Natasha Pickowicz Transcript
Kerry Diamond:
Hi, everyone. You are 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 founder and editor of Cherry Bombe magazine. And each week, I talk to the most interesting culinary folks around.
Today's guest is Natasha Pickowicz, one of the most modern pastry chefs around, and part of the new generation of food folk who seamlessly weave community and activism into everything they do. Natasha's first ever book, More Than Cake, just launched. Congratulations, Natasha. And it is filled with Natasha's unique approach to making desserts. Also, more congrats to Natasha on her big bake sale in Brooklyn in support of reproductive rights. It was nice seeing so many of you there and at our Jubilee conference. We will, of course, be talking about Jubilee in the weeks to come.
I'm so appreciative that Whole Foods Market returned as one of our partners. Whole Foods Market has supported all of our New York City Jubilee conferences since our very first one in 2014. One of the things I admire about Whole Foods Market is they are partnering with Amazon to cut food waste in half by 2030. This year, Whole Foods Market brought its sustainability message to life at Jubilee in several ways. As part of its program called Nourishing Our Neighborhoods, Whole Foods Market has a fleet of refrigerated vans that collect extra produce, meat and prepared foods, and they deliver everything to local food redistribution and food rescue centers. One of these vans was parked outside of Jubilee and collected extra food from the conference. It was one of the many steps we took to combat food waste at this year's Jubilee. Inside, Whole Foods Market showcased two brands that use upcycled produce, Chia Smash, a line of naturally-sweetened jams, founded by Anna Peck, and Matriark Foods, a line of pasta sauces and vegetable broth, founded by Anna Hammond. Rethink Foods, which works with Whole Foods Market and has donated 10 million meals to date, sustainably and equitably, was also at Jubilee. You can learn more about Whole Foods Market's sustainability program at wholefoodsmarket.com/mission-in-action/environmental-stewardship. I know that's a long URL, so the link is in our show notes. Also, look for Chia Smash and Matriark Foods at your local Whole Foods Market. Now, here's today's guest.
Natasha Pickowicz, welcome back to Radio Cherry Bombe.
Natasha Pickowicz:
Kerry Diamond, I'm so happy to be here again.
Kerry Diamond:
I'm sure the audience will be thrilled to hear this. I did zero preparation-
Natasha Pickowicz:
Perfect.
Kerry Diamond:
... for this interview, but I feel like I already know so much about you. I've looked at your book now several times, and you did a wonderful interview on She's My Cherry Pie.
Natasha Pickowicz:
Oh, my gosh. It was so fun. Jessie is incredible. She's such a good interviewer. And I think also, because she comes from a professional baking background like me, the ways that she's thinking about the home baker and writing recipes, I really identify with because we're both infusing our past lives into the way we work now, so it's just great to meet a kindred spirit like that and it was really fun.
Kerry Diamond:
Oh, that makes me so happy. This is my official plug for She's My Cherry Pie, our brand new baking podcast, hosted by Jessie Sheehan. We just wrapped season one and are about to start season two really soon. Jessie really lives and breathes it. In so many of our Radio Cherry Bombe interviews, sometimes I'll get to the end of the interview and I will have completely forgotten to ask anyone a question about food.
Natasha Pickowicz:
We contain multitudes.
Kerry Diamond:
You really do, and that's what Radio Cherry Bombe is all about. But on the baking podcast, you really go deep and nerdy.
Natasha Pickowicz:
I was going to say, we talked about chiffon cake for 25 minutes, and I think she also brought up this idea of testing recipes and logging in those mistakes, and I was like, "We could talk about literally just this topic the whole time because for me," it's so comforting to be able to discuss this sort of... When you get the book, you're seeing all of the labor and effort that went into something, the layers of testing, the refining the text, the passes of the manuscript, and you're getting this thing that hopefully is perfect and works. It feels really cathartic to actually get into all of the mess-ups, all of the screw-ups and be like, oh yeah, this is what literally everybody who's working on a cookbook will go through.
Kerry Diamond:
Let's talk about this gorgeous cookbook. You've been working on it for a long time.
Natasha Pickowicz:
Yeah, I sold the book in summer of 2020, which I think is the first time that we talked about it because already it felt like, "Oh, I did it." The thing about writing a book, and I mean you're publishing Cherry Bombe, you're publishing these texts that involve so many collaborators that, and there's so much that goes into making a single issue. Every time you hit a hurdle, you finish a photo shoot, you finish writing the manuscript, it feels like you're done, but actually it's just all of these smaller pieces that add up to this larger puzzle. Even now, working on the publicity, the marketing of the book, all the partnerships, all the collabs, it feels like a full-time job. Even though the book is done and I have it in hand, it feels like my work is still so ongoing around it.
Kerry Diamond:
It never ends. I have to remind myself to enjoy things in the moment.
Natasha Pickowicz:
Oh, my gosh.
Kerry Diamond:
I don't know if it's a New York thing or a media thing, but it's so easy to just be always thinking about what's next on your to-do list or in your life.
Natasha Pickowicz:
It's so true. And I think now I'm at the stage where the book is very new thing. I've been fantasizing about these engagements, literally like what we're doing right now, for a really long time. All of this information I've held in so close to my chest and not talked about publicly, I get to share with people, so I've been bursting at the seams to do it. And now that I'm inside of it, it's just trying to stay in the moment, present, focused, appreciative of it all because it does feel overwhelming and there are so many things going on. I have my hands and fingers in everything. I'm definitely not passively letting people organize events for me. That's just not who I am. I'm very much doing all of this sort of nitty-gritty administrative, logistical production work to get all of these events off the ground.
Because I'm going on tour, I'm doing all this online stuff. And even something like thinking about a bake sale is not just coordinating an event with maybe a handful of other people. We're coordinating an event that's involving 40 or 60 people, that we're expecting 1,000 people. So the scale of everything is super ambitious, but at the end of the day, I'm just really grateful that I had a very specific vision of how I wanted to publicly share this book with people. And Artisan, my publisher, they were so amazing. I feel really lucky that I have this team behind me because it's definitely not something anybody should ever reasonably attempt by themselves.
Kerry Diamond:
Well, I'm super impressed by the rollout plan you have. You are definitely not letting this book land with a whimper, that is for sure. There are a lot of folks who are deflated because sometimes their publishing companies don't do that much to support them, and they'll reach out to us and ask what can we do. I think it's great to look at what you're doing and just see everything that Natasha's doing to help promote this book.
Natasha Pickowicz:
Yeah, I was just talking to Chris Crawford who owns the vinegar company, TART Vinegar, and I was sort of like, "I don't know how to get the word out about the..." She's like, "You need to ask people for help." And I think that's something that I'm constantly learning, that I hear from other peers and friends too, of this idea of asking for support, asking to amplify something. It doesn't necessarily come easy to me. Even when I'm asking people to participate in bake sales, I'm always like, "Sorry, I know you're busy." I'm always apologizing off the bat to do something and being like, "Oh, there's no way people are going to want to do this with me."
So it's always like I'm pleasantly surprised where people are like, "Yes, how do I show up? What do you need?" I mean, you're a great example of that for sure, and I would never take your help and resources for granted, but it is definitely a practice. There is a great community of people out there who appreciate the world of baking, how it interacts with social justice, how we can create these moments. I just have to remind myself, put myself out there. If someone says no, they say no, and that's okay. I am really counting on these people to help me spread the word about the stuff that we're doing.
Kerry Diamond:
You're like, that said-
Natasha Pickowicz:
Yeah, that said, share it, retweet.
Kerry Diamond:
I really need everybody's help.
Natasha Pickowicz:
Yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
No, I do the same. I always put at the end of... Because we're constantly asking people to do things, and I'll always put at the end, "It's totally fine to say no," or, "Don't worry if you can't do this," because I wouldn't want anyone to ever feel like if you say no once you're on this list where we'll never work with you again. That's not true.
Natasha Pickowicz:
Totally, totally. Because there's so many factors that could go into the timing not being right, the circumstances, whatever. And yeah, I think my work that I do internally is to not take things too personally and just really just take things at face value and move on to the next thing. Jubilee is a great example of something where I've participated in Jubilee before as a pastry chef, providing treats for all of the guests and being in the energy and being in the mix, and so now to be able to attend Jubilee with a cookbook to promote, this is a moment I've been working towards and I want to celebrate it in a way that feels right for me. So of course, I'm like, "More, more, more. I will do whatever."
Kerry Diamond:
That's a good lead into the title of the book. Why the title of the book?
Natasha Pickowicz:
The title of the book is More Than Cake. I think that when I was working on the proposal and thinking about how am I contributing or participating in this sort of canon of baking, of pastry, there are obviously so many iconic books out there. There's no shortage of great titles and authors and voices that are sharing their own perspective and takes on baking traditions. I think for me, it was really this process of looking inward and just being like, "Well, my relationship with pastry is an emotional one, where it's really about a skill or a tool set that I've developed that allows me to connect with other people through community events, through neighborhood organizing, through fundraising."
And so I wanted to write about baking through that lens of, yeah, it is about the cookie and the cake and the scone and the biscuit. More than that, symbolically, we're talking about once you have that thing in hand, what happens to it next? What occasion can we create around it? When you're making the thing, how do you personally feel empowered? How are you personally deriving enjoyment and growth from this process? Hopefully, I'm not too long-winded in the text in talking about these kind of themes and feelings and strategies, but that was something I really wanted to convey.
Kerry Diamond:
The book feels so you.
Natasha Pickowicz:
Oh, good.
Kerry Diamond:
I feel like yours has your fingerprints everywhere in this book, from your family, to your friends, to your cat, you name it. Let's talk about your mom's involvement for a minute because I just find that so special.
Natasha Pickowicz:
Yeah, and I think also whenever I see you, I feel like we're always talking about our past lives, loving music and being involved in these more DIY punk circles.
Kerry Diamond:
It's funny you say that because I thought your title was a riff on Roxy Music.
Natasha Pickowicz:
Oh, whoa. Oh my God.
Kerry Diamond:
It didn't cross your mind?
Natasha Pickowicz:
Well, now... Oh my gosh, Kerry, I can't believe you said that. I am dying. That's amazing.
Kerry Diamond:
The song more than this, obviously.
Natasha Pickowicz:
Bryan Ferry is a God, and one of my favorite band ever.
Kerry Diamond:
I almost broke into the song. We'll re-write the lyrics for you.
Natasha Pickowicz:
Yeah, maybe I can get a cover of that in play. That's genius. But I think in past lives, which we've talked about on this show, are through community organizing, but through underground music and through these kind of DIY and punk traditions of using what you have to make something and the charm and the personality in the event is because it is really tapping into your personal resources and network, and it's not this shiny perfect thing. So when I was working on the book, I very much was drawing on those experiences and wanting it to feel that personal, and so that extended to Nicole and Michael Grayden who shot the book, my prop designer and creative direction through Emily Eisen, close personal friends. I wanted that feeling of warmth and friendship to actually come through the photos.
And by extension of course, getting my mom involved. I wrote the proposal summer of 2020. I think at the moment, everybody was sort of holding the people they love extra tight, just feeling that urgency around wanting to cherish your family, your friends, the relationships that are important to you and being like, "Wow, can't take anything for granted," because so many horrible things were happening around the pandemic. With my mom, I think being able to explain and show to her as somebody who is immigrated to the States in the '80s, who's coming culturally from that Chinese background of what are the right jobs to have, the jobs you want your children to have. And it was always a struggle to be like, "I'm cooking, I'm working in restaurants," and she would point out things that I knew were true. I'm staying up too late. I'm working crazy hours. Kitchens can be a toxic place to work in.
She would be pointing these things out to me and I would be like “La, la, la,” head in the sand because I loved pastry so much. I was so obsessed with what I was doing and I was just like, "I'm not going to law school. I'm not going to medical school. This is my passion. This is what I want to do," and the process of convincing her to do that was, "I want to write a book about the things I've learned and will you participate in that thing?" And so I think that was my way of being like, "Come into this world that I've created. Please understand that me being involved in pastry can encompass other disciplines, like writing, publishing, art, that kind of thing."
Obviously, her contributions are vital to the feel and the tone of this book. It was a dream to work with her on this stuff, and it was so effortless in a way because she's making these black and white illustrations that sort of accent the text. There are paintings that open every single chapter that are breathtaking and insanely detailed, and those are sort of riffing off of the poster she was making for me when I was doing a popup at Superiority Burger summer of 2020. We created a vocabulary together to enhance the book and accent it. And I'm just so happy with how it came out, that her name is in there, that we're going to be promoting this book together in a way.
Kerry Diamond:
Was your mom a working artist through your childhood?
Natasha Pickowicz:
Absolutely, yeah. Has been a working artist my whole life. She also teaches visual art at UC San Diego, so she's straddling this world of academia and also a working artist and how those things come together. One of the things I'm most excited about with this book tour is I'm obviously going home to San Diego to do a slew of events. Our first one is on Mother's Day, so it feels very apropos, but we're doing an event together per my parents' wishes, but also I'm very excited for this, at the faculty club at UC San Diego, which is a place I grew up going to in the nineties for Easter brunch and different kind of faculty community events.
We're going to have a book talk there with Holly Haynes, who's an incredible pastry chef and just a terrific human. The other aspect of this event is the faculty club has installed 25 pieces of original artwork from the book, professionally framed. They're already hung. They're at UCSD, you can see the pieces in person. The reproductions in the book are exquisite. Artisan did an amazing job. But to see the pieces in person, the level of detail is just incredible. I feel like this is exactly what I was hoping for, that I would be doing book events, but that they wouldn't be book events in the traditional sense. There's an art show, there's a bake sale. It's not just about me, it's all of the incredible collaborators that made this book What it is.
Kerry Diamond:
That's why I love food so much today. It's so embedded in the middle of culture right now and extending in every direction.
Natasha Pickowicz:
So true.
Kerry Diamond:
Art, fashion, music, you name it. And it's always just been so exciting watching you bring so many of these things alive.
Natasha Pickowicz:
Yeah, and I think also not working or answering to someone in a restaurant setting allows me the freedom to sort of, like you were saying, do this kind of interdisciplinary stuff, to work with the great fashion brand, to do stuff with an incredible visual artist, to think about music collabs. It's so much fun. And I think you're so right, food is really at the intersection of so many other things going on in our world today, so for me, it's just a chance to relate to all of those things.
Kerry Diamond:
Let's take a quick break and we'll be right back.
Did you know that Cherry Bombe has a print magazine? We do, and it's all about women and food, just like our podcast. We just added annual subscriptions so you can get four issues of our print magazine sent directly to your home. If you've never seen Cherry Bombe, it's one of the most beautiful magazines around. It's printed on lush paper, with gorgeous full-color photographs and contains great profiles, features and recipes from your favorite culinary creatives. We proudly print our magazine in Rhode Island with an independent, family-owned printing company that works with some of the most amazing galleries and book companies around. We have a special subscription offer right now, so visit cherrybombe.com for more. If you own a shop and would like to carry Cherry Bombe, we also have wholesale options on our site. Our latest issue, by the way, is our 10th anniversary issue, so I would love for you to check it out. Now, back to our guest.
Where did your cake style even start? Because you have such a unique style today and it really doesn't look like anyone else's, even when you go through the book and your Instagram account. It's very uniquely Natasha.
Natasha Pickowicz:
It's funny. Well, I also think that cakes in general and also just pastry, I mean it's like Jessie's incredible podcast, this rise of pastry chefs and bakers as being more public figures. I think those things have really took off in the last three years specifically, and I think that does relate to the pandemic, people staying at home, really needing something to celebrate that feels extra, really relating to the visual pull of cakes that are decorated in ways that feel subversive or transgressive or outside of this canon of what cakes should look like, what a wedding cake should look or feel like. And I think people are subverting these ideas and making things that feel truly idiosyncratic and whimsical. Those things thrive, of course on visual platforms like Instagram and on the internet. And so these things as a tradition are really taking off in ways that I am watching and seeing, and hopefully also participating in.
For me, layer cakes, big celebration cakes, that kind of thing was something I stayed away from for a really long time because they felt intimidating to me. And it felt like I wasn't even eating that much cake. I was like, "Ugh, buttercream, not my thing." I think I was working in restaurants and started to have to make cakes for events, for VIPs, for birthdays, that kind of thing, and I sort of just forced myself to figure out how to do it, and develop an approach and a style that I knew how to do with my limited amount of training and that philosophy and that approach is one that is detailed in the book. The way that I made cakes working in restaurants at high volume with the kind of tenant of consistency being the most important thing is the strategy that I've distilled and presented in the cookbook. It's the way that I make cakes and I truly feel it is the most efficient and foolproof way of making a delicious or complex-looking layer cake.
Kerry Diamond:
You are self-taught, we should point out.
Natasha Pickowicz:
Or really taught in a community, taught in a village of being in a restaurant, being around other chefs, not taught in a traditional culinary school setting.
Kerry Diamond:
I think it'll make people happy to know that you started out, I mean pretty much ripping off Ina Garten cupcake recipes, working in the back of a punk rock deli up in Montreal.
Natasha Pickowicz:
Yeah, the peanut butter chocolate cupcakes.
Kerry Diamond:
We all have to start somewhere.
Natasha Pickowicz:
Great recipe. No, it's true. I was looking for other photos for book events that I'm doing in Montreal where I used to live, which is where I started cooking, and I was looking at these cakes that are... I don't think perfection should be anybody's end goal when trying to bake. And I actually think imperfections are what make bakes feel personal, what make them feel charming. I think perfection is overrated. I mean, it just ties into this very American need for striving to be number one, excelling, being the best. That was very much the mentality of the fine dining restaurants that I was working in.
I had to unlearn those expectations and the pressure that I was putting on myself while writing this book to be like, no, perfection is truly not actually the goal here or my version of what that could be. And so I think with cakes it was really about I don't know how to pull sugar to make roses, and I'm not going to ever roll out fondant to cover a cake, but what I do love are natural elements, like what am I growing in my garden? What plants are edible and delicious and surprising and unexpected on a cake, that's like going on long walks, visiting the farmer's market? What am I growing in my backyard? And wanting those things to inform how my cakes could feel aesthetically.
Kerry Diamond:
I do feel like you walk through a farmer's market and there's nothing that you see that couldn't go on top of a cake.
Natasha Pickowicz:
So true. The only thing I would say to stay away from, besides obviously toxic or poisonous things or anything that's been sprayed with chemicals, but alliums.
Kerry Diamond:
I was going to say alliums. That's the one thing that I can't really see on a cake, but even that-
Natasha Pickowicz:
Anything that'll transfer an onion or garlic flavor to a cake is the one... But even then, I have recipes for savory cakes and that's where you go crazy with the savory decorations.
Kerry Diamond:
So who is this cookbook for?
Natasha Pickowicz:
I see multiple audiences for this. Again, I learned how to bake in restaurants. I had the great pleasure at places like Flora, of building out the cookbook library for cooks, and that was something I took a lot of pride in or that we all did, which was creating a library for restaurant professionals to dip into, feel inspired by. And those books for me when I was working in restaurants were like the first Tartine book, the first Claudia Fleming book, these sort of canonical texts I think that really influenced the contemporary way of cake making today. Those were books that were very well-loved in kitchens that I had worked in. That is one part of it, people who have a little experience. But I think the real audience that I'm hoping will pick this up are home bakers of all skill levels, ages, backgrounds. I think that there's something in this book for everyone.
Specifically, when I was working on the text for the writing of the recipes, which is an extremely tedious, methodical process where you're really writing a technical text like a guidebook for someone. And I think I had to be very aware of if I'm writing this for someone who's never made a cream puff or has never made puff pastry or has never iced a cake, how can I use language to give people as much support as possible? And so it's not just time cues and temperature advice, it's also sensorial cues. What will something feel like, look like? Is there a descriptive way we can talk about how something will bubble in a pan, what the texture of a crumb would look like? Anything that will be clues for the home baker to be like, "Oh, okay, I see what she means there. This is syncing up with also the work that I'm doing."
Kerry Diamond:
I'm always fascinated by the sensory clues to baking, knowing something's done by touch, smell, sight.
Natasha Pickowicz:
I think one of the best things I ever read was the pastry chef, Camilla Wynne, who has multiple books, but in her book Jam Bake. She's a jam canning professional and the language she uses to describe this elusive way that jams are set, what to look for when they're done. And she talks about the jam test, which is how do you know when a jam is done cooking in a pot? And she says, "Put a little bit of jam on a plate, put it in a freezer to set for three seconds. When you push your finger across the jam, it should wrinkle like a silk blouse rumpled on the floor." And I was just like, that's the most poetic thing I've ever heard.
But more importantly, it kind of tells you exactly what to look for in that moment. The way that jam will push up against your fingertip instead of running all over the place, that's how you know you've achieved that set. So I think finding this vivid, hopefully witty language to give people another image of a marker of what to look for was a fun part of writing the book for me too.
Kerry Diamond:
What do you love about baking at home, and why do you want more people to do it for themselves?
Natasha Pickowicz:
I think that with baking especially, there's so much that homemakers are like, "I'll just buy a cake. Why would I make this thing? No make a croissant? Insane." Of course, there's so much to take away from that. This is something I talk about in the book where I call it the prideship, which is this sense of accomplishment that a person will feel after making something themselves. When you're making anything from scratch, anything that's DIY, whether it's like a mix-tape or knitting a sweater or baking a cake or gardening, these activities where we engage our senses, our hands we're on our feet and we're making something with grainy sugar and powdery flour.
I think there is a very extraordinary inexplicable feeling that comes from that. I still experience where it's like wonderment. You're like, "I did this," and I think that everyone should be able to tap into that feeling in some way. And maybe it's not baking. Maybe that's something else for somebody, which is great. But for me, it's that. It's a version of empowerment. If I can encourage people to tap into that side of themselves in the kitchen, then that is a very powerful thing.
Kerry Diamond:
I know you've been very busy preparing to birth this book, but have you been paying attention to AI and everything that's going on with AI right now?
Natasha Pickowicz:
Oh my gosh, Kerry, I actually had a really bad day three days ago, and it was literally because I woke up and before I had coffee or did anything, I read the most upsetting piece I have read yet on AI tech. It made me feel so gloomy and the world is ending that I actually had to get out of house and bake. So that actually helped me pull me out of my funk because I was like, "I need to get out of my head right now." So yes, I would say I am keeping in touch with what's going on and it feels very harrowing actually.
Kerry Diamond:
I'm paying way too much attention to it and experimenting with it because I don't want to be caught unawares, and just everything you can do with it for writing and art and graphics. And also, watching The Last Of Us at the same time, which I don't recommend doing both of these things because you can imagine the directions my mind is going in. But I feel people like you are going to be sort of the rebel leaders of the future because anything handmade with a human fingerprint in it, and granted AI's created by humans, but it's different, anything tactile like baking is going to be just so important.
Natasha Pickowicz:
Yeah, I think we're kind of coming from analog cultures and appreciations too. And there are so many digital technologies that are so important, but I think at the end of the day, the idea of making something with your hands on your own is something that I personally connect with very deeply. That being said, I'm sure the first AI cookbook is going to be out any moment now.
Kerry Diamond:
Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. But I bring it up because they were talking on this one podcast I listened to about some things that AI will replace that I didn't even know was replaceable. It just got me thinking, what are the things that will never be replaced by AI? And maybe it's a failure of imagination on my part to not think that certain things can be, but I do think that the act of cooking and baking.
Natasha Pickowicz:
And I think even if you had a 3D-printed scone next to a scone that was made by somebody, I think it's sort of as humans, we crave that context and that symbolic meaning behind that. And I think if I had a bake sale and the items were just produced not by those people, and the tables weren't literally being manned by the baker who made them, and that was always something that was very important to me with how I personally like to do bake sales, which is it's not about eating a perfect scone. It's anybody can walk into the room and it's Sophia Roe is standing behind the table, Claire Saffitz is standing behind the table, Claudia Fleming is standing behind the table, Fany Gerson is standing behind the table.
It's a chance to interact and engage with the actual person behind the baked good, behind the business. For me, that was always very important with how I program this event. Where I'm like, it's not about just dropping off your thing and raising the money. I mean, of course that's what's so important. But it's about creating that sense of community around all of us being in the same room at the same time. It's just unbelievable.
Kerry Diamond:
Yes. Well, you and I are of the same mind when it comes to gatherings.
Natasha Pickowicz:
Exactly.
Kerry Diamond:
But that's my prediction. My AI prediction's going to be baking is going to be more important than ever, and so is gathering in-person. So let's talk about the big bake sale that's coming up. I know you're doing multiple bake sales, but tell me first about the New York one.
Natasha Pickowicz:
It's the day after the Cherry Bombe Jubilee. That was intentional. In my kind of maximalist way, I was like, "Let's make this the best weekend ever."
Kerry Diamond:
Which makes me so happy because I have wanted to turn Jubilee weekend into a big New Yorker festival of food.
Natasha Pickowicz:
Totally.
Kerry Diamond:
So when you were like, "I'm thinking of doing this," I was like, "Yes."
Natasha Pickowicz:
And then I'm hearing from all of the great women who are coming into town and they're like, "We'll be at the bake sale. I'm not going to miss it." And I'm like, "This is exactly what I was hoping for." It's going to be held at the Wythe hotel in Williamsburg. We're taking over two of their huge event spaces, banquet halls. They've been so generous, absolutely unbelievable to work with. I think most importantly, we're partnering up with The Brigid Alliance again. And last year in 2022, I produced two bake sales at the Cherry Lane Theater in tandem with Alison Leiby's hour about abortion show, one-woman show she was doing at the theater. And then again at the Susan Alexandra store on Orchard on the Lower East Side, and both of those were for The Brigid Alliance.
The lineup is just looking incredible, and I think this year I really wanted to reach out to people that I haven't done bake sales with before, and then I really was excited to see what they would do. There are a lot of places that have opened in the last year that I wanted to reach out to. Claud in the city, Librae Bakery in the East Village, these newer places where I'm like, "Get in here." Let's see. Bad Habit, this new ice cream shop on Avenue A in the East Village. So yeah, it's just absolutely star-studded. I'm so excited. I have some people coming in from out of town, Briana Holt from Tandem Bakery in Portland, Maine is driving in.
Kerry Diamond:
Oh, I love Briana. I didn't know she'll be there. That's great.
Natasha Pickowicz:
Yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
They have a cheddar kimchi scone at Tandem up in Portland, Maine, that was maybe one of the best things I ate last year.
Natasha Pickowicz:
Yeah, one of my favorite people. So she's coming in, she's doing the bake sale. That's super exciting for me. It's sort of a day I look forward to all year. It's something I've been thinking about for ages. And my mom painted the artwork for the posters. It just feels really familiar to me at this point, where I'm like, "I know how to do this." The really cool thing that we're doing is we're programming two bake sales together to sort of bookend my tour. So we're partnering up with independent book sellers in each location. So our NYC partner is Kitchen Arts & Letters, the absolutely iconic bookstore in the Upper East Side, Yorkville area, Uptown.
In LA, I'm producing my first bake sale, not in New York City, and we're teaming up with Now Serving the incredible bookstore in Chinatown, and we're having a bake sale in Chinatown. The lineup is so close to being confirmed, but that has really been a treat for me because I'm like, these are the people I've been dreaming about doing stuff with for years. That one is going to be Sunday, May 21st. The New York City Bake Sale is Sunday, April 16th. About five weeks later we're doing LA. That lineup, there's going to be a lot of people I'm meeting for the first time, internet friends, and pen pals.
Kerry Diamond:
I'm having FOMO already. I might have to get on a plane and come out.
Natasha Pickowicz:
Please come out.
Kerry Diamond:
I'll volunteer. I can do that.
Natasha Pickowicz:
I mean, I took a page from your playbook when it comes to street team volunteers because that is a huge piece of the puzzle with producing an event of this scale. Whether it's line control, assisting chefs, ferrying stuff around, there's so much that needs to be done for the event to feel-
Kerry Diamond:
I was on ice detail I think for your last one. I forgot about that.
Natasha Pickowicz:
Yeah. I was like, "Wait, you have a car, right?"
Kerry Diamond:
Put the Cherry Bombe mobile to good use.
Natasha Pickowicz:
Totally.
Kerry Diamond:
I am going to try to figure out a way to be in L.A. for that.
Natasha Pickowicz:
Oh, that would be a dream.
Kerry Diamond:
I have one question for you enough. This is a giant question, but as I was thinking about what we were going to talk about today, it dawned on me, you have been through so much over the past few years, as has everyone who's a human being right now, but the fine dining world you were part of pretty much collapsed at the start of the pandemic. Your AAPI community, which I know your treasure so much was under attack. Your dad, his heritage is Ukrainian. And then you have fought for women's reproductive freedom for years and years and years, and that's under attack. And it just dawned to me it's like, oh my gosh, all these things Natasha treasures have just been attacked from every angle over the past three years in a very big way. I guess the question is how are you taking care of yourself?
Natasha Pickowicz:
Yeah. I think caring about a lot of things is exhausting. There's something about what's going on with me right now personally in my work life and everything that feels exhausting and overwhelming, and makes me feel a little bit anxious. And I think that for me, the reason why I do the bake sales is to remedy these larger existential and difficult feelings I have about women's reproductive rights, the state of the world, like war, AI, all of these things. I think the only way I can attend to or feed that existential angst or that anxiety, climate change, all these things, is by really narrowing the way that I think about community and being an active participant in my neighborhood. That does feel like self-care to me.
Being able to contend with that sort of internal despair that I think a lot of people experience, that is my way of reckoning with that. So I think that the way that I do little events, whether it's a big bake sale or a tiny one, that fills me in a way where I'm like, I'm going to wake up the next day, I'm going to keep doing the work, I'm going to keep doing these things. The relationships that I have with the nonprofits around the city, like the Lenox Hill Neighborhood House on the Upper East Side, God's Love We Deliver in SoHo, The Brigid Alliance, those relationships are priceless for me. Whether I'm just going to the older adult center for the Lenox Hill and just doing a tiny dumpling demo for 20 people, that's the kind of work that maybe doesn't impact people outside of the room that I'm in, but it's the work that feeds me and helps me feel better about everything going on.
When you see people like that, at the Lenox Hill Neighborhood House, they're teaching kitchen, where they're doing a major paradigm shift around institutionalized eating, the kind of food people get in hospitals, in prisons, in senior centers, that is so radical and huge for me. And to even just taste a little bit of that by knowing some of those people and participating in the small way that I can, I cannot recommend that act of volunteering enough to literally everybody. And I think that kind of work is the kind of stuff where it has a after glow in me that lasts a very long time, and keeps me connected and feeling good about the pastry work that I do.
Kerry Diamond:
It is the subtitle of your book also.
Natasha Pickowicz:
I'm such an extrovert. I love being around people. The way that I almost charge or gain energy or excitement about my surroundings are through those relationships, and also my cat at home.
Kerry Diamond:
Shout out to our gray-
Natasha Pickowicz:
That's my real self-care.
Kerry Diamond:
... cats.
Natasha Pickowicz:
Yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay. We're totally out of time, so we're going to just do one question of the speed round, and I don't know what your answer is for this one. Sometimes I can guess, but I'm not sure with you. If you had to be trapped on a desert island with one food celebrity, who would it be and why?
Natasha Pickowicz:
Melissa King, and I just want to go on the record saying that I think she's absolutely incredible. I feel like I have so much to learn from her. I think also she seems like somebody who's very resourceful and would probably lead to my survival on a desert island. She would probably know how to do all of these really cool things. I've got to say her, I think she's so great.
Kerry Diamond:
Well, she just did that National Geographic show, Tasting Wild, where she cooks out in the wild. So you're in luck, Natasha. You won't starve out there. Natasha, you are remarkable. Thank you for everything you have done and all the community building and the money you've raised for all these different charities. I say this with all sincerity, but you absolutely are the bomb.
Natasha Pickowicz:
Thank you so much, Kerry.
Kerry Diamond:
That's it for today's show. If you enjoyed this conversation and want more cake talk with Natasha, check out her episode of She's My Cherry Pie, our new baking podcast. Natasha and host Jessie Sheehan do a deep dive into making modern layer cakes. Listen wherever you get your podcasts. Be sure to sign up for the Cherry Bombe newsletter over at cherrybombe.com, so you can stay on top of all Cherry Bombe happenings, pods, and events. Radio Cherry Bombe is a production of The Cherry Bombe Podcast Network. Our theme song is by the band Tralala. Thank you to Joseph Hazen, studio engineer from Newsstand Studios. Our producer is Catherine Baker, and our associate producer is Jenna Sadhu. And thanks to you for listening. You're the Bombe.