Add Passion And Stir

How does imagination inspire us to make a difference? Partners In Health Co–Founder Ophelia Dahl and Boston Globe Food Writer and Restaurant Critic Devra First join Billy Shore to discuss community and culture, tackling complex problems, and the role of imagination in success. Partners In Health focuses on long-term, systems-level healthcare solutions for some of the world’s most impoverished communities. “We... show that if you not only build a clinic, but you also provide jobs and train people, you’re going to lift the economy of the entire community,” explains Dahl. First is known for infusing her food writing with social commentary. “I think that a restaurant critic’s role ultimately is that of consumer advocate. You can illustrate human issues through food very clearly,” she says.  Billy Shore asks both guests for career advice for young people beginning their careers. “Reach out to people, talk to people… get your voice out there,” First advises aspiring writers. The seeds for Partners In Health we

What is causing the failure of leadership in our government and society? Former Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell and famed restaurateur Danny Meyer (Union Square Hospitality Group, Shake Shack) join host Billy Shore to discuss a variety of issues ranging from immigration, urban renewal, educational opportunity and the reasons for the current crisis in our political culture. “All of us in life constantly face divided loyalties. Where are your obligations? The problem with many political leaders is they lose sight of the proper hierarchy of obligations and loyalties,” says Mitchell. “[It’s the] confluence among self-interest, the interests of our guests and the interests of the city. Investing in people and places and organizations that can lift the whole,” explains Meyer about his own hierarchy of obligations when he applies his signature approach of opening new restaurants in transitional neighborhoods. When the conversation turns to immigration, Mitchell discusses the history and the opportunities

How does authenticity drive success? Philz Coffee CEO Jacob Jaber and Neighborhood Restaurant Group Beverage Director Greg Engert join Debbie and Billy Shore to discuss good coffee, craft beer and how to build businesses that are part of the fabric of their communities. Both guests cite authenticity - in the people they hire, the products they serve, and the experiences they provide for guests - as the basis for the success of their organizations. “The best service is when it’s done from the heart and authentic,” Jaber believes. Engert thinks that just having craft beer on the menu is not enough. “The hard part is echoing the passion of the producer through service and product knowledge,” he says. “The flavors become more vibrant when you wed the intellectual to the more visceral pleasures of drink.” Both guests built their businesses with community in mind. Jaber’s father started Philz out of his grocery store in San Francisco and now they have 48 stores and growing. “If you want to do it right, you hav

How much do you think about how you contribute to society? Is it important for you to help others and give back? Two social sector advocates whose deep values and empathy guide their own career paths discuss the importance of doing good. Dan Cardinali, CEO of Independent Sector, and Bren Herrera, Cuban private chef and lifestylist, chat about food, culture, personal transformations, and their deep passion for helping others with Billy Shore, founder and CEO of Share Our Strength, on this episode of Add Passion and Stir.Cardinali, a champion for the social sector (nonprofit and philanthropic institutions), reveals its vastness: 1.5 million institutions that employ 1 in 10 Americans and serve or engage 1 in 4. However, that impact is often overlooked and there is a misperception that the sector is weaker and less effective than the private sector. “Nonprofit and philanthropic institutions are critically important to America because they often are working on those issues that neither government nor market strate

How do we unite different cultures in the midst of a polarizing political climate? In this episode of Add Passion and Stir, George Washington University professor of leadership Louis Caldera and Rose Previte, owner of Compass Rose and Maydān in Washington DC, talk about culture, leadership and the potential for diversity to drive positive change in the US. Both guests believe diversity is our greatest strength. “As long as we’re true to our principles of equality, and people can develop their talents through education and contribute something, then that’s what we need to do,” says Caldera, the son of Mexican immigrants who became Secretary of the Army. He emphasizes how our country benefits when the brightest people in the world want to come here to be educated. “The growing diversity of this country will become more politically active and they’re going to say, ‘I don’t fear people who come from places like where I come from because I’m a contributing American,’” he predicts. Previte’s restaurants are a celeb

Do you know the #1 cause of death in America? It is not what you think - our diet has surpassed smoking as a cause of death. Michel Nischan, chef and Founder, President and CEO of Wholesome Wave, and Lindsey Seegers, Program Manager of Nutrition Education at Manna Food Center in Montgomery County, MD know that food-related disease is both deadly and preventable. They join Share Our Strength founders Debbie and Billy Shore to explain some promising ways they are addressing the root causes of diet-related diseases. “We spend about $1.4 trillion a year on diet-related disease,” says Nischan. Yet the economic disparities of a disease like Type 2 Diabetes are stark. “I learned that the majority of the people that struggle with that condition lived at income levels so low they couldn’t even afford the basic ingredients to help them prevent the disease in the first place.” Seegers works with thousands of families in Montgomery County on nutritious eating. “Healthy eating is not just for the rich,

On September 27, 2018, more than 100 riders, many of them nationally recognized chefs, will gather in Charlottesville, Virginia to ride 300 miles in three days with the goal of raising $1.8 Million to end childhood hunger in America. We thought this would be a good time to re"cycle"our 2017 interview with international pop superstar P!nk, who participated in our 2017 Chef Cycle ride in Santa Rosa, California. More than 200 chefs from across the country were joined by Grammy Award-winning international rock star P!nk in a fundraising bike ride that raised $2 million for the No Kid Hungry campaign from Share Our Strength. In an exclusive interview for Add Passion and Stir, the podcast from Share Our Strength hosted by brother and sister co-founders Billy and Debbie Shore, singer-songwriter P!nk, says, “What’s awesome about Share Our Strength and No Kid Hungry is that [they] really make it doable to help… [They] make it really fun. [They] make where people’s dollars go make sense. It’s really easy to understand

Why are some social change movements successful while others are not? On this week’s episode, author and Georgetown University’s Global Social Enterprise Initiative Executive Director Leslie Crutchfield and WinniE’s Bakery chef/owner Elise Smith talk about effective leadership and “how to do well by doing good” with hosts Debbie and Billy Shore. In her latest book, “How Change Happens: Why Some Movements Succeed While Others Don’t,” Crutchfield defines common denominators driving recent successful social movements. “Successful movements turn grassroots gold. They invest in and nurture local leaders… It’s the combination of grassroots and organizations that put all the pieces together so that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts,” she explains. She cites Share Our Strength’s No Kid Hungry campaign as one of those successes. Smith describes her passion for being involved as a grassroots volunteer for No Kid Hungry. “Childhood hunger is something that should not be happening in our country. Whenever I

How do we foster big, creative ideas to solve our most urgent problems? President, CEO and co-founder of First Book Kyle Zimmer and award-winning DC restaurateur Ashok Bajaj join Billy and Debbie Shore to discuss their philosophies on giving back and outlooks on our social and political culture. Zimmer worries that today’s partisan divide is fostering an environment where social problems are outpacing solutions. “In the non-profit world, we all have that white-knuckle death grip on our steering wheels and we’re not given the bandwidth to really think of creative, great big solutions,” she says. As a person dedicated to hospitality in today’s hyper-partisan Washington DC, Bajaj wants his restaurants to be seen as non-partisan sanctuaries and is dismayed by recent news of restaurants refusing service based on politics. “Sharing food, sitting in a social setting, brings us together. How do you know [a person coming into a restaurant] is not trying to change her mind and something good comes out of those two-hour

Is being fortunate an obligation to help others? Host Billy Shore travels to Portland, Maine to chat with Pulitzer Prize-winning author Richard Russo and pastry chef and restaurant owner Ilma Lopez (Piccolo, Chaval) about the good fortune that has propelled their careers and how they use their talents to create social impact. “Successful people don’t like to talk about how important luck is… Luck does have a large part to do with success,” says Russo. Lopez agrees that being in the right place at the right time helped her career advance, and her habit is to give back when something fortunate happens to her. “The more blessings we have in our lives, the more we have to give. Every time something good happens to us we have to give something out,” she believes. The guests discuss whether social responsibility is more important than ever given our current political climate. Russo and Lopez agree it comes down to using our strengths. “Storytelling is about empathy… and that is an act of moral imagination. I u

How can business and entrepreneurial principles be used to solve social problems? In this episode, Pace University Lubin School of Business Dean Neil Braun sits down with SALIDO founder and CEO Shu Chowdhury to talk about business, technology and social entrepreneurship. “[There is] emotional satisfaction in helping people at the most interesting stage of life,” says Braun, a long-time Share Our Strength board member. Serial entrepreneur Chowdhury wants community building to be part of the DNA of his company. One of SALIDO’s values is community service. “If someone can’t care about someone they don’t know because it’s the right thing to do, it often happens that they can’t connect with what you’re actually trying to do,” he explains.  After a distinguished career as an entertainment executive that included stints as Chairman and CEO of Viacom Entertainment and President of the NBC Television Network, Braun uses his vast experience in business to help a diverse student body including many from underserved

How does having a voice create responsibilities and opportunities to drive change? Lee Schrager, creatorof the wildly successful South Beach and New York City Wine & Food Festivals, sits down with ChefKevin Tien (Himitsu in Washington, DC) and hosts Debbie and Billy Shore to discuss the ever-greaterinfluence chefs are having on culture and social change. “Thirty-five years ago, chefs were notsuperstars, they weren’t rock stars. Now people are listening to them,” says Schrager. Recently namedone of the 10 Best New Chefs for 2018 by Food & Wine Magazine, Tien is very aware of his own risinginfluence. “Right now I’m at a point in my career where I’m starting to have a voice. With that comes theresponsibility of doing what’s right, giving back and giving support where it’s needed,” he explains. Theguests discuss the importance of celebrities having influence on a variety of societal issues from hungerto mental health. The group discusses the recent suicide of Anthony Bourdain, who many of them knew.They e

Where do the most effective social change agents focus their efforts? Soupergirl founder Sara Polon and Community Wealth Partners CEO Amy Celep join hosts Billy and Debbie Shore to discuss their motivations and strategies for changing the world. Celep works at the systems level helping other organizations accelerate the pace of social change. She cites KaBOOM!, the national nonprofit dedicated to children’s play, as an example. “We helped [them] say, ‘what we need to do is not just build playgrounds and the infrastructure for play, we need to shift the cultural norm in this country,’” she explains. Polon started Soupergirl to shift the cultural norm through individual decisions. By using only plant-based ingredients sourced largely from sustainable local farms, she is giving consumers better choices that could help fix our broken food system. “Our mantra is changing the world one bowl of soup at a time,” she says. Both guests are story-tellers who changed careers in order to drive change. Formerly a stan

It’s more than just fundraising! In this playful episode of Add Passion and Stir, host Billy Shore and event emcee Taniya Nayak (HGTV, Food Network) conduct “red carpet” interviews at the 2018 Taste of the Nation Boston. Guests include Celebrity Chef Tiffani Faison (Sweet Cheeks Q, Tiger Mama), Adam Amontea (Cafco), Lacey Berrien and David Miller (Boston Society), and Emily Pochman (Share Our Strength). In its 30th year, the event features 60 chefs from Boston-area restaurants and raises more than $210,000 for No Kid Hungry. “One of my favorite feelings in the world is to see people come together to enjoy a meal in a space that I got to design,” says Nayak. Faison talks about her background and commitment to social justice and LGBTQ rights. “My job is to make it easier for the next generation, so… they can just give their art, their spirit and their love to the world without having to consider their safety,” she says. Amontea, who is one of the event sponsors, describes his company’s ties to the culinary

Why are personal connections the key to success? In this episode of Add Passion and Stir, Jennifer Eddy (Founder and Executive Director of Root in Salem, MA) and Michael Pagliarini (Chef and Owner of Giulia and Benedetto in Boston) discuss how success is so often predicated on having strong social ties within a community. A No Kid Hungry supporter, Chef Pagliarini sees his restaurants as invaluable pieces of the communities they serve. “When a restaurant can feel like it is part of a community where the community has a sense of ownership of that restaurant, that’s when it’s working,” he says. Eddy sees the same dynamic at Root, a non-profit social enterprise that serves at-risk and disconnected youth through culinary and life skills training programs. “At the end of their 5-hour shift, [participants] all sit down for a family meal together. I think is probably one of the most powerful parts of Root…They suddenly have a community and a friendship and a family,” she says. Pagliarini also sees the strong co

Can a simple cookstove end world hunger and poverty? Celebrity chef José Andrés was named one of the Time 100 Most Influential People of 2018 for his dedication to humanitarian causes and recently delivered more than 3 million meals in Puerto Rico in the wake of the devastating 2017 hurricanes, but he has been helping people around the world for many years. He joins host Billy Shore and United Nations Foundation President and CEO Kathy Calvin to discuss why a simple clean cookstove drives cultural, environmental and economic change in the developing world. “If we want to end poverty in this century, I believe clean cookstoves is the one single issue [where] everything meets,” says Andrés. “It’s one of the number one killers of women and children in the world,” agrees Calvin, explaining the UN Foundation’s Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves initiative. The statistics are jarring: Four million women and children around the world die every year as a result of inhaling the smoke and soot from wood, coal and ker

Is sustainable farming the key to restoring our planet? On this episode of Add Passion and Stir, American Farmland Trust President and CEO John Piotti and Chef John Mooney (Bell Book & Candle, NYC; Bidwell, DC) talk with host Billy Shore and producer Paul Woodhull about the far-reaching impact of building a more sustainable food system. “If we don’t get farming right, we can’t have a sustainable future,” says Piotti. Chef Mooney’s restaurants use aeroponic rooftop gardens, which combine hydroponics with vertical growing techniques to grow fresh, pesticide-free produce. “It really suits us well to be able to do what I want to do as a chef and have it on location. [Staff] also get to learn and maintain, which gives them a little better sense of where our food comes from, which translates into the guest experience,” he notes. Preserving farmland is one of the most important functions of American Farmland Trust. “Farmland itself plays a huge role in environmental protection,” explains Piotti. “But you ca

What difference does it make to get close to the problem? “You really can’t solve the world’s problems from a distance. You have to get up close. You have to be proximate,” says New Profit Partner Marco Davis on this episode of Add Passion and Stir. He talks with Diane Gross, owner of Cork Wine Bar in Washington DC, and host Billy Shore about focusing on diversity, inclusion and equity. Davis describes how New Profit uses venture philanthropy to help nonprofit organizations scale up to maximize impact by focusing on organizational success instead of programmatic goals. They also use an explicit focus on diversity in leadership. “[Leaders from diverse backgrounds] have greater proximity to the issues that they’re working on, and therefore have some insight and added value that they bring to the table,” he explains. Gross likens it to the restaurant industry. “There’s a lot of diversity in the work force, but not in leadership roles,” she says. She believes that supports like health care and maternity leave wou

What role does Chefs Cycle play in the success of No Kid Hungry? This episode of Add Passion and Stir takes place at Chefs Cycle 2018. Krista Anderson of New Seasons Market in Portland, OR, Hugh Mangum chef/co-owner of Mighty Quinn’s New York Barbeque and Ed Doyle of Real Food Consulting in Boston join host Billy Shore after riding 100 miles for the second day to talk about their experiences participating in Chefs Cycle. The question is raised as to why go to such great lengths to raise funds. “There’s strength in numbers and numbers are community, and the community is always going to be a we, and we is always stronger than I,” says Magnum. Anderson talks about one of her teammates who used a twitter campaign to get his company to donate a money to No Kid Hungry. “And there were some comments back ‘just write the check’. Then you don’t have that spread the word,” she observed. Billy Shore notes that Chefs Cycle brings in more first-time donors (4000 per year) than anything Share Our Strength has done because

What’s at the heart of healthcare disparities in America? In this episode of Add Passion and Stir, Grantmakers In Health (GIH) President and CEO Faith Mitchell and Washington Post Food and Dining Editor Joe Yonan talk about equity, the long-term effects of stress, and healthy cooking. “The interest in what we now call equity really started in the mid-80’s,” says Mitchell about the differences in health outcomes among ethnic and racial populations. “It’s many-pronged effort at this point. You have people in healthcare settings who are trying to equalize outcomes,” she shares. Yonan emphasizes diversity in his own work in the newsroom and recently released America The Great Cookbook, proceeds from which support No Kid Hungry. “The thing I think I’m proudest of about the book is the sheer diversity of the group of people in the book. It’s all walks of life, all colors, ages,” he says. “The same diversity I went for in the cookbook, I want to show up in the food coverage of the Washington Post.” We