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June 2, 2023 12 mins

This week I have Krimsey Lilleth. She’s the author of The Cajun Vegan Cookbook, and was the owner of Krimsey‘s Cajun kitchen, the world's first vegan Cajun restaurant. Due to Covid, Krimsey made the tough decision to close her North Hollywood restaurant in Spring 2020. She knew she wanted to share her recipes with her fans so they could re-create their favorite dishes at home, which is what inspired her to write her first cookbook.

Last year I released my full episode with her, which can be found here. Today, here's an except from that show. It's the segment where Krimsey dicusses her decision to leave social media. These days it seems like you have to have a strong social media presence if you want to have your business succeed. But it’s definitely a double-edged sword. How much of your time is being taken up by it? Does it really matter at the end of the day? How had her life changed since making the decision to delete all of her social accounts? I’d love to hear what you think. Are we all just caught up in the hamster wheel, and it’s a huge waste of our time?

KRIMSEY LILLETH

Krimsey's Website
Buy The Cajun Vegan Cookbook

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Episode Transcript

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Chris Spear (00:00):
If you're listening to this episode, I'm willing to
bet that you're probably atleast a little bit active on
social media. You probably foundthis episode because of a social
media post I did. Today's guestis Kinsey Lillith. And she's
going to talk about why she quitsocial media for good. I'm Chris
spear. And you're listening toChefs Without Restaurants, the
show where I speak with culinaryentrepreneurs and people working

(00:21):
in the food and beverageindustry outside of a
traditional restaurant setting.
So this is actually an excerptfrom a longer conversation that
I had with cremonesi. Last year.
Maybe you heard that episode,but if you didn't, I'll link it
in the show notes. So crimsoncame on the show to talk about
her new book, The Cajun VeganCookbook, as well as her
decision to close her restaurantfor good during the early days

(00:42):
of COVID. But one of the mostinteresting parts of our
conversation, and it kind of gotburied at the tail end of the
show, is that Kinsey decided tocompletely give up social media.
And she did this right as hernew book was coming out. Most
people, at least I'd assume,when they have a cookbook coming
out want to spend the nextcouple of months promoting it on
social media. But she decidedshe wasn't going to do that. She

(01:04):
found that while there were manygood aspects of social media, it
ultimately wasn't good for hermental health or good use of her
time. While I'm not quite readyto give it up completely, I'm
trying to find a better balancemyself. As I work on growing my
own personal chef business, aswell as a podcast and community.
I know I spent a lot of time inthe trenches of social media.
I've made some amazing friendsand have had opportunities I

(01:26):
don't think I ever would havehad otherwise. But it can also
be a time suck. And it can alsofeel like you're spinning your
wheels. Sometimes it's easy tospend hours creating dishes and
then photographing them, tryingto get the lighting, right,
thinking about the caption, thehashtags, the description, you
post the photo. Three dayslater, there's like 25 likes. Is
that a good use of your time? Idon't know. So I'm not saying

(01:47):
you should give up social mediacompletely. But maybe you are
someone who has to go all ornothing. I thought crumbs, he
made a lot of interesting pointsand wants to share this as a
counterpoint to all the socialmedia experts. And I'm using air
quotes here that have so many ofus working so hard to create
content. So tell me what youthink. What's your relationship
with social media these days?
Are you all in? Are you tryingto find a balance? Or have you

(02:09):
thought about leaving itcompletely? Let me know. Feel
free to DM me on Instagram ordrop a comment when this is
posted. You can find me at ChefsWithout Restaurants.
And this week's mini episode hasbeen brought to you by the
United States personal chefAssociation and hire a chef. The
show will be coming right upafter a word from our sponsor.

(02:32):
Are you a personal chef lookingfor support and growth
opportunities? Look no furtherthan the United States personal
chef association. with nearly1000 members across the US and
Canada. USPCA provides liabilityinsurance certification lead
generation and more. Consumerscan trust that their meal

(02:53):
experience is ensured andsupported by USPCA. And now for
a limited time, save $75 on newmembership and get your premier
listing on hire chef by usingthe code tax break 2023 at
uspca.com. Plus, if you haveproducts or services to sell
chefs and their clients showcaseyour business on hire chef and

(03:15):
USPCA websites with our greatintroductory packages. To learn
more about membershipadvertising or partnership
opportunities, call Angela at1-800-995-2138. Extension 705 or
email aprather@uspca.comWell, one of the big things I
kinda want to talk about is Iknow that you quit social media,
which is like, like one of thosebig things right now I feel like

(03:37):
some people are totally intothat. Like that's what they
need. And others are like, Oh myGod, how do you survive without
it? So when did you do that? Andlike what prompted that?

Krimsey Lilleth (03:49):
Well, I did it the day after my book release. I
have the best publisher in theworld because they took well, so
backing up with it. When wefirst started negotiating on the
contract, I was like, Look, I amplanning on getting off social
media, like I had it for thebusiness. I don't want to do it
anymore. Just a heads up. LikeI'm not going to be the one to

(04:13):
you know, do a bunch ofpromotion after the fact. You
know, I just want to write thisbook. Is that cool? No, yeah,
totally fine. Can you keep yoursocial media up until the book
comes out? And I was like, ofcourse. So I did some like, you
know, mild posting here andthere, just you know, leading up
to the book. And then when itlaunched, I was like, Okay, bye.

(04:34):
Everyone's been fun. But youknow, hey, another thing for me
that none of you want me to do?

Chris Spear (04:42):
Was there anything that like one or two specific
things where were you just like,I'm at the point. I just don't
need this in my life. Like it'sa time suck and I have other
things I want to be focusing on.

Krimsey Lilleth (04:52):
That's exactly right. I think that it's so many
things, but I'll try to list Ithink, like you said a big one.
That's just the time suck. Evenif all you're doing is posting
your own stuff, and you don'tever look at your newsfeed,
that's still a prettysignificant time investment. And
I already felt like I don't evennow I don't have, you know, a

(05:13):
normal job. I'm just writing andsort of dabbling, but I still
feel like I don't have enoughtime in the day. So and this is
being off social media. But alsoI took note of like how I felt
when I interacted with socialmedia. And for the most part, I
felt mostly like drained, orthat I had just become a
temporary zombie, and then snapback. And I was like, where did
that 40 minutes go, or evensometimes six minutes, like six

(05:36):
minutes is important to me, lifeis short. And then I guess on
top of that, I mostly only usesocial media in the past for
promoting something. So I had aInstagram food blog before the
restaurant, and then I had therestaurant. And we had all these
pages my sister mostly ran, butthey were always for promotion.

(05:56):
And I just felt like having topromote something was also
taking away from my energy,which I would rather use on, you
know, writing another cookbook,or opening another restaurant,
I'm not going to do that. Butyou know, you get the theme.

Chris Spear (06:10):
And like, as the algorithms change, like, you
don't even get that much return.
Like when I think about like,what I'm putting out on
Instagram, like, I'm gonna breakout my camera, and I'm gonna
shoot a video and post a reel.
And then after like, three days,you're like, oh, like 42 People
like this? Yeah. Like, it'sexact. Was that worth it? Like,

(06:31):
I spent time like shooting thisvideo and editing and posting
and thinking about the hashtagsand tagging people? And like,
literally 42 People saw this,like, what did this do? This
didn't move the needle on likeanything. And I didn't like love
the process. Like, does anyonelove the process? Unless there
may be like, a 13 year old whoenjoys dancing in front of a
camera, but like, yeah,

Krimsey Lilleth (06:52):
I don't know, I think some people do. And, you
know, I will say that, like, myexperience with social media
hasn't been like completelynegative from start to finish. I
have, you know, I've had funmaking videos and goofing off
with friends and stuff. And, youknow, I've met people. But I
would say that when I take ahuge step back and look at my
experience, overall, I'm like,Whoa, how many hours, days,

(07:13):
weeks months, I have no idea howmuch time has been sunk into
this weird imaginary worldwhere, you know, if I'm being
honest with myself, I don't seeany of these people ever. Like,
they're sort of like, they couldbe bots. And I wouldn't know.
And I've just been as I getolder, I'm trying to focus more
on on like in personconnections, and, you know,

(07:33):
taking a walk and saying hi tothe neighbors, rather than
opening up my phone and seeingwhat people on the internet are
doing.

Chris Spear (07:40):
Well, that's where I've really tried to make it
about the personal connections,like I use it for really
building connections withpeople, you know, like, I'm
spending more time DMing peopleand talking to them, you know, I
see a photo of something theydid, and then asking a question
about how they did it andbuilding a community through
that. I mean, I don't know thatI'd have the podcast without
social media. Like when I thinkof all the people who've come on

(08:02):
the show, and I've been on theirshows, it's all people I've met
just through social media, forthe most part, they're not
people I'd ever known otherwise.
And it's been amazing. I've metsome of the best people in my
life. But I've also tried toconvert it into real world
interactions, you know, like, Isit someone I can, you know, meet
up with in DC, and we can grabdinner and become friends like
offline as well. That's reallycool. I

Krimsey Lilleth (08:24):
think that that is about the best way you can
use social media. And I think,speaking personally, I am
somewhat of like a solitaryperson. I'm not like I don't
want to see people or hatepeople or anything like that. I
love people. But I do have acapacity for like, how many
relationships I can maintain.
And I found that maintaining allof these online relationships

(08:44):
was quite exhausting for me. Andat a certain point, I felt kind
of like crushed under the weightof having all of these
connections, which kind ofsounds crazy. And unless you're
someone like me who'sexperienced something like this,
and I just thought, like,there's no reason for me to be
stressed about this. I don'thave to do this. And I will be
sad to like, lose some of theseconnections, but the important
ones will will go on.

Chris Spear (09:07):
Yeah, I mean, if people are really your friend,
they'll know how to find you.
Right? Like they'll have youremail address or a phone number
or something. Yeah,

Krimsey Lilleth (09:15):
when I still do a newsletter, which is not
really much news, it's sort ofjust like bantering. But I do
have people that use I used tobe connected to on social media,
they'll respond to my emails,and then we'll have these kind
of same DM conversations, butit's much more condensed.

Chris Spear (09:30):
And it's always weird when like, someone
disappears out of your sphere,and then maybe sometimes they
reappear, like there's peoplelike, wow, I used to see them
all the time on Facebook, and Ihaven't seen them forever. And
then you look it's like, oh, Ithink they've deleted their
account. I don't even knowthey're gone. And this person
they're gonna find my onlyconnection to them was like this
random app that I had on myphone.

Krimsey Lilleth (09:52):
Yeah, it is.
Yeah, that's another interestingpoint is that all of these
things we're building they'reall still owned by someone else
and not to get to you No antimeta or anything, but it is kind
of scary how your livelihood canbe wrapped up in someone else's
choices. Like I think Facebookwas down recently for a bit, and
everyone kind of freaked out.

(10:14):
Oh, yeah, I think that was afterI was gone. But, you know, I
didn't even notice, obviously.
And I heard about it later. AndI kind of felt the pain of all
these people who were like, Ohmy God, if my Facebook page is
gone, like, I've just lostconnections to 1000s of people
that are really important to meand personally, or for business
or whatever. And so, yeah, I waslike, Okay, well, I don't, I

(10:36):
don't want to ever be tied uplike that again.

Chris Spear (10:40):
Or, like, when you think about like, it hasn't
happened, me, but these peoplewho's like, Instagram gets
hacked and have to start over,right? Like, he's got great.
You've got like, 10,000followers, or like, if you're a
celebrity, like a million, andthen you're back, like, day one,
start again, and like, makes mystomach hurt. You can only
friend request 20 people a dayor something, like a slow build
to like, get back up there.
Because, I mean, it's a lot ofwork to do that together. You

(11:03):
know, I have like 5000 followersand like, if tomorrow I had
none, you're like, I think Ijust be like, I'm done. I'm not
if I have to start from scratchor something like that. I just
throw in the towel and be like,I'm not doing it.

Krimsey Lilleth (11:16):
Well, you know, and that's why I decided to
delete my page. A lot of peoplesaid, like, why don't you just
pause it or like, you know, youcan go dark or whatever. And I
was like, You know what? No, no,this has to be this has to feel
very permanent, like you said,because once it's gone. You
don't really want to start overand I just decided that that's
not something I want in my liferight now. And I need to like

(11:36):
take a really solid action andmake sure that I don't get
sucked back in. Go to

Chris Spear (11:41):
chefs without restaurants.org To find our
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free to join. You'll get gigopportunities, advice on
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