Zainab Storms is the creative force behind A Classic Twist food blog, dedicated to sharing classic, everyday recipes with bold twists and flavors.
Zainab Storms is a baker, home chef, neuroscientist, world traveler, and mom.
Born in Freetown, Sierra Leone, Zainab didn’t grow up baking with her mother or grandmother. In fact, she had never baked before 2012 when she decided to bake a heart-shaped cake for her then-fiancé on Valentine’s Day. (Romantic right?)
She says, “It was an organized disaster!”
For Zainab, baking began as a grad-school hobby, a way to de-stress and express her creativity while earning a Ph.D. in neuroscience. She enjoyed experimenting with new recipes and techniques and quickly realized that, with a bit of experience and background knowledge, putting her unique spin on the recipes she loved was simple and rewarding.
Now, there’s nothing she enjoys more than being spontaneous in the kitchen, guided by instincts and curiosity.
Zainab loves sharing recipes inspired by her travels and her favorite flavors and showing her readers how to relax and tune into their own intuition in the kitchen.
Zainab Storms Show Notes
Contact:
A Classic Twist
Instagram
Pinterest
Twitter
Facebook
Books:
This post contains affiliate links, which means I get a small commission, at no additional cost to you, if you click the link and buy something . You can read my disclosure here.
Better Homes and Garden Cookbook
Equipment:
Canon 6D
Canon Rebel Series
100mm f/2.8
50mm f/1.8
Mentions:
Bintu Hardy
Purr Designs
#Jeff
Laurie Buckle
Questions:
What did you do before you became a blogger?
Did you end up going into that field?
Is that interesting?
When you go into work, do you have something new every day or do you have a project that lasts for months?
Where do you live now?
Where did you grow up?
Did you go through a name change for your blog?
Did it take a lot of time to think about rebranding? Did you mull it over for a while?
How did your readership take the rebranding?
When did you start blogging, what was the year?
How many iterations of the website have you had?
You said you had a free one at first, then did you go to a paid one or did you go to a designer?
After your started blogging, was it a big surprise when you realized you had all these people reading your blog?
When you first started, how many times did you publish a post?
Do you find it hard being a baking blog? (not eating everything)
After you started, how long do you think it took you to make money?
Do you have a VA or someone that helps you with your blog?
Do you have the same VA or have you switched VA’s?
How did you find her?
What is the hardest thing you find about blogging?
Do you do your own SEO?
Are you going back and working with old posts for SEO and keywords?
What is your top performing post?
How often do you look at google analytics?
Do you have to import all this into your spreadsheet or is it something you can export out?
What is your favorite social media platform and why?
Did you have a viral moment?
Once you realized your blog was a business, did you map out a plan in your head or even on paper?
Who did you use as a brand consultant?
What is your biggest food failure?
What is your favorite thing to make?
Why?
What is your favorite cuisine?
What is your favorite African dish?
If you were to make a sweet from your culture, what would it be?
What is your favorite cookbook?
What is one thing you can’t live without in your kitchen?
What camera and lenses do you use?
Did you keep your old cameras?
Do you use them?
What would be your last meal?
Tina Dawson | Love is in my Tummy
Elaine, another brilliant podcast! I adore how you bring out the ‘fun’ in your guests. I’ve known Zainab for over a year now, she is so amazingly supportive and my idea guru. But on this podcast, I still discovered so many new things I didn’t know about her, and I love that!!
Elaine
Tina! Thanks so much! I appreciate your kind words! I love my guests and have so much fun chatting with them! You’re up next!! 🙂
Zainab
You are too kind Tina! I love sharing ideas with you 🙂 Thank you Elaine for having me. It was fun chatting with you.
Elaine
Thank you Zainab! It was my pleasure!