Lisa Steele

Lisa Steele, author of 'In Season' and known for her expertise in eggs from her Blog, and first cookbook of the same name Fresh Eggs Daily, and farm-to-table cooking, shares her journey from chicken farming to cookbook author. She discusses her creative process, the challenges of social media, and her upcoming baking book, offering insights for aspiring food creators.

Stephanie Hansen (00:00.718)

Hello, everybody. Welcome to Dishing with Stephanie’s Dish, the podcast where I talk to cool people in the food space. I’ve been expanding my repertoire, but I got a cookbook that came across my desk earlier in the season. It is called In Season. It’s by Lisa Steele. She’s the founder of Fresh Eggs Daily. And this is Lisa’s second book. The first book that she has is really all about eggs. Because if you know Lisa, she is a chicken farmer.

But she is so much more than that. Lisa, this new book "In Season”, 125 sweet and savory recipes, is gorgeous. Congratulations.

Lisa Steele l (00:37.886)

thank you. Yeah, it it is a really pretty book. I mean, I know the most important part is that the recipes are delicious, but you know, we do all eat with our eyes. And I feel like if someone’s in a bookstore flipping through the book, you know, they’re just gonna be like, I wanna make that, I wanna make that, that looks so good. I mean, it’s just so because it’s vegetables and fruits and berries, you know. So it was easy to make it like bright and vibrant. You know, my first book, All Eggs, it can get a little dull, you know, eggs are kind of tough to photograph sometimes.

Hmm.

Stephanie Hansen (01:08.138)

Your first book though, okay, so every season I spend a bit good portion of the summer at my cabin. And your book came with me to the cabin this summer because there’s so much to do with eggs and I do a lot of entertaining there. So there’s a lot of brunch ideas. So I use that book a lot.

Lisa Steele l (02:19.71)

Good. And I mean the second book does have a whole egg chapter. So anyone who does love eggs, I managed to slide in, you know, like a bunch of deviled egg recipes and, you know, some baked dishes that I feel like are, you know, kind of like casseroles that are really good for entertaining, or like you said, if you’re, you know, somewhere that you have a limited, you know, cooking space or whatever. So there are still egg recipes for those people that love eggs.

Stephanie Hansen (01:55.47)

Can we talk about like obviously after you got done with the first book, y you had more to say and more to say that wasn’t just eggs? I loved that you expanded your repertoire because obviously you’re a cook. you know how to make and put together a book and put dishes together. What was it that kept propelling you forward, or were you just like, I’m gonna stay on this cookbook jag?

Lisa Steele l (02:19.71)

yeah. So after the first book came out, I mean it was it was brand new. Like you said, I was in the chicken world. I was writing books about raising chickens. I was giving talks about raising chickens and you know, COVID came along and my publisher wanted me to write another chicken book. And I had written like almost a book a year for like six years. And I said to him, I don’t really have anything more to say about chickens. Like I have a blog with a ton of information. I just couldn’t get excited about it, you know. And so I said, I really want to write a cookbook. Like it’s COVID. I feel like this might be the end of the world. You know, I wanna like

Check things off my bucket list. And he did he wasn’t interested. He he said, No, you’ve got your lane. This is what you do. This is what you do. Well, you need to do it. But he very graciously let me out of my contract. you know, you know, as a cookbook author, you they have like first write a refusal, right? And you’ve got like whatever. He let me out of my contract, wished me well. and I hired an agent and pitched, you know, the egg cookbook to him. He loved it.

Jill kind of was so gracious to share with me her agent. and yeah, he loved the idea of an egg cookbook. And he said, you know, it’s the next natural step for you. You know, you’ve got all these people that raise chickens and have a ton of eggs. Let’s do this cookbook. Plus, people who don’t have chickens, you know, so it’s just widening your your universe kind of. so he loved it, got right on board, and it was so much fun. you know.

People say cookbooks are hard to write and it wasn’t easy and it took a long time, you know, two years, right? Start to finish pretty much. but I found it so much easier than writing like a nonfiction chicken book because each recipe is like its own little capsule. You know, you’ve got your your title, you’ve got your head notes, you’ve got your recipe and your photo, and then you move on. And like writing a nonfiction book.

There’s got to be chapters and there’s got to be paragraphs and you can’t do all run-on sentences and it has to flow. And I I just found the whole cookbook process in my mind was so much easier to like wrap my head around, you know. yeah, and I loved it so much. And the book really, for someone who wasn’t in the food world at all and didn’t know anybody and nobody knew me, it really did well. And so, you know, I did get a second book deal and now I’m working on my third cookbook actually. So I was thrilled because

Just to kind of leave that chicken world behind, although I still have my foot in it. I’ve had a couple offers to sell my blog. And I’m like, I don’t know. You know, that’s kind of like my bread and butter still. So I I’m still holding on to that part of it. but the food world is so fun. I’ve had so much fun.

Stephanie Hansen (04:55.276)

So you the first book is egg specific. This second book in season is 125 recipes with eggs, but there are other recipes too, a lot of them. How long did this book take?

Lisa Steele l (05:09.813)

Yeah, vegetables and berries and stuff. so it’s been four years since my first book. But for the first two years, like every week, I was bugging my agent. I was like, I want to write another cookbook. Let’s write another cookbook. And he said, You can’t. You gotta like get some traction, you gotta get some sales, you know. We can pitch one now, but you’re not gonna get as good deal as if you have like a track record. We gotta give it some time, right? So that was like the first two years. And then I just kept bugging and I was like, you know what? I’m just gonna start writing another egg cookbook.

so I I started doing that. I just started creating recipes and testing them and putting them in my little files and stuff. And then finally, you know, they said, okay, we can pitch another book. And I said, okay, great. I’m like, you know, halfway done. And they said, no, no, not another egg cookbook. Like sequels don’t usually do well, whether it’s movies, books, whatever it is. you can’t write another egg cookbook. So I was like, what the heck am I gonna do? Right. So they they suggested farm to table. And I said, I hate that.

that was cool like maybe 20 years ago, but it’s like so overdone. Like I just hate that phrase, like the farm to table. Cause I was like, technically everything is farm to table unless you’re growing vegetables in a lab, right? Or meat in a lab, whatever. So I was like, I hate that, but that’s what they pitched and that what was was bought. So me being me, I was like, well I’m just gonna do what I want to do anyway. So I just kept continuing on. I got the whole egg chapter in there. and then okay.

You hire professionals because they know what they’re doing. And in the end, I am so glad that they pushed me in that direction because it opened up, like obviously I don’t just cook eggs at home, right? You know, so I was like, well, what else do I make? I make sandwiches, I make soups, I make, you know, so I kind of like went through my files and thought about what I ate as a kid. And like it was so freeing not to like have every recipe have to have eggs in it, you know. So I

had a lot more fun with it than I thought it would. Like once I started really embracing it and being like, okay, I have to use different ingredients, you know, it was a lot of fun.

Stephanie Hansen (07:13.866)

As you go into the third book now, are you kind of moving away from egg specifics and what is your third book’s theme? Have you thought of it?

So the the my next book is coming out next September. So once I finished my second book, I said, I don’t want to wait another four years. Like we got to keep the ball rolling, we got to keep the momentum going. And they said, Yeah, now you have a track record, you have whatever. So they almost pitched the next book as soon as I finished my second book. So it’s coming out next September, like in a year. so it is done, it is almost on its way to the printer, like working on the cover, like we’re in that part of it. I mean, I spent the last year and a half, pretty much that was my focus. It is a baking book. so going in kind of a completely different direction, there are a lot of eggs in baking, you know, so kind of I guess, you know, you could say for people who have eggs, it’s a great but I was really excited because at heart I’m a baker. I was an accountant.

And I think that baking, because it’s so precise and there’s measurements and ratios and numbers and you follow instructions, like for my accounting mind, baking makes so much more sense. And I I just really love to bake. Like I find it really relaxing because I feel like cooking is like being in a jazz band. You know, they’re just like, okay, now you and you’re like, like throw in some of this, some of that. Like I don’t know what I’m doing, you know, whatever.

Stephanie Hansen (08:35.723)

Yes, yes.

Lisa Steele l (08:55.487)

But baking is like, okay, like this is a classical piece. Like this is your part and this is what you do every time. And I just find that so relaxing and calming. So I had a blast and it it’s a lot of family recipes. It’s a lot of history. It’s it’s the most personal book to me because it really is going back to like, you know, recipes that I grew up with and, you know, all that kind of stuff. So yep.

Stephanie Hansen (09:21.462)

I can’t wait for that. you are so interesting to me. Like hearing you describe the baking versus the improvisation of just general cooking. I this is why I really don’t like baking because it’s too regimented for me. I’m kind of a shortcutter. I’m like, well, I don’t have dill today, but I have basil, so let’s just throw that in. And for me, that basil.

Baking like gives me just hives because I’m like, it’s so precise. There’s only this box, and I can’t fit in that box.

Lisa Steele l (09:51.58)

Well, it’s just it’s funny too because I am. I mean, asked my husband. He was in the Navy. He is like the disciplined, regimented one. I am like a total free spirit when it comes to life. I fly by the seat of my pants. I don’t really make plans. Like a brand will come to me and say, Hey, can you fit us into your like posting calendar? I’m like, What calendar? I don’t have a calendar. Or like I just whatever, you know, I wing it. I basically wing life. But I think that’s why baking is so calming for me because it is a place where I don’t

like have to be like all chaotic and crazy. And, you know, I just follow the instructions, which is is good for me. But yeah, it doesn’t appeal to everyone. yeah, and people so many people don’t understand you can’t just like make shortcuts. Like, yes, in a soup, if you don’t have potatoes, you can use sweet potatoes or a salad. If you don’t have pecans, use, you know, walnuts or whatever. but in baking, like like if you don’t have like, you know, brown sugar, you can’t just go adding honey or like

Can’t just make up your own rules, you know.

Stephanie Hansen (10:54.232)

Can we talk a little bit about reinvention? Because I feel like it’s maybe I don’t want to be impolite, but you are a woman of a certain age, as am I. And I feel really interested in your transition here because you have really created this whole other life that going from accounting you probably didn’t see coming.

Lisa Steele l (11:20.649)

No, not at all. But I have to say accounting is probably the most boring profession in the world. and I I don’t know what I was thinking, because I am very much a free spirit, you know. So to go to school for accounting, but again, I think it was like a safe space. You know, I was like, I understand what accounting is and what it does. And so, you know, it it kind of like grounded me a little bit. but yeah, great. I mean, accounting, and I worked on Wall Street in the 80s, which was probably the most like exciting type of accounting you could do.

But even still, I said, you know, I don’t want to work in a cubicle like my whole life. That just wasn’t me. But now because I do have a brand and a business, I am so thrilled I have an accounting background. Because you like I I I mean, I keep balance sheets and, you know, cost of good soul. And like I I know, you know, profit margins and, you know, finances. And I mean, I don’t do my own taxes anymore. I used to, but you know, I have an accountant now. Cause again, professionals, you know, I don’t have time to keep up with like

all the latest tax codes and stuff. But accounting is a great like I would suggest for everybody, like anyone who wants to be an influencer or creator or do anything entrepreneurial, at least take a basic accounting class. Like if not in college at like a local community college or in high school, like learn the basis of accounting because it’s just it’s so important for so many aspects of life.

Stephanie Hansen (12:45.826)

That’s a great piece of advice. when we think about being creators, you know, you have to be good at lots of things. So you are good at writing, you are good at recipe development, are you as good at social media? Are you good at video? Are you thinking about expanding your YouTube channel? Substack. Can you walk me through like some of your silos and how you’re getting joy from them and what your strategy?

Is or if it’s just all free flowing.

Lisa Steele l (13:17.301)

Yeah, there is not a ton of strategy. I do have to say I don’t consider myself an influencer. Like I get email constantly from brands, you know, we want to send you our product and we want you to hold it up and talk for 15 seconds and we’ll give you 10% for this code. No, absolutely not. I don’t do that. I’m not an influencer. No desire to work for affiliate income or product. You know, when I started out in 2012, it was so much easier because brands would just put a banner at the bottom of my blog and pay me.

Like it was basically passive income. And that was the majority of my income was just put a banner at the bottom of the blog. And now social media has made it so labor intensive. Like I think if I worried about the algorithms of all the platforms and what I was supposed to be doing and how I was supposed to be doing it and when, I think the burnout has got to be insane. Especially for the people who aren’t aren’t earning that much money. You know, I mean, if you’re earning a ton of money, then fine, hire somebody to do it. But like

I it it just I can’t I can’t spend my whole day trying to figure out what Instagram wants or what Facebook wants. Like I was lucky enough to get in early that I have a huge following, but the engagement is terrible. Like the the platforms are saturated and that’s kind of why writing books appealed to me because I want to reach people outside of social media. Like I don’t it’s just too much for me. It’s just too loud and too noisy, and I do it because I have to. If it imploded tomorrow.

I would be thrilled, you know. I d I do YouTube, I don’t do as much as I should. I have videos on there from like ages ago and that. And I’ve kind of thought about that. but really it doesn’t, it doesn’t really excite me. I mean, I’m bored with my social media. I probably shouldn’t say that, but I’m bored with it. So how can everyone else not be? Like, how can you post? I’ve posted like I’ve posted like 30,000 posts on Facebook. Like

Stephanie Hansen (15:00.326)

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No, I feel you deeply.

Lisa Steele l (15:06.533)

No one’s life is that interesting that they need to post 30,000 posts. And I’ve gone from posting every hour to posting once a day to posting three times a week. Like nothing matters, nothing unless you pay, nobody sees your stuff, whatever. So I love doing podcasts. I love doing radio shows. I love being interviewed for you know digital publications. I love, you know, just doing things like out in the real world more. and I think it’s fooled folly. Anyone who puts all their eggs

In either TikTok or I mean TikTok came so close to going away altogether. If you don’t have some kind of hub like a website or a blog or something that is your own platform, that’s not a business. You’re not a brand. Like it could just evaporate in a second, you know. So you can’t you can’t put so much and and trying to go viral is also not a business plan. Like if if your whole business plan is trying to post things to go viral, I was on

One of my posts, which the only one who’s that’s ever gone viral, will to in 17 years. One was how to tell how old eggs are by reading the code on the carton. You know, there’s like a little code that tells you when the eggs are put in the carton. It was on Dr. Oz. It was shared by like Rachel Ray and Cosmopolitan and The Delish. It got like 17 million views on Facebook. You know what that earned me?

Nothing. You know, so going viral is not a viable business plan either. Like you have to just consistently like do your thing.

Stephanie Hansen (16:35.946)

It is it is funny. I think I went viral-ish, 250,000 views for a video that I took of dragonflies in my garden. I was standing in the garden, all of a sudden I realized I was in like a hatch of of dragonflies, and it was very beautiful. And I filmed and it was like a 20-second video, and I have no makeup on and I’m just filming these beautiful dragonflies. And I posted that and

That was like the most traction I’d ever gotten on a video. So I was like, huh, I wonder if this will move the needle at all. At the end of that month, when I got my check from Facebook for being an influencer on Facebook, it was $33. And it was just, it made me laugh. It was like, gosh, for all the chasing that you do of content and of likes and

This one thing that I just automatically did ‘cause it was beautiful and interesting, it and it barely moved the needle of anything. What is all this brain space that we’re giving to this beast?

Lisa Steele l (17:40.349)

Yeah. People

Yeah. People are not making sure there are people that are making millions of dollars and all that, but most people are not making as much as people probably think they are.

Stephanie Hansen (17:56.503)

Yeah, I think that’s so true. Tell me a little bit about some of your favorite recipes in the book. Yeah. Completely exhausting.

Lisa Steele l (17:58.63)

And it’s exhausting, totally exhausting. Yeah. yeah. So probably and back just before we move on, back to your point. I mean, I can spend first of all, cooking videos are intensely labor intensive. Like, so you can spend all day doing a 30 second recipe video. I can go outside with my camera and point it at the chickens for 30 seconds and it gets much better engagement. So the amount of time and effort you put in

Is not it doesn’t correlate to how well it’s gonna do. So it’s it’s just all confusing to me. So

Stephanie Hansen (18:34.881)

Yep.

Lisa Steele l (18:37.339)

Okay, so yes, favorite recipe. Yeah.

Stephanie Hansen (18:37.908)

So back to the book, if you could tell me.

Lisa Steele l (18:43.429)

So two months ago, I would have said the salad chapter was my favorite. I know salads are not not really what we want to be talking about right now. but I I never really liked salads until I started creating them myself and putting all kinds of interesting things in them, you know, like berries and nuts and cheese and all that. But since salads aren’t really you know, what’s trending right now, I would say that the peach Caprese grilled cheese sandwich.

is one of my favorite. I love stone fruits. and I also did like a grilled apricot like Caprese salad with either mozzarella, a barata, some balsamics, some honey, maybe some herb oil. I really like that, like combining like the sweet and the savory.

Stephanie Hansen (19:30.05)

Yum.

Lisa Steele l (19:33.408)

Yeah, thing just kind of unexpected, like you wouldn’t expect. You know, like take an ingredient and swap it out and make something new.

Stephanie Hansen (19:43.791)

One thing that really intrigued me, well, there were a couple of recipes that I liked. The glazed cardamom peach quick bread. I love cardamom being of the north. That’s a seasoning that is pretty Scandinavian and feels near and dear to me. But having peaches and a quick bread, I really liked that. tell me, there’s pictures of the ingredients here, but not a picture of the finished bread. Is that like more like a zucchini type density, a zucchini bread type density?

It is. It’s it’s like a quick bread. And you that’s it’s funny you should mention that. you can have a photo of every recipe in your cookbook, and invariably you will get a review on Amazon of someone saying, I wish there was a photo of every recipe. Or for my first cookbook, I I think there’s a recipe a photo for almost every recipe. And someone reviewed and said, There’s not a re a photo for every recipe. So I doubt she’s ever even made these. And I was like, What? I mean, first of all, photography is incredibly expensive.

And secondly, some things just don’t photograph well. Or this the spacing, like there’s books have to be in like pages have to be in sets of four just because of the way, you know, books are made. And when it comes to editing, like stuff gets left on the cutting room floor, you know. So the peach bread, actually funny story, because I’ve made that a bunch of times. for the photo shoot, they made it and it just didn’t work. For whatever reason, it was just a disaster. And the time is scheduled so fat, so like.

Lisa Steele l (21:09.166)

they can’t go back and start over because they got to move on to the next recipe, right? So we were like, shoot, like we have no photo. And of course the photos I take are too low res. Like they wouldn’t be high enough resolution for a cookbook because I was like, I have it. Like I’ve made it a million times. Here’s my photo, you know? So they fortunately they had taken kind of a beauty shot of the ingredients. So I was like, well let’s just use that because everyone kind of knows what a quick bread looks like, you know. but this next cookbook too, there was a cheesecake and the

photographer was bringing it over to the table to, you know, set it where she was going to photograph it. And they had all the garnishes ready and the silus came in with the garnishes and the cheesecake slid off of the cake plate onto the floor. And I mean, completely destroyed. And again, they I mean it had to chill. So like they don’t have time to go back and start it over. And so fortunately we did the photo shoot in two sections. So next month we’re doing

the final photo shoot. So they’re gonna have to make it again. But like you you just have to keep moving on. Like stuff happens and you can’t, you know, so sometimes things end up with no rest no photo. But yeah, it’s basically a quick bread. And you could use cherries, you could use plums, you could use apples, you could use like whatever you wanted.

Stephanie Hansen (22:23.852)

Yeah, I liked that recipe. Another one that appealed to me was the roasted grapes with walnuts feta rosemary. Roasting grapes is sort of underrated. Why don’t we roast grapes more?

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Lisa Steele l (22:35.319)

Same reason we don’t grill things. I mean, the grilled apricots or grilled peaches, like when you grill or roast fruits, like it brings out the sugars, they caramelize. those, they’re just delicious. And like I love on a charcuterie board to put those grapes because it is something that’s like unexpected. You know, people are like, what’s that? You know, something a little different.

Stephanie Hansen (22:58.752)

Yeah, and super pretty. Well, Lisa, I am a big fan of your books. I appreciate spending time with you today. I do not have chickens, but I’m chicken aspirational and you usually kind of start that inspiration in me. I don’t think I’ll ever do it, but I do scan your your videos and I go to your page. And I think if I ever was gonna do chickens, I’d start by deep diving into Lisa Steele, because you know so much about chickens.

Lisa Steele l (23:24.385)

you’re funny. Yeah, yeah, I do. We’ve known this a long time, but yeah, I’m thrilled to move into the yeah, yeah. But the food world has been so much fun. And I it’s just, you know, the thing people like make your recipes, you know, it’s it and it’s just creative. You know, I I definitely am like a type A, you know, short attention span kind of person. So there’s so many aspects to writing the cookbooks that

Stephanie Hansen (23:30.038)

Yeah, you’re you’re the ultimate expert on chickens.

Lisa Steele l (23:50.62)

It keeps me busy and occupied like for two years, which is great, you know. So been fun.

Stephanie Hansen (23:57.996)

I love it. Yeah, well, thanks for joining me today. I will put a link to the books in the show notes. I’ll put a link to your blog so that people can find you. And when the new book comes out, make sure to put me on your list. I do want to compliment you two on the packaging of your book. You do a beautiful job.

Lisa Steele l (24:17.313)

the again, another aspect, the like the influencer boxes. It’s so much fun to come up with little things and brands have been so generous, you know, donating things. And that’s the kind of brand work I love to do, like things that are a little bit different. but yeah, brands have been very generous. And this this third cookbook, I definitely want to come back and talk to you about because I think it’s gonna be right up your alley. And there’s a lot of cardamom in it, is all I’m gonna say. So I think you’re gonna love it.

Stephanie Hansen (24:45.322)

Okay, I love it. Thank you so much, Lisa. I appreciate you being a guest today.

Lisa Steele l (24:50.353)

Thanks, Stephanie.

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