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Dishing with Stephanie's DishHost of Emmy award-winning TV show Taste Buds with Stephanie, Author of "True North Cabin Cookbook," blogger at stephaniesdish.com, radio host of "The Weekly Dish", podcaster at "Dishing with Stephanies Dish" and contributor on Fox 9s The Jason Show. Author: Stephanie Hansen - @StephaniesDish
I talk with Cookbook authors and Makers obsessed with food stephaniehansen.substack.com Language: en Contact email: Get it Feed URL: Get it iTunes ID: Get it |
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Ashley Russell
Friday, 14 November, 2025
Original Episode Transcript Follows:Stephanie Hansen:Hello, everybody, and welcome to Dishing with Stephanie’s Dish, the podcast where we talk to people in the food space, a lot of cookbook authors, manufacturers, and people who are doing cool things with food. And Ashley Russell came across my desk, and she has a cookbook that’s called “What’s Cooking Good Looking”. And I was first of all, captured by the illustrations in the book you are working on or have. They were very. How do I describe them? They were like tattoos. They were adorable, and they are original art by @sadpuppytattoo. When Ashley describes the banana bread of her grandmas, she was generous enough to share the recipe here.Ashley Russell:Yeah.Stephanie Hansen:Tell me about the book and how you decided to illustrate it the way you did. And then I wanted to talk to you specifically about self publishing a book, because I think a lot of people think about it, but they’re not sure how to do it. So I just wanted to get your feedback.Ashley Russell:Totally. So I started this book inspired by my grandma. She passed away in 2024, summer of 2024. And it was almost immediate, was like, we have to have all the family has to have our recipes. And so she had a really cute little vintage recipe card box, and the whole process just sort of unfolded over the past year and a half. It is definitely a lot of Southern cooking. She’s from Texas, but lived the past 30 years up in northern Washington. And her and my mom and her siblings lived all over the country.So there’s just a little bit of everything in there from, like, recipes she got from neighbors or things that she learned from different parts of the country. So it’s a really fun, like, eclectic mix of American cooking. And it’s just so much her. Like, there’s sugar and everything, and it’s just. I’m so happy to have all of the family favorites in one place. Yeah.Stephanie Hansen:Did you work with members of the family, or was it primarily. Did it fall on you to compile everything?Ashley Russell:I definitely compiled everything, but my family was there every step of the way. Like, my grandma wrote in cursive, and I couldn’t always read it.Stephanie Hansen:A lot of our grandmas wrote in cursive, and it is hard to read.Ashley Russell:It’s so hard to read. And so we started this text group, and I would be like, does anyone know what this says? And then also things like vegetable oil or sweet milk or, you know, polio olio. Exactly. What is that?Stephanie Hansen:It’s shortening. But, I mean, nobody knew.Ashley Russell:Nobody knew. And so it was a lot of just, like, you know, there were puzzles to it, and it was funny, and it brought us together and it kept us talking about her. And then, in addition to the community that I reached out to here in Portland, all My family members helped recipe test because it’s like they remembered how it was supposed to taste. So it was almost like, you know, I think that this is missing this because she didn’t write everything down. Like, a lot of things lived in her head.Stephanie Hansen:Yeah. Did you ever done this before or anything like this? Do you. What’s your background?Ashley Russell:No. So I worked for a decade in costume design. I worked on a lot of small budget indie film and tv. And so I think I’m used to like, okay, we have this big hurdle of a project ahead. But I’ve never, I’ve never written a book. I’ve never written a cookbook. And the whole process was such a journey, but it, it was all so much fun, I think, because I was like learning and uncovering things about my family along the way. Yeah.Ashley Russell:So.Stephanie Hansen:Well, the creative process too, I think, is. Know you talk about being a costume designer. I didn’t really think about writing a cookbook or recipes or being a recipe developer as a creative endeavor until I kind of started doing it more. And then I was like, oh, yeah, this does require creativity. And this is where that, where I scratch that itch.Ashley Russell:Yes, totally. I agree with that. It is super creative. And I never realized that either. I have a few cookbooks, but in this process, it made me realize, like, what little magical creative books they are and how much, you know, there’s people’s dreams and they nourish us and they’re little windows into different parts of history and people’s lives and they’re just pretty cool. Yeah.Stephanie Hansen:And people talk about like, I’m, I’m in the process of. I just released a book in September, so I’m out at bookstores and grocery stores and selling the book everywhere. And a lot of people are like, oh, you know, nobody really needs cookbooks anymore. And I was like, well, actually, you can always look up a recipe on the Internet that’s there, but the narrative, the piece of how that fits into their life, the memory that that recipe brings or that combination of spices that transports you to a place that is what is unique about a cookbook. It’s. It’s so much more than just the recipe. And if you’re not jazzed by any of that, then, yeah, it’s probably not for you.Ashley Russell:Totally. Yes. Like, you have to be inspired by it. Right. And like, I don’t know, I get pretty annoyed with recipes online. There’s a ton of pop ups and your phone, you know, has the auto timer and it has to face ID every two minutes. I. It’s just when you have it in a cookbook, it’s almost like the record version of like a Spotify song.I don’t know, like, you sure? Yeah, yeah.Stephanie Hansen:Like, and you can get a song but you don’t have it in the context of all the songs in the record and that the artist had. Yeah, it’s very similar, actually.Ashley Russell:Totally. And like, people love listening to records and collecting records and I really just think it’s, it’s, it’s a similar. Comes from a similar place.Stephanie Hansen:Yeah. Okay. So your book, what’s Cooking Good Looking? It is a spiral bound, which I thought was an interesting choice that I want to ask you about. And it’s also got these illustrations. Did you illustrate it or did someone else? They’re real cute. They’re like tattooed inspired and they’re kind of jazzy and it kind of. It had like a hipster core vibe to it.Ashley Russell:Yes. So my boyfriend’s brother’s sister, so more or less my sister in law. I’ve known her for six years now. She’s a tattoo artist and she does a lot of florals and she did like a food flash at one point. And I’ve always loved her art. And when I was first starting the book, I was in Canva and I was like, oh, clip art’s cute. And I was like, you know, I don’t know if I would ever release a book with clip art in it, you know, And I wasn’t sold on doing photography. I knew how specific and it had to be.Ashley Russell:Like, people have nailed food photography. If I was going to do it, I wanted to make sure it rocked. And so I asked her one day, I was like, would you want to illustrate this book? And she was like, oh my God, yes. And her tattoos are in black and white already. So it kind of, it transferred pretty easily into print form. And so I was able to use all of her tattoo library, like things she had already drawn. And then she drew things specifically for the book as well. And I just think it looks awesome.Stephanie Hansen:Yeah, it really does. It’s real sweet. And what about the choice of spiral bound? And can you talk, can you make that be the introduction of talking about like how you decided to self publish and did you go out and try to find agents or did you go right to self publishing?Ashley Russell:Sure. So I in the past couple years have been really inspired by Rizzo prints and graphic novels and a lot of small press publishing and super inspired by vintage cookbooks. And a lot of them are spiral bound or they’re notebook bound. And it’s. It’s kind of like, it gives it this retro feel, and it’s kind of an homage to all of, like, the women’s groups and church groups that did cookbooks over the decades. But I also think it’s super functional in the kitchen. And I had a graphic design friend mention to me that she loves when a spiral bound is a color that totally offsets the book. So my book is, like, very black and white and yellow, and then it has this bright red spiral binding.And I just think it makes it pop. Like, it’s. It’s fun and practical. So as far as self publishing. So when I started this, it was really just a project for my family. It was really just, you know, I wanted them to have all the recipes. I. I wasn’t even sure if I was going to print it.And as the process unfolded more, I realized more and more that I wanted to make this a book. And I wanted to put my heart in this book. And I wanted to share who Wanda and our family is with the world. And it really was just like a flower slowly blooming. Like, every week would be like, oh, I have to put the ingredients in the order of the method. Oh, you have to do this. Oh, people like, you know, like, you want everything in a recipe on one page. You don’t want to have to, like, go back and forth.And it became this really fun project puzzle for me to be like, maybe I can create a cookbook. And so I didn’t reach out to agents or anything, because I think the main important part was for this book to be about my grandma and come from me. And I was worried that having an agent or a publisher might dilute that a little bit.Stephanie Hansen:Yeah, they’d have feedback or input or change things. Sure.Ashley Russell:Yeah. So I was able to work with a lot of friends, family, and get a lot of feedback throughout the entire process. I hired an editor, and so there was that constructive criticism, but I didn’t feel like the voice or the vision was changing for profit, per se. And so self publishing is what I stuck with. And I think that in order for me to print this book the way I wanted to and for it to look the way it does, I don’t know if I could have convinced a publisher to get on board with that.Stephanie Hansen:So then you make that decision and you’ve got your book assembled or your PDF pages, essentially. Did you tell me about, like, did you go out and just Google, like, how to self publish? Did you figure out, like, how to print on Demand was there color considerations. Kind of walk me through that process a little bit.Ashley Russell:Sure. So I did start looking up print on demand and I started Googling, you know, how to write a cookbook. I listened to Maggie Green’s podcast Cookbook Love, like, religiously. I got books on the subject, and I really just created, like, it was my own research project. And I was learning as I went. What turned me away from doing, like, on demand printing or online publishing was that I really wanted it to be spiral bound. I knew that from the beginning almost. And I really wanted to do a mixture of Rizzo printing.Ashley Russell:And I wanted the paper. I just wanted everything to be really high quality and feel like her note cards, feel like her recipe cards. And I didn’t think I would get that with online printing. So I went and talked with a few print shops here in Portland, Oregon, and Brown Printing, like, got the project right away. And I’ve been working with them for the past several months to get it printed.Stephanie Hansen:Have you. Have you printed, like, X amount and you’re kind of selling stock as you go?Ashley Russell:Yeah, So I, you know, budget has been a concern throughout this whole process. Like, anyone who’s made a cookbook knows it gets very expensive between recipe testing. And I did end up doing photography. I did it myself. All of those things really add up. And so I did an initial print run of 300, which is almost gone at this point. I just picked it up in the beginning of the month. And Brown’s doing another run of.Ashley Russell:Of, 300 for the 1st of December so I can have more for the holidays.Stephanie Hansen:And then do you package them up and ship them when people make an order? Can you talk a little bit about that? Because people don’t think about that. But you have to buy, like, special envelopes. You have to go to the post office. There is a category for media mail that makes it a little cheaper, but it’s still. It’s a process.Ashley Russell:It is a process. Like, every bit of this has been such a process. And so, yeah, my. My limit, I had about 180 orders to ship out when I got all the books from recipe testers. Order, pre-orders, family, you know, you name it. And our whole. Our whole living room and kitchen was just, like, stacked with boxes and you.Stephanie Hansen:And they’re bigger than you think.Ashley Russell:Like, they’re bigger than you think and they’re heavy.Stephanie Hansen:Yes. And a box of like, 15 books is, like, a big box. And they’re everywhere.Ashley Russell:They’re everywhere. Yeah. So, you know, it’s kind of like if you’re an Etsy shop owner, you know, kind of our pain, I guess. But, you know, you’re doing. You’re the manual labor and you’re the author and you’re the publisher, you know, so you’re doing everything. And I lugged them all down to the UPS and USPS and shipped them off. Yeah.Stephanie Hansen:Where do you go from here with it? Like, you gotta sell through your next 300, obviously. Did this, like, create a pathway for you, or is this where you’ll end this journey and just one and done. And it was great.Ashley Russell:Yeah. So when I first started, I had over 300 recipes from the family. And I reached out to my first editor contact and they were like, whoa, that’s a lot of recipes. They’re like, books are usually like 75 to 150. And I was like, oh. And like now seeing this printed and it’s 260 pages, like, I get it. But at the time, I was like, I just wanted to have everything. And so I have at least one other book of Wanda’s on the horizon.But for now, I’m really just trying to put myself in. What if I had a publisher? What if I had an agent? What would they be doing? So it’s a lot. Yeah, it’s a lot of reaching out to retail stores, seeing if I can get an interview on a podcast, trying to put my book out there in ways that I know of and seeing where it lands. I have. There’s about seven stores in Portland that are carrying the book right now, and they’re all stores I really love. And that’s super exciting.Stephanie Hansen:They carry it on consignment or do you sell them to them outright?Ashley Russell:It depends. So a couple are wholesale and a couple are consignment. Wholesale obviously works better for us, but I’m just happy to have the book out there. I think it’s a good time of year. You know, she made all these dishes for Thanksgiving and. And Christmas, so it’s the. It’s the time to have it in your kitchen.Stephanie Hansen:Do you. Can you talk about, like, how much you make per book?Ashley Russell:Sure. So if I’m talking just printing costs to do the 300 with the brown printing and the riso printing I did by hand at outlet PDX, we’re looking at about $20 a book. And I have the book priced at 38. So because I’m not splitting this with any publisher or agent, that means technically $20 profit goes back into my pocket. But at this point, we’re still paying off all the production costs, and it also doesn’t include that dollar amount. Doesn’t include, like, my labor. So when you really figure it out, it’s probably. Or food.When you really figure out the numbers. This first round probably cost me about $50 a book to make, you know, and then the hope is, over the years, if continuing to sell copies here and there, you break even, or maybe you make a few dollars.Stephanie Hansen:Yeah, it’s. It is kind of like that. As you get, like, past Wanda’s story, do you see this being a journey you’ll stay on, or is it really just. I’m curious if it ignited something in you because you seem like a creative person.Ashley Russell:Yeah. Like, I’ve always wanted to be a writer, and it’s been pretty daunting. My grandma always encouraged me to be a writer. This feels like that first step. I also like the idea. I’ve heard a cookbook is, like, the best business card, you know, And I think that’s, like, a great way to look at it, too. It’s something that I’ve made that I can say, you know, I wrote this, I’ve made this. I’d like to do this project.Stephanie Hansen:And fascinating, because that is for. For me personally, I wanted to have agency in the cooking space, and I wasn’t. And I wasn’t a writer, so I was like, how am I going to get that? I wanted to have a television show. I wanted to do more podcasting, specifically about food. I had a radio show about food, but I needed to have more autonomy, and that's how I started.Ashley Russell:Totally. That makes sense. Did you. Do you feel like that helped achieve some of the dreams you had?Stephanie Hansen:Oh, for sure. I have a TV show now, and I wouldn’t have had the TV show if I hadn’t have written the cookbook, I don’t think.Ashley Russell:Yeah.Stephanie Hansen:Because even though I’m a home chef or a home cook and not a chef at all, actually having the book gives you some credibility of why this person’s gonna invest in you and put you on television station. 88 markets. I don’t think they would have done that if I wouldn’t have had the book.Ashley Russell:Totally. And honestly, like, I think being a home chef, you almost write a better cookbook because you can anticipate what other home chefs are going to be confused by or what they need written down.Stephanie Hansen:Well. And a lot of the best chefs, who I have much admiration and respect for, their books are really challenging or technical and. And that’s great. Like, maybe that’s who they’re writing them for. But some of my favorite chefs, I get their books and I keep them because I love the photography and I just admire so much of the skills and what they bring to the party. But very few of them I actually ever cooked out of.Ashley Russell:Yeah, they’re like these beautiful aspirations.Stephanie Hansen:Yeah, they’re aspirational books, for sure.Ashley Russell:Yeah.Stephanie Hansen:Can you talk a little bit about Wanda? Just your grandma? Like, you just have a real spirit about you that must come from her. And I’m just curious why she was so meaningful to you outside of just being your grandma.Ashley Russell:Yeah, totally. So I was raised by my mom. It was just me and my mom and I would spend a lot of time with my grandparents. I think when you’re set up in that sort of one parent system, I was either going with my mom everywhere or I was spending summers at my grandparents, and those summers at my grandparents. I, I feel like as an adult, I’m sort of chasing that feeling, you know, of, of being, you know.Stephanie Hansen:Really? Yeah. Oh, that’s so touching.Ashley Russell:Yeah. I mean, it’s true. Whether it’s cooking in the kitchen or laughing with my grandpa. You know, my grandma taught me how to sew, and later on in life, I worked in costumes and I used to bake with her, and now I’m making this cookbook. She meant a lot to me. And I know, I know both of them meant so much to our whole family that I don’t want, I don’t want us to lose that, and I don’t want anyone that comes next in our family to not know about it.Stephanie Hansen:Yeah. Yeah. What a beautiful sentiment. I, I just the I, the what you said, just, I’ve been chasing that feeling is really. I wrote my book for very similar reasons. You know, my mom had died early of breast cancer, and I wanted to document family recipes. Yeah, just the way you said that was really beautiful, so. Oh, that’s so nice.Ashley Russell:I, I, whether or not we’re aware of it, that we’re, we’re kind of doing that right. You know, where’s your happy place? What makes you, what brings you happiness? And those memories really do as, as I’m sure other memories for other people do for them.Stephanie Hansen:Yeah. All right. Well, I have loved hearing your story. I knew right away when the book came across my desk and you reached out to me directly, I was like, oh, yeah, I do want to talk to her. I want to figure out, like, what inspired her to take this on. Because it is a labor of love, you. Even if, I mean, I don’t I’ve not read a statistic, but like most cookbooks and most cookbook authors are not getting rich by writing cookbooks. They’re using it to parlayed into other things.So it’s usually not actually a money making endeavor. It’s more a creative process and something that you do as a labor of love. And I think a lot of people that love cookbooks may be listening, you know, have wanted to do this. So I wanted to like, really document, like, how did you do it and what did you think about and how did you decide to put it together? When you put your list of recipes together, was it obvious what was going to make it?Ashley Russell:Yeah, you know, it started with what are the family favorites? What, what do we have to have? And then it was with, you know, what turned out really well in recipe testing. And from there, like, you know, the, the, the baking section’s over half the book. Yeah. And then it was sort of trying to round out the other sections of the book. Yeah. And they were recipes that could stand the test of time and that people would still want to make and also that my, my grandma would enjoy another favorites. Oh, yeah. So I mean, her banana bread is like, I knew I wanted to start the book with her banana bread and end it with sweet tea.That’s my grandma to the core. And then in between, you know, there’s so many great home cooked meals, home cooked desserts. She had a famous chocolate pie, famous pecan pie. Her Italian cream cake is to die for. It’s like a coconut cake. Um, my aunt Angie, her oldest daughter, said that people used to request that she make that. So that was fun to learn and to put in the book.Stephanie Hansen:And now you know how to make all the things too, or a lot of the things.Ashley Russell:Yes. My family’s like, well, I guess you’re cooking for Thanksgiving now because you know all of her recipes.Stephanie Hansen:Oh, that’s so great. I really enjoyed talking to you. It is Ashley Russell. The book is I wrote the what’s Cooking Good Looking? Sorry. It is a really beautiful, fun, different way to approach this topic of cookbooks. And I was really. I’m impressed by what you did and I know your grandma would be, she would love it. She’d be real proud of you.And it’s really nice to talk with you and share your story. I’ll put a link to the book in the podcast notes and put that all together and hopefully we’ll help you sell through your next 300. Ashley.Ashley Russell:Thank you, Stephanie. I really appreciate it.Stephanie Hansen:Yeah, it was great. To hear your story and to just spend time with you. Good luck.Ashley Russell:Thanks. Have a good day.Stephanie Hansen:All right. Bye.Ashley Russell:Bye.Stephanie’s Dish Newsletter is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit stephaniehansen.substack.com/subscribe
