We plan to make many seasons of Taco Hat TV. Here’s how we plan to create a sustainable business that builds on the crowdfunded pilot season. We have longterm plans, see, and we can’t get started without you. With less than a week left in the campaign, please help us make the pilot season!
Know what’s funny? It’s funny that the first two show guests we’ve confirmed are for food-related episodes, because THTV is not specifically a cooking show. It’s just that when Ben and I were hashing out what the show would be, I knew immediately that I wanted these two women to be a part of it. You met Jeannette Ordas last week. Today, meet Kari Chellouf, who is going to change your pie-loving life.
Kari’s a line cook/baker. As she explained to me, “Some cooks can also bake, many bakers can also cook. I’m greedy and want it all, and have worked a bit in both fields, currently at a restaurant where I get to do both. It’s awesome.”
I wasn’t kidding about pie. Kari’s episode will not be a step-by-step tutorial for how to make one kind of pie. It’s going to be a mind-blowing exploration of why pie is pie, and how we can make the most delicious pie possible. I’ll just say it once more because I can: Pie.
I asked Kari a few questions so you can get to know her better. This is quite possibly my favourite wee interview in my history of wee-interviewing people (you may not want to read this if you’re hungry; also, you may never see tacos the same way again).
What was your favourite dessert when you were a kid? And what’s your favourite dessert now?
My favourite dessert was almond-vanilla pound cake. Mom made it all the time (I was a chubby kid…); when it was fresh out of the oven, she would flip it out of the giant bundt pan and give me a piece. I always ate the crunchy, crackly top first. Nowadays? It’s impossible to choose…sorry! I want a small taste of everything, and work out like a maniac so that I can have it, especially really decadent treats and old-fashioned Grandma stuff with a twist. Giant, hunky fudge brownies with candied nuts, light, fluffy little goat cheese-cakes, churros, choux puffs, straight-out-of-the-oven biscuits with fruit, whatever you got. If it has carbs and fat and sugar, and can be spoon-fed to me by an unreasonably attractive man in a suit, I would like to taste it before slamming a Vega shake and running on a treadmill. Ridiculous, I know.
Pie crust: super difficult or easy as – wait for it – pie?
Hah! SO EASY! And I will show you. Anybody who says that pie dough is hard was either not ready to make it (pastries can smell fear), or they figured out that it was totally cool but lied because they don’t want you to one-up them at the next staff potluck. Get ready to outshine Myrtle the receptionist.
As you’ve explored baking, what have you learned that totally blew your mind?
Eggs and butter. Two of my favourite food groups. Awesome on their own, but in baked goods they’re like stage managers for theater productions. They make all the magic happen behind the scenes. So many different purposes/functions and ways to incorporate them into recipes, depending upon the intended result. They’re the Batman of dessert ingredients. You know they’re lurking around somewhere, taking care of business and making things great, you just don’t see it.
What music keeps you groovin’ in the kitchen?
If I need to stay awake for a baking all-nighter at home, The Village People’s Macho Man vinyl, all the way.
If I need to distract myself from outside noise during the daytime, My Chemical Romance gets blasted on high volume.
Tacos are, by their very nature, savoury. But, what about sweet? Surely we could delight in sweet tacos, right?
We sure could! What about sweet-savoury tacos? Maple-bourbon candied pork-belly tacos with roasted apple and cinnamon salsa on top, crunchy pear slaw with a vanilla bean-lemon vinaigrette. Finely grated orange zest on top. And if you’re not into meat, sub rice pudding for the pork belly. Who doesn’t like a little carb-on-carb action?
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Making a show ain’t all in the camera work. To design our titles and supers and general graphic everything, we’ve brought on illustrator and graphic designer Emily Smith! This completes the Vancouver Mini Maker Faire trifecta. Emily started the event, which pretty much means that if it weren’t for her, Ben and I wouldn’t have met and this show wouldn’t exist.
Emily’s been super busy lately, so I sent her a wee interview via email. Get to know her a little, would ya? She’s gonna play a huge role in bringing the taco to life.
Tell me about an illustration project you’ve recently done that you absolutely love. Personal or professional, it doesn’t matter.
Some of my favourite illustrations to do are those that are both technical and have some sort of creative / artistic element. For fun a couple of years ago, I made this ‘octo-mollusc‘ pattern by following Julia Rothman’s ‘How to make a repeat pattern‘ tutorial. I had made repeating patterns in Photoshop before, but drawing on paper and physically cutting the paper and taping it just felt so much more daring than copying and pasting in Photoshop. It was a bit more finicky than I thought, putting it all together, but once I got all of the sides to line up, I found it very rewarding!
What kind of music do you anticipate listening to as you work on THTV?
I’m really big into podcasts, and Radiolab is one of my favourites. They do a really great job of relating science and technology back to the human experience. My two favourite podcasts that they have ever broadcast are ‘Famous Tumors‘ and ‘Parasites‘. Yah I know, they don’t sound like the most appealing topics, but the way that they weave stories of people and experiences together is really both captivating and thought-provoking.
If The Big One (earthquake!) were to strike tomorrow, what kind of DIY skills do you see yourself relying on?
Whenever I think this sort of scenario through, I usually think that there will likely be a lot of glass everywhere. Glass, and water – or some sort of flooding (i.e., not drinkable). I imagine that there are certain basic needs – like having proper footwear, wearing my bicycle helmet, having a first-aid kit ready, a radio, preserves (ideally non-breakable), water and a flashlight will be my first line of defence.
After seeing what those affected by Hurricane Sandy and the tsunami in Fukushima are going through, it’s pretty clear that there is a huge effect on the local community, post-natural disaster. If I make it through the initial shake in one piece, I imagine there will be some efforts to restore things, or at least deal with the after effects. Seeing how members of a Tokyo hackerspace responded in Fukushima by making a DIY Geiger counter kit as well as solar-powered lanterns, hygiene packs, among other items, I can see myself getting involved with facilitating some sort of project like this. It doesn’t have to be something technological, either. It could be something as simple as pairing together enough resources between 10 people on the block to make food for the week. I’d like to be involved at any level, whether it be cleaning pots and pans, cooking a few meals, or setting a nice table. I’ll probably be knitting a lot as well, to keep warm (if that’s the case).
I think my role with the DIY movement in Vancouver has been to bring together and connect various individuals and groups. I love seeing that creative spark that can happen when a knitter or spinner realizes they have something in common with an engineer. I can see that this “pulling together” of resources, individuals, or project planning, to make a bigger shelter or protective space or nourishing environment, will be what I would bring to the table. That is, if I don’t have a serious head wound!
So far, nobody – not one person – has suggested a title for our show. We’re beginning to wonder if it might actually end up staying Taco Hat. Would that concern you or thrill you as the person who will be developing such an important part of the show’s brand?
That would not concern me at all. I think it would be thrilling. In fact, if the name sticks, I believe that we should make some taco hats and wear them. I imagine the process of making them will go something like this. I also believe that capes are of utmost importance. [Ed. note: This is why we love Emily.]
While we’re on the topic: tacos! Beef, chicken or bean? Hot sauce or no hot sauce?
I’ll have a chicken enchilada, please! Extra spicy. [Ed. note: Also, she's a rebel.]
We are pleased as peanut butter (see what I did there?) to announce that Jeannette Ordas, Vancouver food blogger and designer, will be the guest on our food episode! You may know her award-winning blog Everybody Likes Sandwiches, or you may recognize her from the recipes she posts on Poppytalk. If you’re local to Vancouver, you may recognize her from craft fairs, where she sells her lovely and witty cards.
I had coffee with Jeannette last week and we agreed we should ask you to help us choose the focus of our food episode. So tell us, what do you want to know about? An ingredient? A type of dish? How and why certain ingredients interact the way they do? (Note: This episode will specifically not be about dessert foods.)
To get our food groove on a little, I put Jeannette on the spot and asked her five questions (I put myself on the spot too; they’re not my most creative questions):
Kim: What’s your favourite thing to eat?
Jeannette: A hamburger. And I never make hamburgers. Maybe that’s why I love them.
Kim: What’s something you learned online about cooking?
Jeannette: How to truss a chicken. [I had to ask her how to spell that. True story.] It involves twine and a whole chicken.
Kim: What would you want to learn online about cooking?
Jeannette: How to descale a salmon. And how to cut up a chicken into eight different pieces. [Jeannette had chickens on her mind.]
Kim: What’s the most delicious thing you’ve ever made?
Jeannette: Always really good is this weird yam, peanut butter and pineapple soup I got from the Rebar cookbook.
Kim: What’s your ideal taco?
Jeannette: It’s that porky one with pineapple. [I have no idea what she means.] It’s a soft taco. A little spicy, a little sweet.
Now I’m hungry. And I’m excited to hear from you about what you’d like our food episode with Jeannette to focus on. Ready? GO.
Ok, so the man is Kim’s friend Boris, and the giraffe is his Halloween costume in-progress, made by artist Rachael Ashe (who is also Kim’s friend).
But we think this is about the best endorsement in the history of half-costumed people endorsing a web show.
If you feel like shooting a video supporting THTV while wearing your in-progress Halloween costume, now you know you’re not alone. You should do it, and we’ll post it here and everywhere else we can!
Ben whipped up a couple banners yesterday that are more… shall we say… enticing than our beloved solo taco.
Please use them to spread the word about the show and Indiegogo campaign! We want to reach every corner of the web that has curious people and makers in it. Perhaps you know a few people like that? Yeah, we thought so.
There’s a big one and a small one on our new banners page, complete with code you can just copy and paste into whatever you want.
With just five weeks left to raise more than $7,000, we can’t express enough how important your enthusiasm is, and how thankful we are for it!
I wasn’t lying when I mentioned in the campaign that I’ve been thinking about making this show for years. It was perhaps but a wee seedling in the back of my mind in the summer of 2008, and since then it’s grown into what Ben and I want so much to make now.
Back in the summer of 2008, during the Hollywood writers’ strike, Joss Whedon gathered some fine folks and made a web short called Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog. Maybe you’ve heard of it? Starring Neil Patrick Harris, Nathan Fillion and Felicia Day, it’s a musical romp about a wannabe villain (Dr. Horrible, played by Harris) who’s in love with the girl from the laundromat (Penny, Day), and the doofus good guy who may or may not really be a total asshole (Captain Hammer, Fillion).
Whedon, et al., released the short in three parts, only online. It was a grand experiment at the time: a non-amateur production made exclusively for web distribution. And the experiment was a success – servers crashed, people got paid, there’s been talk of a sequel ever since.
During the publicity craze about the show, Whedon made a throw-away sarcastic remark to Wired about not getting much attention from a made-up crochet magazine, and at the time I was actually the editor of a crochet magazine and I was still running CrochetMe.com. And thus ensued the most fun I’ve ever had on the internet, as a few tweets and a blog post sparked great enthusiasm amongst other crafters to try to land an interview – about crafts, naturally – with Whedon.
The short story is that we did manage to get his attention, and in November of that year the dude who would eventually make that wee art flick The Avengers spent a half hour talking on the phone with little old me. And one of the things he told me when we were talking about Dr. Horrible and how it’s become (even more so now, four years later) possible for anyone with a crappy camera and a good idea to make a great show, was this:
It is no longer the time of sitting around and thinking about doing something.
Ok, yes. It’s taken me four years to stop sitting around on this idea. But that’s how long it took for me to meet Ben, and to find a few months when I’m not overwhelmed with other work. So let’s consider Taco Hat TV the gift that comes from a book I want to write not having found a publisher yet, and from Ben having some time this winter to shoot.
On the t-shirt I’m wearing in our Indiegogo campaign video is a quote from Dr. Horrible, and I wore that shirt on purpose both as a reminder to myself that we can do this thing right, even on a shoestring budget, and because now is the time to do it. And it’s going to be fun, and it’s going to be good.
PS Coincidentally, Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog will air on network television for the first time tonight, on The CW at 9pm Eastern.
Our Indiegogo campaign is now live! We’ve put together a shoestring budget to film an eight-episode pilot season of a DIY web show that’s fun to watch, educational, and really well made. It’s for curious people and makers, and focuses on skills rather than specific projects.
Pretty much, we’re making the DIY show we’d set aside time to watch. If you’d like to see a show like this, too, please help us make it! We’ve got some great perks to thank you for your support, and also we’ll just totally thank you. Even more so if you tell your friends and family about the campaign!
Here’s our wee video intro to the project. There’s loads more information on the campaign page. Thanks in advance for your support!
