Illyanna Maisonet Transcript
Kerry Diamond:
Hi everyone, you're listening to Radio Cherry Bombe, and I'm your host, Kerry Diamond, coming to you from Newsstand Studios at Rockefeller Center in the heart of New York City. I'm the editor and founder of Cherry Bombe Magazine and each week I talk to the most interesting culinary personalities around.
Joining me in the studio today is Illyanna Maisonet, the author of Diasporican: A Puerto Rican Cookbook. Illyanna, who is the country's first Puerto Rican food columnist, shares the story of how Diasporican came to be, and the moxie and tenacity it took to get the book published. Stay tuned for my chat with Illyanna.
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Let's check in with today's guest. Illyanna, welcome to Radio Cherry Bombe.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Thank you for having me.
Kerry Diamond:
And congratulations on your book.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Thank you.
Kerry Diamond:
How does it feel?
Illyanna Maisonet:
Surreal, yeah. I don't think I've really had a chance to really appreciate it yet.
Kerry Diamond:
It is fun when you go into a bookstore though and you see it on a shelf.
Illyanna Maisonet:
I haven't done that yet.
Kerry Diamond:
You haven't done that yet?
Illyanna Maisonet:
I've wanted to but then I'm like, I don't know, I'm kind of shy, because I don't want to be that weirdo who's just like-
Kerry Diamond:
Telling the people in the store, "That's me."
Illyanna Maisonet:
So I haven't done that yet, but I want to though.
Kerry Diamond:
Well, your friends all need to go into the bookstores and redecorate the bookstores, that's what my friends and family did when the Cherry Bombe cookbook came out, because sometimes it wasn't facing, most times it wasn't facing out, so they would pull it out and put it in front of another cookbook that was facing out.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yes, some of my followers have already done that, sent me photos, are like, "Fixed it."
Kerry Diamond:
We've got a lot to talk about. The book is Diasporican: A Puerto Rican Cookbook, but you say in the intro, "This is not a cookbook for Puerto Ricans."
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yes.
Kerry Diamond:
So what is this book?
Illyanna Maisonet:
It's almost like a ‘gotcha,; like the title's for the SEO [search engine optimization], it's like, "A Puerto Cookbook," gotcha. It's like for the diasporicans, it's for all the ones that didn't grow up on the island, but still connected primarily through food, still have that romantic idea of what Puerto Rico was. I don't think there's really been a book necessarily for them, and there's a lot of us here.
Kerry Diamond:
Mm-hmm, 5.5 million strong.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yep.
Kerry Diamond:
Yeah, it's a very big diaspora here.
Illyanna Maisonet:
We're the second largest Latino Hispanic population here, so.
Kerry Diamond:
Mm-hmm. So you grew up in Sacramento. Most Puerto Ricans, as you point out in your book, and as some folks know, mostly have settled on the East Coast.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Mm-hmm.
Kerry Diamond:
How did your family wind up in California?
Illyanna Maisonet:
I have no idea. I don't know. I mean, I already had a lot of family in Philly, but that was my grandma's family, and I just don't think that my grandpa was ready to open that can of worms, and he was just like, we got to go polar opposite, polar opposite, and that's all I know. I never got the chance to ask him, so I literally no idea.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay, okay.
Illyanna Maisonet:
But I see the similarities though between California and Puerto Rico though when it comes to the abundance of natural resources, and the weather, and the coastal aesthetic, I see similarities.
Kerry Diamond:
Mm-hmm. You write in the book about Sacramento being a hard place for you to grow up. We'll talk about your time as an artist, and you still are an artist, you're a culinary artist, I think you can say, but you did not love growing up in Sacramento. I did note though you wrote about your backyard.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yes.
Kerry Diamond:
I think it was maybe just a sentence that you gave it.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Mm-hmm, growing up.
Kerry Diamond:
And I was like, well at least there was a little bit of beauty for Illyanna in her backyard.
Illyanna Maisonet:
That is very indicative of that type of old-fashioned neighborhood, where all the houses are from the 30s, the 40s, and the 50s, where they plant a lot of fruit trees. So I grew up in a lot of that aesthetic, where just to have a pomegranate tree, or persimmon tree in the front yard is normal to me. But then when my cousin from Philly visited he was like, "What's that?" I'm like, "You never seen a persimmon before?" So our backyard was almost like a mini-ranch kind of thing. Yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
Was that something you appreciated back then or were you too young?
Illyanna Maisonet:
Well, my mom says I pretty much spent all day out there, in the crab apple tree, and picking the blackberries, so I must have.
Kerry Diamond:
So you became an artist. So food wasn't something you discovered, even though food was a big thing in your family, you learned how to cook from your grandmother, your big thing was visual arts.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
How did you fall into that?
Illyanna Maisonet:
Well, my mom's a visual artist, and so was my dad. My mom has some of my dad's work, and that's pretty much how they met, was through the arts connection, so I'm sure I got it from them.
Kerry Diamond:
Mm-hmm. So what kind of art were you doing?
Illyanna Maisonet:
When I was young and svelte I was doing graffiti writing in Sacramento, so the older that I got the more out of shape I got, I basically just transfer that to the canvas. So at the time, in 2005, they were calling it lowbrow art, and it was a big deal. There are magazines that came out of that medium, like Juxtaposition, and Hi-Fructose, and Shepard Fairey, and a lot of those artists, there was a lot in San Francisco at the time.
Kerry Diamond:
Shepard Fairey, who went on to do the famous Obama poster. So you wind up in San Francisco.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yep.
Kerry Diamond:
And you're showing your work in galleries.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yep.
Kerry Diamond:
And what happens?
Illyanna Maisonet:
The housing financial crisis of 2008. It literally came to a crash and that was it, done.
Kerry Diamond:
People stopped buying art.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yep. They're like, "We don't have money for this." Yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay, so that happens, you move back home.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yep. Well, I don't even move back home, I go further than Sacramento and I am staying with another visual artist friend out in the rural Auburn. It is black, it's pitch black, he has no neighbors, there's an olive oil farm ranch across the street, so it's just olive trees. A ton of peacocks that come on his property that he doesn't own, by the way, I don't even know where these peacocks come from. And he has neighbors maybe a mile down the way, but I can't see their house, I could just see their horses. So it's quiet, you can hear peacocks, gunshots from people shooting out there, of course, and that's pretty much it. I mean, it was so black that I just remember thinking that, I know it sounds super naive, but looking at the sky when it's so dark and you can see everything, it's terrifying, it feels like it's going to just collapse onto you. I was convinced a mountain lion was going to come by, I was convinced. I don't know how he lives out there, and he loves it, so I don't know.
Kerry Diamond:
You've set a good picture for us, there was not much to do out there. So what did you wind up doing?
Illyanna Maisonet:
So that was the first time that I made beans from scratch, or making bread from scratch, just all kinds of things. And he was like, "Do you ever think about going to culinary school?" And I'm like, "Nope, never." And I said, “Why not?” I ain't got nothing to lose at this point, I don't have anything else going on for me, and I was literally trying to think of my next move.
Kerry Diamond:|
You and your mom go out to Napa to check out, is that where CIA [Culinary Institute of America] is out there?
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yeah, Greystone is in Napa, it's this huge, my mom was like, "Hogwarts," that's how she described it. I'm like, yeah, it's an old winery that they turned into culinary school, but it looks like a castle.
Kerry Diamond:
Greystone is what they call the-
Illyanna Maisonet:
That is what the winery was called, and now that's what they call it, they call it CIA Greystone.
Kerry Diamond:
Got it, okay.
Illyanna Maisonet:
That way they can defer the difference from the one in the Hudson Valley.
Kerry Diamond:
So it sounds like it was very nice looking, but expensive.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Very expensive.
Kerry Diamond:
With the castle came the price tag.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Oh yeah. We went to orientation, and they had us sitting in their demo kitchen, almost like a stadium, the overhead cameras.
Kerry Diamond:
Thinking Iron Chef.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yeah, I was like, I don't think that I could afford this. And then they gave us the brochures and stuff, my mom was like, "No." Because it's so remote that you would also have to live out there. Sonoma Valley is super expensive, other than agriculture, it's going to be agriculture or restaurants, you're going to have to get a job, and then you're going to need a car. There's just all these things that come with it for you to have a semi-undifficult time there.
Kerry Diamond:
And then having to pay all that off once you're out in the real world.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Right exactly.
Kerry Diamond:
So what did you wind up doing?
Illyanna Maisonet:
Some way or another I came across a local community college in Sacramento, American River College, had a culinary department, but it was almost hidden, the information. I'd never heard of it, hardly anybody had heard of it, and they have their own separate website that you have to know about. It was really crazy. Somebody said, "Oh they have it," and I said, "Well I went to go look for it, and I could not find it anywhere." And then somebody said, "Oh, you have to go to ARCCulinary.com, whatever, slash chef," and then it was right there. But if somebody wouldn't have helped me like that, I would've never found that thing. It was weird.
Kerry Diamond:
What was the culinary school there?
Illyanna Maisonet:
More realistic. It just felt like they were preparing you more for the real world, you know what I mean?
Kerry Diamond:
There's something to be said for that.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Right. It was not romantic like Greystone was, it was not idyllic like Greystone was. You might not get the same connections if you went to Greystone, you know what I mean? You're going to have a much harder time working your way up to the French Laundry from ARC in Sacramento as opposed to Greystone Napa. So it really depended on you, how hard you worked, how much you wanted it, it really like, we're going to give you these tools, and then if it's something that you really want, we're going to try to make it happen. It was like that.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay. Did you learn the basics?
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yes.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay. And you learned you were very good at this?
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yes. I was like, this is easy, and I've never said that in my life.
Kerry Diamond:
Were you the star pupil?
Illyanna Maisonet:
Kind of ish. I was the one that people would copy their homework. People would show up late and then copy my homework and stuff. A lot of it is math and I am horrible at math. But they teach you calculations and food costs and stuff, especially fractions, I'm like, I don't understand any of this. I would just try so hard to learn it and learn it, and then I would cry because I didn't get it. And then I would just keep at it though, and then I would finally understand some of it. But I think because I would show up early, I would just really focus, and the teachers, they will see that. They won't cut you some slack, but they're a lot more understanding when you're like that. Except for the dude Rudy who's showing up late and copying my homework, you know what I'm saying? Sorry Rudy, I know you're listening.
Kerry Diamond:
I just thought of that song in my head, “A Message to You, Rudy.” Do you know that song?
Illyanna Maisonet:
[Singing] A message to you Rudy. That's how it was. So I just made sure just to take it seriously, and they saw that.
Kerry Diamond:
Did you have a plan in the back of your mind that this could be a career?
Illyanna Maisonet:
No, it taught me what I didn't want to do. So they have a restaurant on campus that's open to the public, and that's your keystone classes. They make you do front of the house, they make you do back of the house, and because it's open to the public, you're on a real restaurant timeline. If you don't order your ingredients in time, your menus fucked and you're not doing anything. Real pressure. You're still in the bubble, so there's some grace, but the public's still, they're paying, so they still expect a certain, I don't know, professionalism. I was like, I definitely don't want to do this when I'm 50 or 60. Hardly any benefits, with low pay, working my body out, I don't want to do that.
Kerry Diamond:
But you didn't have a plan B?
Illyanna Maisonet:
No.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay. And writing wasn't even a thing yet for you?
Illyanna Maisonet:
No, not for me. I would write, when they would give you writing projects in culinary school, those are the ones that I would do, and because so few people really put any effort into it, my teachers were like, "Wow, this is amazing." They're like, create a restaurant from scratch, and you had to do the design. You had to do the interior design, and you would have to do all the profit and lost, the whole thing.
At the time turn of the century aesthetic was huge, the Edison light bulbs and stuff, but because where we live in Sacramento it made sense, because there's so much gold rush era stuff up there, so I create a restaurant that had that. And then when you get stuck with a group, there's also that one person that does everything and then everybody else is just phoning it in, and people would be like, "Yeah, we should have live music," and I'm like, "No, that's cheesy, I don't want that." They'd be like, "You don't want violins?" "You want to go to a restaurant with that? I don't want that." I was just that type of person, I had a very clear aesthetic in my head of what it is I wanted, and I would give them this packet, they'd be like, "They are illustrations in here." I'm like, "Are there not supposed to be illustrations in here?" I don't know, I was a mad person.
Kerry Diamond:
I mean, we have so much to talk about still, I'm so curious. So we've established that you're naturally gifted when it comes to cooking and culinary things. When does the writing become a thing?
Illyanna Maisonet:
I still had all of my issues of Gourmet, all the old issues of Gourmet, and Bon Appétit, all these old issues that I had.
Kerry Diamond:
And you bought those because you were in culinary school and you just wanted to have them?
Illyanna Maisonet:
No, I bought those before at the community thrift store in San Francisco, because they're just there for 10 cents, or 25 cents, and I was buying old issues of Art In America. So I was like, all these food magazines are interesting, oh they have stories in there, I'm like, okay. And I would just read the stories, which is how I got introduced to Ruth Reichl, because she was at Gourmet at the time.
So I was reading them, I love the way that they write, it's a very ethereal, removed type of way. I am guilty of saying that most of my favorite writers are Hemingway and Kerouac, all these drunk, misogynistic white dudes. But that's the type of writing that I liked. So when I was up in Auburn, that's when the Bloomsbury edition of Kitchen Confidential had came out, so it was getting reintroduced to the world, and when I read that I was like, this dude's writing food like Hemingway writes about adventures in the Serengeti, it's something I had never seen before. And I was thinking, when I was writing, I was trying to mold my writing after Ruth Reichl and M.F.K. Fisher, which I'm clearly not, I don't really come from that type of background, so the way that Bourdain wrote made a lot more, more sense to me and I said, this might be something I could actually do. So I just started writing how I talked, how I spoke mostly.
Kerry Diamond:
Now you mentioned to me that your main writing back then were Yelp reviews.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Horrible Yelp reviews.
Kerry Diamond:
Wait, reviews of horrible places or horribly written Yelp reviews?
Illyanna Maisonet:
Both. I started that in 2008, and I would write, and I would still, for a long time I would still use Yelp as a place to practice for public eye, way after I was professionally writing. There are so many horrible writers on there that I was like, okay, I got to do this for the cause, man. Your writing is not only terrible, it's also terrible to the restaurant. Your writing is grammatically horrible, and also you're saying horrible shit. So I have to do justice and write about things, but because I was writing about most of the places in the neighborhood that I grew up in, it actually gave me the idea to write about them professionally, which I really hadn't considered before.
Kerry Diamond:
I love how all these pieces came together for you.
Illyanna Maisonet:
It's all just, I don't know.
Kerry Diamond:
Did you become one of the Yelp Elite? Because there was actually a level called Yelp Elite.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Not only that, I did, but because I did it for so long I got their black badge, which they give to people who've been on for 10 years, or something like that.
Kerry Diamond:
I wanted to start a thing called ‘Yelp Something Nice Day,’ where everybody on the planet had to review something they really liked.
Illyanna Maisonet:
See, exactly.
Kerry Diamond:
I never got that off the ground.
Illyanna Maisonet:
That would've been a nice thing to do.
Kerry Diamond:
Still time.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yes.
Kerry Diamond:
When did you realize how important Puerto Rican cuisine was to you and your life?
Illyanna Maisonet:
I didn't really start chronicling it until culinary school.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay.
Illyanna Maisonet:
You finish culinary school you're like, "When I went to culinary school, when we were in culinary school we..." So I was definitely in that phase. So my grandma's cooking, everybody in my family likes to eat Puerto Rican food but nobody knew how to make it and every time I would try to make her food it didn't come out. You know what? I'm going to just sit in the kitchen with her and watch her and document what she does. So when she'd be like, "Oh, you add this much water," and I'm like, "Wait a minute, wait, pour that into this measuring cup and then I will reverse and then see how much you use," or whatever, it was like that.
That is the beginning of when, I produced a little cook booklet with my brother-in-law, it was like 15 pages, or something, 10 recipes, and it was all my grandma's recipes. And then he and I, we went to Puerto Rico together to look at, take photos, and visit some other people and stuff. And we went and saw this woman, Lula, and she was making this food, it was Puerto Rican but it was almost Puerto Rican food in its early existence. She was doing everything really rustic and primordial, and I had never heard of anything like that, I had never seen anything like that, I found her through just a deep rabbit hole one night at 3:00 AM, I'm like, I have to see this woman, she was like a mystic.
And I remember going up to her, and arroz con gandules is like Puerto Rico's national dish, I just assumed that everybody ate that, and I remember saying, when we were ordering food I said, "Do you have arroz con gandules" And she was like, "No." She said, "Around here we do rice with crab," that's what she said. And I was like, "What the hell is rice with crab?" I had never had it, it only exists in certain parts of Puerto Rico, the crabs have to be in season. And to me I'm like, okay, well there's only one season in Puerto Rico, it's hot as hell here all the time, how do you guys have seasons? Because to us seasons are the four seasons, but yeah. So when I read Bourdain I was like, okay, I want to be a food writer. But when I met her I said, I want to write about Puerto Rican food. So it's all by accident, each time.
Kerry Diamond:
And when did you start to think, wow, we're such a big block, the Puerto Rican diaspora in America, but Puerto Rican food just has never really gotten its due in this country.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Especially in New York, I feel like because New York is its own little thing. Puerto Ricans have had such a huge influence on New York, to the point where there's Nuyorican. There's no Los Angeles Ricans.
Kerry Diamond:
We have a parade.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Right, or Jersey Ricans, it's just Nuyorican. They contributed to so much of the culture and music and art and poetry and theater, and somehow still, out of all that, I mean, even contributing to the beginning elements of hip hop, graffiti, and DJing and beatboxing, and somehow or another the only thing is just food. There's just still no food. Everything else, but except food, and I'm not really sure why. I mean, maybe it's because people think, one of the main complaints with my book was, oh, the recipes are beautiful, but a lot of the recipes take a lot of time to make. And I feel like that might be a thing. Post-residual 30 Minute Meals, Rachael Ray thing, and people got really influenced by that so now they're almost expecting now to have recipes be around that time.
Kerry Diamond:
I think you just need to be like Julia Child. Try making that beef bourguignon in less than a few days.
Illyanna Maisonet:
But even when they make that it's a huge ceremonial thing for them, they're like, "We got to document this on social media," it's like, "I'm making Julie Child's beef," it's this huge thing, and I'm just like, dude, I'm over here stewing freaking meat for an hour on a regular basis. I don't know.
Kerry Diamond:
How did you wind up becoming the country's only Puerto Rican food columnist?
Illyanna Maisonet:
Another happy accident. I had already written a couple of things for the Chronicle [San Francisco Chronicle]. So I used to do pop-ups in San Francisco, at a place that's no longer there, and I was doing Puerto Rican food pop-ups, of course. And then through that they had found me and they asked me to write a very small something for the Chronicle. It was just a little small, nothing really. And then just from there I was getting more and more gigs from them. Somebody asked me, "What are the Puerto Rican restaurants?" I said, "Well, there's actually a couple of Puerto Rican restaurants here," I'm like, "Not a lot, but there's a handful." And they said, "Well, why aren't there more?" And I was the first real article that I wrote for the Chronicle, was why aren't there more Puerto Rican restaurants in Northern California?
So from there, it was a short period of time from them giving me a story and then from me pitching, and then literally maybe one other pitch, and then I said, "Is there any chance for me to become a columnist there?" And they're like, "Well, what would you write about?" And I said, "I want to write about Puerto Rican food." So I had to come up with a pitch of course. I sold him on an idea this doesn't exist anywhere else, nobody has written about this at all. And I think at the time I might have had a few colleagues that were also columnists there, like Nik Sharma was a columnist at The Chronicle, who has now done his book A Brown Table. Paolo Lucchesi was there at the time and he was really big on that. He was really big on not just performative diversity, but actually having diverse voices, because that's the voices that he likes to hear. He's not there anymore, he's at Resy now.
So I was like, "Okay, cool." And most of the stuff that I wrote about in the column found its way in the book. I didn't know it at the time that those things would end up in the book, but they did.
Kerry Diamond:
When did you decide you wanted to write a book?
Illyanna Maisonet:
When we did that little booklet in 2014, that book was supposed to be a supplement that was going into my proposals to the acquisitions editors, they'll have a better idea of what this concept looks like if we do this book. That's why the book, the photos in that book don't look much different than the photos in the Diasporican because they're both by my brother-in-law. I knew that I wanted to do a bigger book, but it just was trying to convince other people to want it to, I guess.
Kerry Diamond:
So you've talked a lot about what a tough journey it was to actually get a deal, get a book.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Right.
Kerry Diamond:
Did you anticipate that it would be hard?
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yes. Becoming an author is not an easy thing, I realized that becoming an author, it's a privileged position, even though everybody wants to be an author. But I also knew that I had, when they say find your niche, I had a niche. At this point I knew so many people in the industry, people like renowned chefs and stuff that were like, "Just keep writing," I kept writing, "Become a columnist," I became a columnist, "You should do this." It was like I was doing all the steps, the steps that they knew that had made them successful. I'm doing all the steps, and I know that I'm doing well. I am not a braggart, but I also know that my old work is not crumbs. By the time it took me to get my one book published, homegirl over here had already published like six Instant Pot, paleo, Atkins, keto books, you know what I mean?
Kerry Diamond:
It is frustrating when you dig into what really sells in the cookbook world.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yes. And I was like, okay, and they just kept saying, "There's no market for it. There's no market for it, you don't have a platform." And by platform they keep saying, some of them would say, "Well, platform doesn't necessarily mean social media numbers." Yes, it does, because they want you to come in with your own built-in audience, so then that way it, to them, it means automatic sales.
Kerry Diamond:
Had you considered self-publishing?
Illyanna Maisonet:
No, everybody told me to. First of all, I'm too stubborn. I'm way too stubborn, I'm way too hardheaded, way too hardheaded. But also I was like, I shouldn't have to, my idea is good, and there's nothing like it that exists. I shouldn't have to self-publish.
Kerry Diamond:
Mm-hmm, you're like, I've got 5.5 million strong who will support this project.
Illyanna Maisonet:
That also makes me more stubborn and hardheaded to even say something like that, yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
You did have amazing connections along the way. I mean, you even had José Andrés going to bat for you.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yep, he is my mentor, José is my homie, yes.
Kerry Diamond:
That's amazing that you can say that. I mean, he's a hero to so many people, and myself included. How did you two become friends?
Illyanna Maisonet:
He saw me on the internet bitching and complaining. He said-
Kerry Diamond:
Wait, is that all it takes? I love complaining.
Illyanna Maisonet:
I was literally on Twitter moaning and groaning, as is my style at the time, which I can't do anymore cause my agent won't let me, and he's like-
Kerry Diamond:
That's no fun.
Illyanna Maisonet:
"Do you have a cookbook proposal I can see?" And you go on Twitter and you're like, your 140 characters of grobblety goo, and then you walk away, and then you come back you're like, it was a uh oh moment, people are tagging me, they're like, "You better send him your proposal now," I'm like, what are these people talking about? I was like, oh snap. I was like, okay.
Kerry Diamond:
Damn.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Luckily I already had that proposal ready though.
Kerry Diamond:
And you got it to him?
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yep.
Kerry Diamond:
Great. And what was his feedback?
Illyanna Maisonet:
"Let's try to make it happen. I will do everything that I can to make it happen. I will introduce you to my agent," which he did, "I will use my contacts," which he did. He had got me a gig here in New York where I cooked for the wrap party of the West Side Story movie.
Kerry Diamond:
Steven Spielberg's movie, mm-hmm.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Right. And I was like, nobody had done that for me. Everybody kept saying, people were just giving me these well-meaning, well-intentioned piece of advice, but José was like, he's a doer. He's one of those rare people that's both a dreamer and a doer, those people don't really exist a lot, and he's one of the few people that was actually doing for me instead of just talking, and I got paid a lot.
Kerry Diamond:
Nice, nice, bonuses all around. Even someone as renowned and beloved as José Andrés could not make a cookbook materialize for you, a deal.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Nope, nope.
Kerry Diamond:
You wound up selling this on your own, you didn't even have an agent.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Nope. So when I got the offer, I tried to run back to the people who had rejected me and say, "Look, I got an offer, I'm basically having you be my agent for nothing, I did all the work," and they were still like, "No."
Kerry Diamond:
You tried to ‘Pretty Woman’ them?
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yep, big mistake. They were like, "Nope, we're still not interested." I'm like, "Okay, so now I'm starting to guess that maybe it's not you guys aren't interested in the idea, you might not just be interested in me, and that's fine, just be upfront about that so I can move on."
Kerry Diamond:
Mm-hmm. And here we are.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
So tell us who finally published the book.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Ten Speed did. In 2020 Lorena Jones, who's no longer there, because of all my moaning and groaning I was cutting through the noise, I think. And at the time a lot of people were looking for creators of color to help uplift and put on, or whatever. After George Floyd got murdered it was these two sets of people that were panicking and trying to do this performative thing, and then there were all these people that were also, they had been looking, but it's just so hard to cut through the noise. So I think that Lorena was one of those people that was just looking, but once she saw it she was like, "There it is." And people always say, if you stay ready, you don't got to get ready, and I was already ready, I'd been ready. So when she said, "Do you have a proposal?" I'm like, "Do I? Not only that," I said, "I have this little booklet," and she said, "I remember seeing that little booklet a couple of years ago on the acquisitions editor's desk," and I was like, "Tell me who they are right now." Give me names.
Kerry Diamond:
Are you a grudge holder?
Illyanna Maisonet:
I am not only a grudge holder, but I'm also a ‘revenge is a dish served that's cold,’ type of person. So it'll be like 20 years, you forgot, I'm like, yeah, there it is. I'm very petty, very petty. My therapist knows this, sorry.
Kerry Diamond:
Oh my gosh. Well hey, at least you own it, there's that. Some people can't own their pettiness. Okay, so now you've got this beautiful cookbook.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yes.
Kerry Diamond:
So it's finally out in the world, thank you Ten Speed. For giving us this book.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yes.
Kerry Diamond:
Let's jump into the book. There's so many aspects of it that I love. I laughed, you wrote in one part of the book, "Some of the folks who rejected it said there was too much memoir in it," and I'm like, that's what makes a good cookbook.
Illyanna Maisonet:
"Very memoir-y," they said.
Kerry Diamond:
Memoir-y, yes. Yeah, that's not a word, people, don't tell Illyanna it's too memoir-y. I really like the cooking traditions and flavors part because they are traditions I didn't grow up with and I love learning about other cuisines and cultures. I did not know about washing meat.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Washing meat.
Kerry Diamond:
So tell us about washing meat. I've never seen my mom or my grandmother wash meat.
Illyanna Maisonet:
There are several ways to wash meat, some people go too much, go to great lengths. Sometimes if I get chicken and it's a little slimy I will rinse it off, because I'm like, ‘eh, whatever.’ However, there are also some people that will fill their sink with water and submerge the meat in there, and rub it with vinegar and lemon, and dump it and then wash it again. It's almost removing what that thing is supposed to taste like. I don't really understand the concept, I feel like it could be from a time where that was necessary, but it is not necessary now.
Kerry Diamond:
Do you still do it out of habit?
Illyanna Maisonet:
No.
Kerry Diamond:
No.
Illyanna Maisonet:
If the chicken is whatever I rinse it, but I don't wash my beef, I don't wash my pork. It literally goes from whoever I bought it from straight into the pot.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay.
Illyanna Maisonet:
But I do leave it in a bowl for a little bit with vinegar, but that's something that I got from my grandma.
Kerry Diamond:
Why do you do that?
Illyanna Maisonet:
Well one, because I got it from my grandma, but I think that it does tenderize the meat.
Kerry Diamond:
I'm sorry, grandma, I don't mean the question.
Illyanna Maisonet:
I think it does tenderize the meat a little, it makes it a little more softer, but I also like that flavor that it gives. Especially if I'm not cooking with too much acidity, it's already there in the meat.
Kerry Diamond:
I know you learned how to cook originally from your grandmother.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yes.
Kerry Diamond:
Is she still alive?
Illyanna Maisonet:
No, she died in 2015.
Kerry Diamond:
Oh, okay. Well she'd be so proud that you have a cookbook.
Illyanna Maisonet:
She loved me unconditionally, so there's that, yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
Aw, okay. So you don't wash your meat, but you do wash your rice.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yes, and what's funny is that there's a man whose last name is Lundberg. In California there's a rice empire called the Lundberg Rice Company.
Kerry Diamond:
Yeah, their rice is all over.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Right, so that's where he comes from. And I didn't know he had in my book, he just had it, I don't know how he got it, whatever. And he had posted what I said about rice and he goes, "Can confirm." He's in politics now, but he still comes from the Lundberg family. So I was like, thank you. Yeah, somebody in rice backed me up, cool. But it's true, especially we're in Sacramento, there's rice patties all around, and they're beautiful. They flood them with water, and it gets really green, and it's really beautiful and stuff, but it also parallels at the time where there's a lot of migrating birds, oh rice patties, also thousands of migrating birds (beep) on top of the rice patties.
When they say people don't think about where their food comes from, I think when they think of that they're thinking mostly about produce and meat, but they also don't think about how their grains are stored either. That's how they're grown, and then they get processed, and sometimes, depending on where your rice comes from, where you're buying it from, it's also stored in huge silos just out in open air, just on top of each other. It's not in a bag, it's not in a sack, it's just a metal silo and the rice. Mice run over that, lots of stuff run over those things. So if that's not one reason why you should be washing rice, even though it does get processed and polished and stuff, unless you're making sushi rice, you also don't really need all that starch either. Most people complain about that part of rice, "It's so sticky." Yeah, because you're not washing it.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay, so washing rice. You don't soak your beans.
Illyanna Maisonet:
No, my mom and my grandma never did, I think they just let it cook for longer. They're trying to cook, but it's also like, I don't have time for this, just put them on the stove and walk away, not soak them overnight and then have to think about it, it's the same amount of time, you just put them in a pot.
Kerry Diamond:
I love the Puerto Rican flavor lexicon in the beginning of the book.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Thank you.
Kerry Diamond:
Tell us one or two things in that that you can't live without.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Sofrito and tomato sauce. I usually sneak those two things into everything. I sneak those two things into curries, taco fillings, stir fries. When I'm cooking sometimes I'm like, this needs more flavor, sofrito. This needs a little more moisture, tomato sauce. Because tomato sauce will give the moisture, but also a little bit of more flavor. I just always go to those two things for some reason, I don't know. And then the same thing with adobo seasoning, I got to put that in everything. I don't know, I just have to.
Kerry Diamond:
So if somebody's got your book, and I hope you all get the book, what's a recipe that you think is a good gateway to the rest of the recipes?
Illyanna Maisonet:
I always like to start people off with carne guisada, made with chicken though, which it becomes pollo guisado, because chicken recipes are always so popular. Because I feel like when you make that it's relatively easy, it's relatively quick if you break down the ingredients smaller. All the ingredients are accessible, but then you also have to make two recipes to make it, you have to make the sofrito, which I'm really trying to press people to get, and then you get to make the chicken braise too, which the carne guisada is basically just a braised chicken dish. But when you make the sofrito, you can freeze it and use it in everything else. That's what I said, the curries and taco fillings and chili, all the Americana recipes that people love to, use the sofrito in that.
Kerry Diamond:
And is there a standard sofrito, or does everyone put a little bit of flair into their own?
Illyanna Maisonet:
Everyone has their, I mean, there's some things that automatically go into it, but everybody has their own-
Kerry Diamond:
Such as?
Illyanna Maisonet:
Garlic, onions, some type of pepper, then it depends on where you are. Here cilantro has become a big thing, but if you're in Puerto Rico then you use culantro, which is recao. Here we have to use green bell peppers, in Puerto Rico ají dulce are what they use, which they look like habaneros, but they're not spicy, they're sweet. But here we have to use green pepper bell peppers in the place, but in California, where we have bounty, people use bananas or gypsies or anaheims. You can use all type of peppers as long as they're sweet.
And then the controversial ingredient is tomatoes. Most people would say, "That's not a sofrito." Well, interesting you should say that, because when you add the tomato it becomes sofrito, if you don't use a tomato, you only use the cilantro or the recao it's recaito. I don't think most people really pay attention to that, because even when you see Goya on the shelves, the red jar is sofrito, the green jar is recaito. I don't think that they really pay attention to that, so sorry.
Kerry Diamond:
Which recipe is the most personal?
Illyanna Maisonet:
I would say my mom's, her mushroom chicken recipe. It's really one of the only entrée recipes, most of her stuff is quick cook. It's her longest cooked recipe. It's my death row meal, first of all. She used to do chicken wings, they're kind of expensive now, so she would take chicken wings, specifically chicken wings, fry them first and then take them out, set them aside, make the gravy. So the gravy is just the Campbell's cream of mushroom, with a little bit of milk. Her secret ingredient to all her gravy is soy sauce. I don't know where she picked that up. I asked her, she doesn't know either. A couple of splashes of that, and then she'll add fresh mushrooms too, because my mom really likes mushrooms. Put the chicken back in and let it simmer in with the gravy, and then serve it over mashed potatoes or rice, or if we don't have either, bread.
Kerry Diamond:
Yum.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
That sounds great. Recipe that you think will be the most popular?
Illyanna Maisonet:
I thought that the lechon recipe would be popular, especially with the barbecue bros. There's not a whole lot of information about lechon cooking in books, so I know if I started seeing them I know where they got item from. So the only two places I know that make lechon, roasted pork, like Puerto Rico is the Philippines. Both obviously colonized by the Spanish. You take a whole pig, you put it on the spit, we use the bamboo pole, and then you roast it over an open fire on the spit. So I just built a pit, put the coals underneath, and then you just keep turning it. Some people have gotten a mechanized one, which is super fancy, but otherwise you just have to keep hand turning it for eight hours, which is what we do, we hand turn it for eight hours.
Kerry Diamond:
You earned that meat at the end, right?
Illyanna Maisonet:
Totally.
Kerry Diamond:
After eight hours of turning.
Illyanna Maisonet:
And you marinade it inside with mojo, lot of oregano, lots of garlic. And then while it cooks, you baste it with a mixture of achiote, oil, and garlic. And so far the most popular recipe I think that people make is arroz con gandules.
Kerry Diamond:
It's never the one you think it's going to be.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Never.
Kerry Diamond:
Aside from buying your book, how can folks support you?
Illyanna Maisonet:
They can subscribe to my newsletter on Substack, which the information can be found on my Instagram at Eat Gorda Eat, E-A-T, G-O-R-D-A, E-A-T.
Kerry Diamond:
So you have a free and a paid version of the newsletter.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yes, my Substack newsletter has a paid and a free option, yes.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay, so hopefully if people do the free, they'll convert to paid.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Mm-hmm.
Kerry Diamond:
And you also have a fun project that you did with Burlap & Barrel.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yes, I created a sazón and an adobo blend with Burlap & Barrel.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay, and what's unique about them?
Illyanna Maisonet:
It's salt-free. We're the only sazón that uses wild achiote single origin from Puerto Rico, so we get it from a small farm in Puerto Rico.
Kerry Diamond:
Is that a fun project to work on?
Illyanna Maisonet:
No. I mean yes, it's fun, but it's also, somehow or another I became a freaking achiote spice sourcing person, you know what I mean? Because-
Kerry Diamond:
You're an expert now though. They gave you a lot of free-reign.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yes, they're like, "Do you know anybody?" I'm like, "Eh, I could probably find somebody," and they're like, "Okay." I found a couple of people, a lot of them just, they were like, "Yeah," and then they just ghosted me, and I'm like, "Hello?" I'm like, okay. And then one guy finally came through, and he's been really great. But the only issue is now, when they first released it sold out in a week.
Kerry Diamond:
That's exciting.
Illyanna Maisonet:
It's like, yay, but we also use wild achiote. And then Hurricane Fiona came through, and that affects our source, we have to wait to see how Mother Nature tore through that area of Puerto Rico. If it did, then it's going to be a while. We'll see. So, so far it has sold out, but we are getting some new stock in really soon because we just got some achiote.
Kerry Diamond:
Right, well it sounds like a fascinating project.
Illyanna Maisonet:
I like it, it's fun.
Kerry Diamond:
Yeah.
Illyanna Maisonet:
I like it. It's challenging, so I like it.
Kerry Diamond:
Producing a cookbook and doing a cookbook tour are like running a marathon, how are you taking care of yourself these days? And it's okay if the answer is you're not.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
Because if a lot of us are honest, it's hard.
Illyanna Maisonet:
I don't know, I just try to have boundaries, you know what I mean? Unfortunately, much to Ten Speed and to my agent and my publicist, I say no to a lot of things, especially if I don't think it's really going to serve me, I'm like, "Unfortunately, I just have to say no." I think in that way I am taking care of myself because I know my limitations ,and I know where I exert, so I'm just like, I'm not going to do that, and I'm not going to feel guilty about it.
Kerry Diamond:
What's next?
Illyanna Maisonet:
I don't know, maybe create a television supplement to the book, which would be great, it'll have more eyes on what's in the book. But other than that, I don't know.
Kerry Diamond:
Have you been able to enjoy this yet?
Illyanna Maisonet:
Nah, it doesn't seem real to me yet.
Kerry Diamond:
When do you think it will sink in?
Illyanna Maisonet:
Maybe when I become Oprah rich, which is my version of success.
Kerry Diamond:
Oprah rich is pretty rich.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Yes, that, to me, is success.
Kerry Diamond:
I think you're a success already, Illyanna. I mean, you've shown so much tenacity in getting yourself this
far and getting this book out into the world.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Thank you.
Kerry Diamond:
And I hope it's being received as positively as it deserves to be.
Illyanna Maisonet:
I hope so too.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay, I guess that's it. Well, Illyanna, you're the Bombe, thanks for coming by.
Illyanna Maisonet:
Thank you, thank you for having me, I appreciate it.
Kerry Diamond:
That's it for today's show. Be sure to check out Diasporican at your favorite local bookstore. If you enjoyed today's podcast check out past episodes with great cookbook authors, including Melissa Clark, Zoe Adjonyoh, and Hetty McKinnon. Listen on your favorite podcast platform. And sign up for our free newsletter at cherrybombe.com so you can stay on top of all Radio Cherry Bombe news and new episodes.
Radio Cherry Bombe is a production of Radio Cherry Bombe, our theme song is by the band Tralala. Thanks to Joseph Hazan, studio engineer for Newsstand Studios at Rockefeller Center, and to our assistant producer, Jenna Sadhu. And thanks to you for listening, you're the Bombe.