Interview with Lyndsay Wells AKA The Kitchen Witch

Lyndsay Wells is one of my favourite foodies. Any woman who dresses up as a witch and makes magical foodie videos and blog posts is super cool to me. And others must agree because she has had phenomenal foodie successes and I wanted to know more about them. After making her fabulous Curried Coconut Chicken, I knew I and to do an interview with her!

Where did your idea to become the Kitchen Witch come from?

Life is so funny; I’d been blogging for years about my family under the pen name “Maven” and often included a recipe or two at the tail end of the blog. But when my son graduated from high school in 2009 and went away to college, I lost my funny bone and the passion I had to write about my day to day life. Around that time, a friend gave me a Nora Roberts book and one of the characters was a Kitchen Witch. I was immediately enchanted with the idea of creating magic through food and gardening and the Kitchen Witch blog was born!

How long have you been blogging?

I have been blogging since 2000. I began on MSN with a little community I called “Maven’s Haven” where we exchanged recipes, and connected daily with women all over the world including Pakistan and Australia. One of the things in life I am most proud of is that they are all still with me on Facebook and continue to follow my adventures – now in the world of cooking!

Lyndsay’s Creamy Tex Mex Chicken in Avocado Corn Crepes

“I’m excited to feature one of my absolute favourite recipe creations: Philly Chicks in a Blanket. Delicious cornmeal crepes filled with creamy Tex Mex  chicken! Better still it can all be made ahead of time and re-heated before serving making it another great dish for entertaining!”

In this video Lyndsay demonstrates ideas for creating a romantic Provence-inspired picnic for you and the one you love!

Have you always been a foodie?

Under “special achievements” in my baby book my mom wrote “Loves to eat” – so yes, I guess I have always been a foodie

Of all the foodie adventures you have had, what is your favourite? Recipe to Riches perhaps?

While Recipe to Riches was beyond amazing – and I LOVED the batch up challenge, so fun – I would have to say my experiences with The Real Women of Philadelphia are my favourites. Not only did I get to meet and work with Anna Olson (who is a wonderful person), I made life long friendships in that contest. I have so many incredible memories of summer in Toronto, cooking off in KRAFT kitchens, and having my $20,000.00 grand prize winning pork tenderloin prepared by the Chef at Scott Conant’s restaurant Scarpetta! The fact that Rosie Edeh from Entertainment Tonight Canada ate my dish still makes me smile! I also had the best meal I have ever had in my life at Canoe restaurant – oh for the love of sweet sweet foie gras – and I thoroughly enjoyed having the chance to shoot two professional videos that featured my recipes!

Where do you find your foodie inspiration?

I find my foodie inspiration in a variety of places like the farmer’s market, the grocery store, and the library – I go there every Saturday morning and am constantly reading about food and ogling recipe books I also collect vintage cookbooks and love to re-imagine old time recipes in modern ways.

I would love to hear about one of your foodie disasters, do you have a funny story to tell?

I have many funny stories – but perhaps my biggest fail wasn’t with food per se, but with a homemade hair treatment. It was mid July, one of the hottest nights of the summer. I was sipping wine and watching an interview with Jane Fonda on TV and she mentioned a homemade hair tonic she created for soft shining tresses. Made up of two parts mayonnaise, one part sesame oil, I thought it would be just the thing for moisturizing. So I slathered the concoction onto my head, covered it with a plastic bag, wrapped it in a towel, and went to bed. Remember, hottest night of the year.

I woke up the next morning to my husband screaming “What the HELL is that smell?” But before I had a chance to answer him, the aroma of day old mayonnaise and sesame oil hit me and I ran, gagging, to the bathroom. When I ripped the towel and plastic bag from my head, the smell about did me in – and my hair! The hardened mayonnaise looked like a poultice. I can’t even begin to tell you how many showers it took to get it off my head but it was a few days before I could get the memory of the scent from my mind. Even now, I feel queasy thinking about it!

Check out Lyndsay’s Sweet and Savoury Stir Fried Pork with Cashews: “One of the most delicious meals to serve a crowd is a stir fry – and today’s original Kitchen Witch recipe for Sweet and Savoury Stir Fried Pork with Cashews is not only a favourite among friends, it’s one of my most requested recipes!”

I have to ask, are you happy with who won Recipe to Riches this year?

Although I would have loved to have seen my dear friend Elisa (who I met in The Real Women of Philadelphia) win Recipe to Riches, I was super happy with the winner. Those mac and cheese balls are amazing! I ate the whole box myself.  I also loved the Acadian pie and Jessie’s cheesecake bites. I thought Superstore did a great job with reproducing the recipes this season.

Thank you Lyndsay for your friendship and for agreeing to do this interview with me. You are such an inspiration in and out of the kitchen! BTW, it was Lyndsay‘s birthday yesterday. Hope it rocked!