My Open Kitchen – Social Media Training for Farmers and Food Producers

August 20, 2017

Series 2, Episode 8 – Show notes

Hello all!! Here we are again back for another episode of My Open Kitchen this time recording from Sophie’s Farm, Mandagery Creek. Imagine us wrapped in thick winter coats and scarves, warmed by the afternoon sun, a hot cup of tea and freshly baked muffin. We’re loving our new studio!

This is the final episode in Series 2 of My Open Kitchen which has been so generously sponsored by Country Style Magazine. We say it often, but without this sponsorship this podcast wouldn’t happen, so thank you a million times over to @countrystylemag. Whatsmore, they have decided to help us keep the conversation going by supporting another Series, Series 3 of My Open Kitchen – so peeps, we will be back. Thank you Country Style.

Image by Teagan Jane Photography

When we recorded this episode Sophie had just returned from Broken Hill, where she interviewed Jane Smith aka @theshadybaker. Jane has been blogging since 2011 and I think, is one of the best Australian food bloggers out there. She is always completely authentic, she posts about great smoko recipes because every morning at 9.30 she turns out a batch of sausage rolls or pizza scrolls or whatever for a crew of hungry farm workers who’ve been mustering by air since dawn and for her children who are home with her doing school of the air. Jane is a wonderful baker, recipe writer and photographer and one of the really interesting things about her is that she uses social media mostly because she just wants to share her stories, recipes and life and build a community.

Jane is a great representation of what we are trying to achieve at My Open Kitchen; a farmer, who loves food, sharing her stories on social media to the bigger wider world. Go Jane!

Image courtesy of Jane Smith

Skye’s Top 5

#1 Grenfell – My new home and the hottest place in Australia! I can’t believe I didn’t mention it in our last episode. I am yet to fully immerse myself in the community and I can’t wait to do so but in the meantime I’ve come across some very beautiful local Instagram feeds. See Instagram is a great way to connect. Have a look at @weddinfarms @quandicandles and @mywhitewalls

#2 My latest binge listen is the Soulful PR podcast by Janet Murray – I came across this podcast through this episode of Sara Tasker’s Hashtag Authentic podcast (of course!) If you are trying to build business on social media, Janet’s advice is real, relatable and super super practical.

#3 A few weeks ago, I asked for some suggestions on Instagram for people doing good things in the world of Wool. Wow! There is a plethora of goodness out there in this field. Through this converasation I discovered the Woolful podcast by Ashley Yousling– is a series of conversations with farmers, knitters, woollen mills and fashion peeps all over the world. I really love her introduction music too.

#4 I have a major crush on everything Naomi Bulger does and her Meals in the Mail project is just so cool. She asked people to pick a fave recipe, write it up by hand, perhaps include a few pretty drawings and and explanation of what the recipe means to them. Send it to her via snail mail and she then collates them all into a special cookbook to be redistributed back to everyone who’s taken part. I LOVE EVERYTHING about this. She greatly inspires me, as a fellow lover of handwriting, letters and pretty drawings. has an e-course on how to write a beautiful letter!

#5 Sonya is an old work colleague from the ABC and I find her blog, Sonnie and Share, such a relaxing read. You know when someone’s personality oozes through their words?! Her posts are light and bright, uncomplicated and she loves weekend cooking – which inspires me into the kitchen.

Sophie’s Top 5

1. Pinterest has developed a ‘shazam’ for food. Shazam being the app that lets you point your phone at the radio and it will identify the song and artist. So here, through Pinterest’s new ‘lens’ feature, you open the app and select the camera icon and point your phone at a bowl of apples or block of chocolate or whatever and it will bring up a bunch of recipes featuring that ingredient. So cool.

2. Amy Flying a Kite on Instagram – A Canadian musician, gardener, I adore her words and photos.

3. Wowee – an Australian podcast hosted by two super, fun-sounding Melbournians all about bringing together creative communities and promote the sharing of ideas, skills and experiences in a supportive space.

4. Social Media Marketing Talk Show Michael Stelzner – a brand new weekly update on all the latest algorithm changes, developments, things you need to know if working in or around social media.

5. Chris Ferguson @lifeinthemulga, a photographer and grazier from the Mulga in North West NSW. What I love so much about Chris is how committed she is to breaking down the barrier of misunderstandings and misinformation that us ‘insider country’ people often have about outback life and farming. Chris posts very honest stories about the challenges she and her peers face with wild dogs attacking their goats, kangaroos decimating their precious feed and water stocks and takes a huge amount of time to respond to comments and explain why they do what they do and the ins and outs of rangeland farming and all its challenges. She also shares the crazy beauty of her part of the world, the freedom, community and amazing people living and working there.

In other news you might have noticed #myopenkitchenstories as you scroll through Instagram. From next week, August 21st, we will have a whole new calendar of weekly prompts tying in with the next round of the e-course which starts that same day. Everyone is welcome to join in so please do! You can find the prompts on the blog every Monday.

AND we are still so very excited about our first #myopenkitchengathering to be held in Orange next May. A big part of this excitement is our keynote speaker ……. Sara Tasker of @me_and_orla who’s jumping on a plane and coming to Australia especially for this event. Wow!

If you want tickets sign up for the My Open Kitchen newsletter as all updates and ticket details will drop there first. Program details will be announced on October 16. Advance bookings will open on October 23 for past, present and future (enrolled) students of the My Open Kitchen ecourse) then the following week, October 30, we’ll open up for general bookings first via the My Open Kitchen blog.

If you are thinking you might like to come along, and even bring a few friends, here is a link to all the details for you to send on.

As always thank you so much for tuning in! We still really really love seeing your reviews on iTunes. So if you have a spare minute we would love a rating and a review to help keep our little podcast from and center in iTunes.

Until next time – Sophie and Skye xx

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August 8, 2017

My Open Kitchen Gathering May 2018

Image by Sara Tasker

For the past few years I’ve watched with envy as groups of creative, generous, clever people were gathering at events like Cherry Bombe Jubilee in the States and Blogtacular in the UK, thinking how much I’d love to go to something like this, but with a farming/food focus in my own backyard. So here goes. We at My Open Kitchen (meaning myself and my podcast co-host and as of this week one-day-a-week saving grace Skye Manson) are organising our very own festival of ideas and it’s going to go down in Orange next May.

So far, like all the best projects (fingers crossed), it has all come together super smoothly – everyone I’ve invited to join the line up of speakers and panelists has emailed back with a yes almost immediately, and our Keynote speaker Sara Tasker is taking a big leap of faith coming all the way from the UK to share her considerable wisdom with us. Yup. Excitement is building at MOK HQ.

So here’s what we know so far about the My Open Kitchen Gathering;

What’s it all about?

The main point of this event is to get a bunch of farmers, food producers and small businesses together to share ideas and inspiration about how we can all use social media to better tell our stories and build communities around what we do. Plus of course, spend a weekend with awesome, like minded people talking about food, taking photos and learning from each other. Starting with welcome drinks on Friday night we move on to Saturday with a full day of talks, panel discussions, feasting and networking and then finish up on Sunday with a choice of six mini-workshops covering everything from ‘Bloom and Grow’ with Sara Tasker to food writing, working with brands and loads more (still to be confirmed!).

Our keynote speaker will be….. Sara Tasker of Me and Orla and podcast Hashtag Authentic and truly we are just so thrilled to be bringing this lovely and clever ‘queen of Instagram’ out specially for this event – whoop boom bang. And the confirmed panelist line up so far, features some of our all time favourite Australian creatives; Luisa Brimble, Annabelle Hickson, Tamsin Carvan, Barbara Sweeney, Michelle Crawford and MORE to be announced soon.

Image by Sara Tasker

When’s it happening?

Friday 17, Saturday 18 and Sunday 19th May

Where?

Various locations around Orange NSW (3.5 hours West of Sydney) but the main venue will be The Old Convent, 10 minutes out of Orange..

Why?

See above.

How much will it cost?

Cost of all events is still to be confirmed but the main event, Saturday’s full day of talks and panel discussions will be $300 including morning tea, lunch and afternoon tea.

How do I get tickets?

Basically – the main thing to do is sign up for the My Open Kitchen newsletter as all updates and ticket details will drop there first.

Program details will be announced on October 16

Advance bookings will open on October 23 for past, present and future (enrolled) students of the My Open Kitchen ecourse) then the following week, October 30, we’ll open up for general bookings first via the My Open Kitchen blog. (www.my-open-kitchen.com)

We can only fit 70 into the venue so that’s how many tickets are up for grabs!

Want to support us?

We are going to be looking for sponsors to help us make this event as fantastic and delicious as possible so if you are a coffee roaster, wine maker, cheese maker, bag printer, tea blender, whatever, and would like to be a part of this event please get in touch – [email protected]

This is the first of what I hope will grow to be an annual event bringing generous, creative, food and farming loving people together to share ideas, inspiration and collectively propel each other forward. That’s it for now! Whoop. Sophie x

July 31, 2017

#myopenkitchenstories hashtag challenge week 5 – Shout it out!

So we are now in Module 5 of the ecourse and this one is all about connecting and collaborating. So… this week I’d love you to reach out and mention one, two or five people whose work you are LOVING on Instagram at the moment and why. Give them a virtual high five and tell your followers why you love them and why they will too. This is such a great way to broaden your networks, to reach out to people you admire in a really lovely way and could be something you decide to do regularly, maybe once a month or whenever it suits.

With this challenge, it will be tempting I guess to repost an image from one of the people you are mentioning and that is fine – just please do remember to do it properly and with full credit. Everyone has different ideas on reposting others’ images on your own feed, my take on it is that sometimes this works but generally it’s better to use original work on your Instagram page. So for this challenge, you could create a lovely flat lay, vignette, still life or use an evocative image from your farm, garden or wherever you feel inspired.

Thank you so much to everyone who joined in last week’s challenge, here are some favourites below. Plus, if you like the look of the above lemon cakes, you can find the recipe over on Local is Lovely.

Top row, left to right; @exchangestoresnundle, @abadger64, @the_not_so_constant_gardener

Middle row, left to right; @thefoodstoryteller, @good_hope_blooms , @moorefarmfreshproduce

Bottom row, left to right; @fairywrencottage, @acooper1982, @pleasure_on_a_plate

July 25, 2017

Hashtag challenge – week 4 ‘bee observant’

I’m virtually bribing you all with cake (see below) to do this week’s challenge – because it will I think, be the most challenging of all but I think, the most rewarding…

But first, here are my favourites from last week’s challenge – the human element. Thanks so much everyone who gave it a go, so many great pics!

July 20, 2017

Podcast show notes – Series 2 Episode 7

It’s been a while between drinks, but we are back! My clever co-host Skye Manson has been MIA for the past couple of episodes, and with good reason; she’s has a baby and moved with her family to their new farm in Grenfell NSW. So yes it was super exciting to have her back in the studio – or rather, my garden, to record this episode to the tune of birds singing, machinery turning on and off and baby Florence gurgling and and making the odd noise of protestation in the background.

Thanks first up must go to our much loved series sponsor Country Style magazine, without their support we wouldn’t be able to keep chatting with you so THANK YOU! Plus, their latest issue is absolutely gorgeous, as are they all.

And also, just a subtle reminder below about the e-course!

So anyway… this episode is all about how social media can help anyone in rural, regional or urban based business build communities around their actual shops, drive their online sales and draw more people through their doors. And it’s also about how much we are loving newsletters these days.

To chat about all this, we brought in the big guns – two women who run online and virtual shops in regional NSW and do it all so beautifully we just wanted to pick their brains on how it all comes together. First up is Megan Trousdale from Nundles’s Odgers and McClelland Exchange Stores and then Orange’s Pip Brett of new concept store The Sonic. I interviewed Pip for this month (July’s) Country Style magazine so please do check that article out for more of Pip’s story and some beautiful pics of her store.

Interview one – Megan Trousdale of Nundle’s Odgers and McClelland Exchange stores

Megan can be found online via her website and online store, on Instagram at @exchangestoresnundle and via Facebook too.

Skye’s Top 5

My love of a good podcast has gone from an interest to a full blown obsession. I have listened to SO many in the last few months……. And I look forward to refreshing my podcast inbox, like I look forward to a parcel in the mail!

1. A new-to-me podcast Tea and Tattle – which I think I might have found through Me and Orla ……… it’s the most English things I have ever listened to! A range of topics from social media, to travel journaling, to daily routines to gardening. I’ll post a link to their latest episode, which was all about small urban gardens but totally got me motivated to get out in our garden despite it not being a small balcony.

2. Another podcast… Now that I am a full bona fide ‘farmer’ – the Rural Business Collective is right up my alley. Fleur Anderson has really hit the nail on the head with the people she chooses to interview – entrepreneurs and people who are doing things differently in agriculture and making money to boot. I love it!

3. @activefarmers on Instagram and Facebook. I admire this concept – which is all about people in the country looking after their health. Its not so much about beautiful pictures or words on social media but more about community and bringing small communities in rural Australia together through exercise classes.

4. I have long been a fan of Abbie Melle on Instagram – her pictures are a sanctuary of green lusciousness. I started following her journey through the United Kingdom last year, which so accurately reflected the beautiful walks I remember from my days living in England. And now she is in the Southern Highlands and pops up frequently in Country Style. We need to have her on My Open Kitchen – her Instagram stories are refreshing, clean and beautiful!

5. #simplenaturefinds – As the name suggests this hashtag is a beautiful treasure chest of nature’s goodies.

Sophie’s Top 5

1. I’ve been raving about this book in my Kassia St Clair’s book the Secret Life of Colour, goes through every shade in the rainbow with wonderfully written stories behind each. She also has a great IG feed and her blog is a new favourite of mine.

2. Talking newsletters and how awesome they are for building your business online – here are some of my favourites. These are all examples of regular newsletters that are full of personality ‘reader value and are super popular.

Ann Friedman Weekly – lots of great things to read, think about and look at. Out of the US and quite political and anti-Trump so if you aren’t it might not be your cup of tea! Ann is also the co-host of another favourite podcast of mine, Call Your Girlfriend.
Head Overy Heals – Sent out every Wednesday night by Felicity Loughrey, she of the excellent podcast of the same name. Felicity also wrote a great article recently for Whimn about why newsletters are the new Sunday Papers…
Lenny Letter – One of the original and best ‘high value’ newsletters, sent out weekly and full of beautifully written essays, thoughts and ideas.
The Exchange Stores Nundle of course! Don’t miss Megan’s wonderful quarterly newsletters full of recipes, stories and beautiful things.
The Do lectures newsletter, related to the wonderful podcast featuring lectures from the Do gatherings held every year in Wales.
Also the newsletter for Lunchlady magazine
And here’s a new one – our very own Skye Manson has just started a newsletter and you should totally sign up to it.

Megan Trousdale who we interviewed first up this episode also suggests these newsletters to check out. She also highly recommends engaging a graphic designer to help you set up your newsletter template/design from the get go. For their gorgeous one, and website/shop/everything, they used Dan Phelan of Safety Pin Design, Newcastle.
Fat Pig Farm
The Conscious Farmer
Milkwood Permaculture

3. Grids – allows you to have a nice clean Instagram experience on your desktop. You can add posts or stories from your desktop – yay! switch between accounts without logging out. watch stories, comment, add hashtags. Great for those who don’t love tip tapping on their phones with their fingers! There’s a free version or you can upgrade for more accounts.

4. Focusbooster app – Based on the Pomodoro techqnique which says if you work in 25 minute focused blocks your productivity will skyrocket. According to their research – For every interruption it is proven to take up to 25 minutes to get back on course – so focus booster gets you to set up your day in increments and block them out with no distractions. It you work freelance, it allows you to log ‘time sheets’ for different clients – love this. At the least, their blog is full of great ideas and tips for productivity. The basic version is free..

5. A website and a new series to watch in one – the show is Anne with an E – Netflix’s new take on anne of green gables, the book and original mini series were a big deal for me so I had high hopes and when I started watching this with my daughter Alice. She’s been sick this weekend so we tucked into bed and watched a few episodes and SO SO SO LOVE. Also love the review of the series on Australian writing website Kill Your Darlings which a friend sent me to. Lots of great reviews, writing tips and competitions here.

Interview 2 – Pip Brett

Pip can be found online here @jumbledonline and at @igloustore
The difference between inspiration and imitation from Design Sponge and from the same website, check out this virtual tour of Pip’s amazing concept store The Sonic.

Image by Pip Farqhuarson for Design Sponge

Image by Martina Gemmola for Design Sponge

Last episode we announced a competition, the prize being to win a spot in the August round of the My Open Kitchen ecourse – and the winner is…Ali Cooper from Jamestown SA. Ali’s family are graziers, croppers and she’s also worked as a low rainfall agricultral consultant. She wrote the loveliest long email telling us why the course would be a nice thing for her to do, including these words which I loved “ . .so tonight, after listening to Barbara with my cup of tea, I feel empowered to take control of these negative feelings. I am going to not ‘sweat it’ and ‘keep it simple’ and simply tell my experience to my audience. I am going to continue with my aim to show people how beautiful food is in every aspect of its life and how important its impact is on our families, communities, and lifestyles.”

SOPHIE – We are also going to finish today’s podcast on a very sad note – one week ago, food writer and friend of My Open Kitchen Valli Little passed away. Valli was a hero of mine for many years, she was the food director of Delicious magazine for over 10 years, wrote countless books and was one of the most generous, hard working and talented people in the food game. We will miss you Valli. Thank you for being so very generous to everyone you met. We interviewed her in episode 5 of series 1 and please do go back and have a listen if you like, but this morning I found this little snippet which we didn’t include in the original podcast but which I thought might be nice to share here. she is reading words of Beth Kirby from Local Milk blog.

Thank you once more to our sponsor for this series Country Style magazine.

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