His eponymous game design firm is heading into its third decade, boasts a backlist well in excess of 40 titles, and has booked retail sales north of $850 million. The man knows how to make play pay.

Fun and games aside, Hersch takes the business of play seriously. His back story certainly figures in. From a first career in real estate development, Hersch made the unorthodox jump to game design after recognizing a huge untapped market. Thirty years later, he continues to develop hit titles and successfully navigate a wildly dynamic gaming landscape. Here’s his story.

To read more about Brian Hersch and Taboo, subscribe to CAKE&WHISKEY magazine or purchase the single issue here.

Jameson Ginger and Pear Coffee Cake

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Words by Michelle Gayer
Photography by Pamela Sutton

Jameson Ginger and Pear Coffee Cake (Because Jameson is good at all hours.)

Jameson Ginger Syrup

  • 1 cup Granulated Sugar
  • 2 Tablespoons fresh ginger, grated
  • 1 cup Jameson Irish Whiskey
  • Scraped Vanilla Bean pod

Bring all three ingredients to a simmer. Stir until all the sugar is dissolved. Take off heat and let sit for 30 minutes. Strain through a fine mesh sieve.

Oatmeal Streusel

  • 4oz Cold Butter
  • ½ cup Brown Sugar
  • 1 cup All Purpose Flour
  • ¾ cup Rolled Oats
  • Pinch of Salt

Cut your cold butter into ½ inch cubes. Mix all ingredients until crumbly.

Flat Icing

  • 1 cup Granulated Sugar
  • 2 cups sifted powdered sugar
  • 2-3 tablespoons of Jameson
  • 1 teaspoon Pure vanilla extract

Whisk everything together until smooth. Add more sugar if too runny.

Crème Fraîche Cake

  • 8oz Unsalted Butter
  • 2 cups Granulated Sugar
  • Zest of 1 Lemon
  • 1 Vanilla Bean, Scraped. (Save your pod!)
  • 2 Eggs
  • 10 oz Crème Fraîche (or sour cream)
  • 2 ¼ cups Cake Flour (sifted)
  • ¾ teaspoon Baking Powder
  • ½ teaspoon Salt
  • 1-2 Ripe Bartlett pears, peeled and sliced

Cake Instructions:

Cream butter, sugar, zest and vanilla bean. Add eggs one at a time. Scrape your bowl! Add half of your sifted dry ingredients and mix until just combined. Add Crème Fraîche and mix on low until combined. Scrape your bowl again! Add the remaining dry ingredients and mix until just combined. Scrape your bowl one last time!

Pour batter into well-greased medium large bundt pan. Layer pears evenly on the top and push them down slightly so they are nestled in the batter. Sprinkle chopped candied ginger over the pears and cover everything with oatmeal streusel.

Bake at 375 degrees F. until cake tests clean when you poke a toothpick in the middle. About 45 minutes. If the top of the cake is getting too dark you can cover it with tin foil for the remaining time.

After Baking:

Allow cake to cool slightly before flipping it out of the pan and upside down onto the serving platter. Poke holes in the sides and the bottom of the cake and brush generously with the Jameson syrup. Repeat brushing it with the syrup every 15 minutes, 3 times. Save the remaining syrup for serving.

To Serve:

Flip cake onto your serving platter so that the streusel is on the top. Drizzle with flat icing. Top with more candied ginger.

Drizzle a small amount of Jameson syrup on each slice of coffee cake.  Enjoy!

Want more sweet treats? Subscribe to CAKE&WHISKEY magazine or purchase the single issue here.

Whiskey Drink: The Beautiful Little Fool

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Words and Photography by Emily Vikre

2 oz Bourbon (I used Bulleit when I was developing it)

3/4 oz fresh grapefruit juice

3/4 oz Lillet Blanc

3 dashes citrus bitters

Shake these together with ice for 30 seconds, strain into a cocktail glass, and garnish with lemon peel (roll the lemon peel between your fingers over the cocktail to release the oils before dropping it in). If you feel daring, you can rinse your cocktail glass with a peaty Laphroaig before pouring in your cocktail.

Want more spirited recipes? Subscribe to CAKE&WHISKEY magazine or purchase the single issue here.

How the Light Gets In

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Words and Photography by Morgan Day Cecil

My husband and I have a story made for daytime television.

Whenever a new acquaintance asks how we met, I cringe for half a second, anticipating their reaction. I try not to assume they’ll think “Scandalous!” and kiss our friendship goodbye, but I fear it every time. Our “how we met” story is kind of scandalous, and, yes, the soap-opera parallels are obvious.

But our story is also the very thing that shines the brightest in our lives as a beacon of hope and love and redemption.

You want to hear it?

To read the rest of Morgan’s story, subscribe to CAKE&WHISKEY magazine or purchase the single issue here.

Kendra Montejos: The Immigrant Educator

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Taboo Issue Topic: Immigration
Words by Renee Boss
Photography by Sarah Jane Sanders

Clutching a small blue purse with a single coin inside, a gift from her Peruvian grandmother, six-year-old Kendra Montejos and her family boarded a plane bound for the USA. They touched down in a new country to a brand new life in a new language, their belongings fitting modestly into two large suitcases.

Kendra spoke no English when she started public school in Hopkinsville, Kentucky, but she was an eager student, and she was soon asked to help translate conversations between other families and administrators in her elementary school. The rural school system was unprepared for a growing population of Spanish speakers, due to the influx of migrant workers in the area. Kendra took notice, and it eventually became pivotal to her future career.

Curious about Kendra’s career path? Subscribe to CAKE&WHISKEY magazine or purchase the single issue here.

Krista Tippett: The Wisdom Seeker

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Words by Megan Smith
Photography by Pamela Sutton

It’s unusually muggy for a September day in Minneapolis and hair around the city is paying the price. Krista Tippett’s red locks (so I’m told by her assistant) are no exception. Which is why when she darts in the back door of the large Minneapolis studio, behind schedule, she’s apologizing profusely for her tardiness.

Maybe it was just the light from the floor to ceiling windows facing Hennipen Street behind her, but I swear that this mother of two and recent White House Humanitarian Award winner standing in front of me in her smart black sheath dress, wedge heels and September hair, was also donning a halo.

She excuses herself for a moment, and while I finish slicing coffee cake for our afternoon chat, her footsteps echo across reclaimed flooring as she makes her way through the upstairs loft. Minutes later, she’s back on the couch beside me, shoes in hand. “I always have my shoes off here in the office” she confides.

I feel like I’m settling in for an afternoon with my sister.

Trying to tell the story of Krista Tippett within the confines of allotted magazine space is like trying to eat an elephant during lunch hour. Impossible. Her journey is vast and deep and complex, and her interests range from science and politics to history and Netflix show marathons. Her career path has taken enough twists and turns over the past three decades to send a resume writer running for the hills.

Yet, Krista remains grounded, real, funny,  sweet. She’s wickedly smart and keenly observant. And her laugh is as contagious as her humility.

Interested in reading more about Krista Tippett? Subscribe to CAKE&WHISKEY magazine or purchase the single issue here.

Candan Yazar: The Sobriety Savior

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Taboo Issue Topic: Alcohol
Words by Esther Zunker
Photography by Merve Hasman

First published in 1939, Alcoholics Anonymous documents the organization’s 12 key concepts toward recovery from alcoholism and tells the stories of those who have overcome the disease. The book is considered the most widely used resource for millions of individuals in recovery.

Recovering alcoholic, Candan Yazar spent a year translating it into her native tongue.

At 72, Candan’s smile is infectious and warm, and her voice is full of hope. Rightfully so. She will celebrate 30 years of sobriety this year.

As she goes through such daily rituals as drinking coffee, reading the newspaper, visiting her grandchildren and taking a walk by the Bosphorus Strait in Istanbul, Candan thinks of those that are still on the road to recovery, for it wasn’t long ago when she was one of them.

She turned to alcohol while living in Brussels with her husband, ashamed of the way she depended on it, yet unable to give it up. Most disturbingly, she didn’t realize it was a disease that could kill her.

“I thought my liver was a sponge, and it wanted alcohol,” said Candan. “I was becoming crazy. I was very ashamed of myself, but I didn’t know what was happening.”

A knock at her door would change her life. Two women, who would later become her AA sponsors, had heard about Candan’s struggles through a mutual acquaintance and shared their own recovery stories with her over a cup of tea. “I sat with them and listened to their stories, and it was as if they were telling my own story,” Candan reminisced. “I was crying… I was very hopeless, but I begged them to take me to their AA meeting, where my sobriety started.”

Read the rest of Candan’s story by subscribing to CAKE&WHISKEY magazine or purchase the single issue here.

Maria Mejia

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Taboo Issue Topic: HIV
Words by Bethany Miller
Photography by Sonya Revell

Maria Mejia is a powerhouse, even when she’s fragile. The deepest valleys that she has trekked are what make the mountains she is climbing so important. She’s a Sherpa, climbing them not just for herself, but for every person who’s ever heard the words “You’re HIV positive.”

Colombia born Maria is a 25-year survivor of HIV/AIDS. She is healthy because she takes care of herself: she has her daily dose of medication; she routinely sees her doctors; she practices positive thinking and nurtures her body with sleep, nutrition, and yoga. There are moments of fatigue and enervation, so she has learned when to say no and give her body rest.

Her definition of living a full life has much more weight than just physical health. Her strength stems from the love in her life, her travels, and a productive mission:  advocating for HIV awareness.

Those are her words, “productive mission.” I soon found that “productive” is an understatement.

Interested in Maria’s story? Subscribe to CAKE&WHISKEY magazine or purchase the single issue here.

LeNora Fulton: The Native Leader

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Taboo Issue Topic: Politics
Words by Laura Zolman Kirk
Photography by Keith Pitts

We found her by chance: a search for small-town female politicians. The more we researched, the more complex and diverse she became. “Surely this cannot be the same woman,” we thought. A run for president of the Navajo Nation, a mother of six , a grandmother to four, a member of the Navajo Nation Council, a unifying leader in her community and the current Apache County Recorder. Does a mother of six really run for president?

The answer we soon discovered was “yes.”

LeNora could easily be described as the Navajo Leslie Knope. You name it, she’s done it, with poise and a “that’d be fine” attitude. She is not the type of grandmother to sit around and let others take over the firewood delivery for her; she’s the one rolling up her sleeves to deliver it herself. She is a woman in the service of people: her family and her nation. What we need to do with our lives, LeNora told me through a tender smile, “is to help others, to love and have love in our hearts for other people.”

To read more about LeNora Fulton, subscribe to CAKE&WHISKEY magazine or purchase the single issue here.

Marian Anderson: Ambassadress for All

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Words by Lanie Anderson
Imagery provided by University of Pennsylvania Special Collections

We. The word can have powerful implications depending on its context, and so it did on April 9, 1939, when contralto Marian Anderson sang her own rendition of “My Country, ‘Tis of Thee” on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.

When Anderson arrived at the third line of the familiar song, she belted “to thee we sing” rather than the original lyric, “of thee I sing.” The audience—a sea of tens of thousands that stretched from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial to the Washington Monument—might have considered the lyrics a misstep in her performance, but Anderson’s alteration was purposeful.

To read more about Marian Anderson, subscribe to CAKE&WHISKEY magazine or purchase the single issue here.

Barbara Corcoran: Letter To Her Younger Self

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Words by Ellyn Spragins
Photography by Marc Royce

Your people smarts will prove ten times more valuable than all the book smarts you can’t get.

It’s entirely characteristic that the first line of Barbara Corcoran’s bio on her website is “Barbara Corcoran’s credentials include straight D’s in high school and college and twenty jobs by the time she turned twenty-three.” Witty, unpretentious, and an improbable success, Barbara built The Corcoran Group, a Manhattan-based real-estate brokerage started with a $1,000 loan from a boyfriend, into a high-profile market leader that she sold in 2001 for $70 million.

Since then, Barbara, with her signature blonde pixie hair and big, telegenic smile, has popped up as a real-estate contributor on NBC’s Today and has been a columnist for the New York Daily News and Redbook. She’s also written two books: If You Don’t Have Big Breasts, Put Ribbons on Your Pigtails: And Other Lessons I Learned from My Mom and Nextville: Amazing Places to Live the Rest of Your Life. When I spoke to Barbara, on vacation at her summer home on Fire Island, New York, she had recently finished shooting eleven episodes of Shark Tank, then a new reality show on ABC. On the show, Barbara is one of five self-made millionaires—who are the so-called sharks—competing to invest their own money in entrepreneurial ventures they deem worthy.

Her television debut is the culmination of a long effort to reinvent herself after selling The Corcoran Group. As usual, her mother, Florence, provided a key piece of encouragement. After Barbara confessed that she lacked confidence on Shark Tank, her mother said, “Oh, Barbara, don’t be worried. Just picture Mom and Dad floating over your shoulder cheering you on. You know you always do well.”

     If it sounds unusual for a woman in her sixties to still be getting support from her mother, instead of the other way around, consider how fundamental Florence has been to Barbara’s later achievements. Her mother’s unfailing confidence in Barbara formed an armor that insulated her from despair in elementary school, when she discovered a shocking truth about herself. In third grade she heard some of her classmates laughing when she read aloud. She was sent to a special after-school reading class taught by the dreaded Sister Stella Marie. During the very first session, the nun grabbed Barbara by the ear and said, “If you don’t start paying attention, you’ll always be stupid.”

“That’s when it hit me that I had something really wrong with me,” says Barbara. That afternoon she went into the woods and cried. But at home that night she was still a star to her mother. Florence’s reaction to Barbara’s reading problems: “Barbara Ann, don’t even worry about it. With your imagination, you’ll learn to fill in the blanks.”

Here Barbara writes to herself in third grade.  

Dear Barbara Ann,

     Don’t be afraid. Stand up and shout loud and clear enough for everyone to hear: “no, I am NOT stupid.”

     There’s a world of difference between being different and being stupid. It’s not a sin when you can’t follow directions or don’t have the answer. Know that there is no shame in reading out loud and that the other kids’ laughter is just a sign of their discomfort with fears of their own. They don’t realize they are hearing, for the first time, a different kind of beautiful mind.

     You know things the smart kids don’t. You create sidewalk chalk games the other kids can’t even dream of. You often know what the other kids think before they decide to tell you and can feel the mood in a room the moment you walk in.

     You know how to get your sisters to do all your chores. You’ve learned how to bring humor into the middle of your family’s chaos. You know how to build complicated worlds of levels and bridges and alcoves and cliffs and islands and beaches in the little stream behind the house.

      Trust yourself, Barbara Ann. Your talent for daydreaming will come in handy later. And your people smarts will prove ten times more valuable than all the book smarts you can’t get.

     Be patient with yourself and repeat after me: “I am NOT stupid. I am NOT stupid.”

 

     Barbara

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