Screaming and Crying My Way to Cookbook #2
And oolong mochi "Twunkies" with vanilla maple cream
Welcome to the paid section of Call Me Dumpling! I want this to be a special space just for you where you’ll get exclusive recipes and guides, access to the behind the scenes adventure that is writing a cookbook in real time, and more. This will also be the space where I’ll engage directly with you! An internet hotline if you will, where you can spam me with your questions, comments, concerns, unsolicited advice, unhinged comments, and I’ll pick some to respond to here. I’m sure this will evolve and change as time goes on, but thank you for being some of the first people on this little corner of the internet, I appreciate you! 💕
What are you working on?
I took an entire month off to take a full break from social media (surprise sometimes recipes are filmed days/weeks/months in advance and scheduled ahead of time, the internet is a lie! 😬) so I could finally start and finish my cookbook proposal for book #2 which was due in less than a month..
For the record I had the entire year of 2023 to do it if I wanted to have the book come out on time (the first one took me about 8 months to write). However, I have this masochistic tendency of waiting until the very last minute in order to feed off the incredibly paralyzing anxiety of not finishing on time and disappointing everyone I love. It’s that feeling of being sat on by a 12,000 pound elephant of anxiety that somehow is channeled into getting a large amount of work done in a very short amount of time. Very healthy I know!
I think another big reason I waited so long to write this cookbook proposal was the fact that I am terrified of starting another book. From a schedule perspective, it’s a two year process from when you start to when you finish that can be both extremely rewarding and incredibly exhausting. When I worked on the last book, there would be some weeks where I felt like I could crank out 15 incredibly delicious recipes in 5 days and earn 10 Michelin stars while juggling 3 babies in the process. Then there would be stretches of days and even weeks where I would have a complete and total existential crisis just reading and rereading the recipes and words I was putting onto the page and thinking, “I could literally wipe my ass with printer paper and it would sell more copies than what I’m creating right now.” It’s incredible the amount of both immense pride and total dread that the book writing process has on your psyche.
But ever since I finished my book tour, I couldn’t help but marinate on another idea. It’s an idea that I feel incredibly excited about, and so I just had to pull up my big boy undies and get my shit together.
To write a cookbook, it all starts with the proposal, the pitch that communicates the vision of why this cookbook deserves to be in the world, essentially a business pitch. You’re trying to get the publisher to invest in both you and your cookbook aka get them to give you lots of cash money for an advance. The proposal is broken down into three main questions to answer:
1. Why should you write this cookbook?
2. What is the vision of the cookbook?
3. Does this cookbook have product market fit?
Just by answering these three questions, before you know it, you end up with a document looking sort of like this!
A proposal that communicates everything from the vision to sample recipes. Most of this will change, but the general thesis of what you’re trying to create in a cookbook is what really matters. Now that the proposal is finished, it’s in the hands of my agent where hopefully with her powers of persuasion she can convince my publisher to ink me a multi-billion trillion dollar blockbuster book deal where I’m drowning in so much cash that I can build a farm that only has wiener dogs, pigs, and one peach tree (I kill plants easily) hah!
What recipes are you working on?
I’m currently in a deep dive of Asian American and Mexican history for a section of my book. In the late 1800’s, the US enacted a law called “The Chinese Exclusion Act” which was the first major piece of legislation restricting immigration in the United States. Basically the government to the Chinese was like, “Hey girl! We know we needed cheap indentured labor after abolishing slavery and you guys came and helped us build our railroads, establish our garment industry, and innovate in our agricultural industry, but like we need you guys to just like, chill. You’re like, I don’t know, doing a good job?!? And are becoming entrepreneurs and are making a life for yourself and staying? So like, if you could not, that’d be great. thanks.” And because the US government was being a bossy biatch, the Chinese ended up settling in countries like Peru, Cuba, and Mexico. Many Chinese settled near the Mexican border trying to get into the United States, and as a result, entire communities of Chinese Mexican food was born. So a long way of saying, I’m currently on the chapter that’s based on and inspired by this history. At this very moment, I’m testing a batch Queso Fundido with Chinese Chorizo and I’m also trying to make a vegan version as a side quest (for my dairy-free, fart-tastic ancestors). So for the next day or so I’ll be drowning in queso, which is not a bad problem to have (just don’t walk behind me if you see me in the grocery store the next couple days! 🏃🏻♂️💨 )
What’s the best thing you made this week?
I had so much fun recreating Twinkies and bringing them into my delusional fantasy world to become Twunkies. My favorite flavor I made has to be these Oolong and Maple Vanilla Cream Twunkies, the recipe linked here is exclusive to you all!
Oolong and Maple Vanilla Cream “Twunkies” recipe here.
What’s the worst thing you made this week?
Sometimes on recipe development days, there’s sort of this romantic notion that your kitchen is filled with beautifully plated food all the time and you’re always full. The reality is the timing doesn’t always work out to have a perfectly executed meal at meal time. Especially during lunch, my kitchen straddles the line between dish washing mania and a small army’s worth of recipes in various states of dissarray. So come lunch time, I’m usually purely eating out of function. One of my go-to meals is what I like to call a turkey cigar. It’s just chunks of cheese artisanally wrapped in the finest Oscar Meyer’s deli meat, served on a used cutting board. Delightful!
Anything else?
Thank you for paying to read my words?! That is wild to me still. Please feel free to email me any feedback or things you’d like to see on here. I’d love to chat with you and make this a space that feels beneficial for you. Thank you for all the support. ❤️
Rapid Fire
🥟 Currently Eating — An incredible meal from Off-Alley, one of my fave little restaurants in Seattle.
🎵 Currently Listening — The Jump Off - Lil Kim
📖 Currently Reading — Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry
❤️ Currently loving — Photoshopping Charles Melton and Steven Yeun holding Twinkies, my finest use of my design degree yet.
My mom was born in Mexicali and I grew up for part of my childhood on the other side of the border. I miss that Chinese food. Can’t wait to read your new book!!!