John and I are currently off celebrating the completion of his law degree and this wonderful, wonderful life we have with a trip to South Korea and Bali. We have friends there we’d been dying to visit and who agreed to be our obligatory tour guides while we shack up in bungalows and learn how to surf during our 20+ day island- and country-hopping tour. Lots of inspiration – both food and cultural – to be shared once we get back. But until then, let’s talk ice cream, minimalism and how this humble site began. Minimalist Baker was an afterthought. I’d already been food blogging for a couple years on another site when the idea for a new food blog suddenly hit me like a ton of bricks. Minimalist Baker was born at Chipotle, so to speak. One evening, as John and I were chatting over steak and veggie bowls, respectively, I told him I had an idea for a new site I’d been thinking of. I wanted to call it Minimalist Baker, and it would be entirely focused on simple, healthy recipes with minimal ingredients and equipment – an exact reflection of how I approach cooking. I’ve always loved food blogs and have followed them for years. But I always found that when a recipe – no matter how tempting it may be – required more than 7 or so ingredients, I bolted, never to consider it again. So the idea behind this new blog would be to keep things simple, focused and entirely minimalist, not only for my benefit but for yours, too. I knew John thought it was a great idea because his eyes got really big as I was sharing. Like clockwork. We threw some ideas back and forth and the framework came to be right there over our corn salsa, gauc and chips. Days later John had finished the framework and I got to work on our first recipe – Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookie Pancakes – which is still our most popular post on Minimalist Baker. You guys, that post has 621,000 pins to date! We did it, and yes I mean WE. This site wouldn’t be what it is today without your feedback and tweets and pins and love. So thank you for helping us making this site flourish. In one year we have done a lot. Since our first post we’ve:
Published a FREE 7 Ingredients Or Less E-Cookbook.Collaborated to create a FREE 1 Cup Water E-Cookbook, which raised $1,000 for Charity:Water.Published a Detox Guide with 12 healthy recipes to help you hit the “reset” button on your diet.Created an entire Food Photography E-Course for $19.99 – a product to help you start taking better food photos today.Created an entire Blog Resources page to help you start a food blog, grow it, and improve your blogging skills (more to come on that front soon!)Published an E-Book outlining 5 Ways to Make Your Photos Go Further (Faster).
So what’s next? Well, for one we’re celebrating with a vegan version of our favorite Dairy Queen childhood treat: A copycat Dairy Queen Cupcake. See how it all went down on Instagram and Vine. Our version is made with coconut milk chocolate ice cream, Oreos, vegan hot fudge, coconut milk vanilla ice cream and coconut whipped cream. Yep, it’s all in there: 5 sexy layers of dairy-free goodness. My cupcakes were so good I could’ve eaten both, with two spoons AT THE SAME TIME. Maybe I did. Who can recount such details…? Make these cupcakes to enjoy this summer, and in the meantime just know that we love that you’re here and want you to stick around probably forever. Or at least until the internet dies. If this next year is anything like our first year, we know it will be a friggin’ blast. Cheers!
