In the ever-expanding world of plant-based food blogs, Cookilicious stands out as a vibrant and informative platform. Its creator, Priya Lakshminarayan, is a passionate home cook who has turned her love for Indian cuisine into a successful online business. This blog post dives into Priya's journey, explores her mission to showcase the versatility of vegetarian and vegan Indian food, and offers valuable takeaways for aspiring food bloggers.
From Home Cooking to Online Success
Priya's culinary journey began in Bombay, India, where she grew up surrounded by the rich flavors of traditional home cooking. After moving to the US, she found herself unable to work due to visa constraints. This turned out to be a blessing in disguise, as it gave her the time and opportunity to revisit her passion for cooking.
Driven by the desire to preserve her family recipes and document her culinary experiments, Priya started Cookilicious as a simple recipe blog. As she delved deeper into the world of food blogging, she realized the potential to connect with a wider audience and promote a plant-based lifestyle.
The Rise of Cookilicious: A Celebration of Vegetarian and Vegan Indian Cuisine
Initially focusing on vegetarian recipes, Cookilicious soon pivoted towards veganism. This shift was inspired by Priya's readers' requests and her own growing awareness of the benefits of plant-based eating. Today, the blog is a treasure trove of delicious and easy-to-follow recipes that cater to vegetarians, vegans, and anyone looking to explore the exciting world of Indian cuisine.
What sets Cookilicious apart is its focus on making Indian food accessible to a global audience. Priya expertly breaks down traditional recipes, offering substitutions and tips for using readily available ingredients. Her blog also features a wide range of recipe categories, from holiday feasts to comforting everyday meals, ensuring that there's something for every palate and occasion.
Priya's Tips for Aspiring Food Bloggers
In the interview, Priya emphasizes the importance of staying true to your unique voice and perspective. The food blogging landscape is crowded, but authenticity and a genuine passion for food can help you stand out. She also stresses the importance of creating content that resonates with your target audience. Understanding their needs and preferences is key to building a loyal following.
Here are some of Priya's key takeaways for aspiring food bloggers:
Stay true to yourself and your unique perspective.
Focus on creating high-quality content that is informative and engaging.
Target your content to the needs and interests of your audience.
Embrace the ever-changing digital landscape and adapt your strategies accordingly.
Don't be afraid to experiment and have fun in the kitchen!
A Look Ahead: The Future of Cookilicious
Priya's vision for Cookilicious is to continue inspiring people to explore the world of plant-based Indian cuisine. She has plans to develop new content formats, including recipe videos and e-cookbooks. With her dedication to creating delicious and accessible recipes, Cookilicious is sure to remain a leading resource for vegetarian and vegan Indian food for years to come.
Key takeaways
Cookilicious is a plant-based food blog that celebrates the rich flavors of Indian cuisine.
The blog's founder, Priya Lakshminarayan, is passionate about making Indian food accessible to a global audience.
Cookilicious offers a wide range of vegetarian and vegan recipes, from holiday feasts to comforting everyday meals.
Priya's tips for aspiring food bloggers include staying true to yourself, creating high-quality content, and targeting your audience.
Cookilicious is a valuable resource for anyone looking to explore the world of plant-based Indian food.
Listen to the full conversation with Priya Lakshminarayan here
and embark on a delicious journey through the world of plant-based Indian cuisine.
🔗 Useful Links:
Website: https://cookilicious.com/
Facebook: @cookiliciousveg
Instagram: @cookilicious
Pinterest: @cookiliciousveg
Until next time, keep that fire burning!
Subscribe to the Plant-Based On Fire podcast on YouTube or your favorite streaming platform today and stay connected with our ongoing exploration of the complex plant-based business world.
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Episode’s Transcript
Please understand that a transcription service provided the transcript below. It undoubtedly contains errors that invariably take place in voice transcriptions.
Bryan (00:00)
Hello everybody and welcome to Plant Based on Fire, where we talk about plant based businesses and their inspiring stories to thrive in our industry. I'm your host Bryan and joining us today is Priya Lakshmi Minnaryan. She is the creator of Cookielicious, a vibrant vegetarian and vegan food blog based down in Orlando. And she's a published cookbook author and welcome to the show. Priya, how'd I do on your last name?
Priya (00:29)
You almost got it right.
Bryan (00:30)
Okay, tell me one more time so everybody knows how to say it.
Priya (00:33)
So it's Priya Lakshminarayan Narayan.
Bryan (00:36)
Okay, perfect. I will try it one more time at the end of the show here. We'll see how we do. But it is so nice to meet you and hang out with you here. I really appreciate you taking some time out of your busy day to talk to us today about Cookielicious. But take us like back to the beginning. Like how did Cookielicious get started and why, you know, in this plant based space?
Priya (01:01)
So, I grew up in Bombay, I am from India.
I moved here to the US 11 years ago after marriage. And coming here, obviously I couldn't work because of the visa constraints and I had to wait. So that was a good thing for me because I had a corporate career back in India. I was working as a human resource professional and cooking was always part of me because I enjoyed it right from my teenage years. I had seen my parents cook in the kitchen and I used to always be around looking what they're doing, what they're up to.
what are they mixing in all that stuff so it was always there with me but i never like pursued it i also studied foods and nutrition as part of my curriculum as part of my graduation so i did study the science behind food and what goes into it and why you mix different ingredients and how they benefit your body so but it was there in the background but moving here since i couldn't work in a corporate space and i even didn't want to i wanted to
something creative and it was just on a whim I started this vlog as a place to record just document my recipes especially the recipes which were made by my mom because I lost her when I was just 23 years old
Since then I've been trying to recreate recipes of hers and some recipes even my aunts don't remember. She's like, I don't know how she made it and I'm like, okay, I better document at least the ones we remember so that it's there for future reference. So that was the main idea of starting my blog.
But as I was into this, I realized that this could turn into a profession because me and my husband, attended a blogging conference in Florida. And that kind of opened our minds to the possibilities of blogging. And the same night we came back and we created our own domain and everything. We created our own website and all of that. And since then, it's been five years now that I've been doing this as a full time.
I'll just talk about vegans,
So like I said, we are vegetarians, I'm vegetarian, I have never tasted meat. We come from a family of vegetarians who have been vegetarians for generations. So we have a huge dearth of recipes that are vegetarian. And incidentally, many of the recipes are also naturally vegan, or they can easily be made vegan by making just minor tweaks. So when I started the blog, it was more of a vegetarian recipe blog because that's what I grew up eating. But as I started getting feedback from my readers,
they wanted to know how to make it vegan or how they can skip dairy or you know how to because my recipes didn't any way have meat but they had dairy so they would ask me what are the ways to swap dairy and all that stuff so that kind of I that's how I pivoted towards veganism vegan food on the blog and
Yeah, so it's basically thanks to the readers actually. They wanted me to share more vegan recipes, which is why then I consciously made that shift in my mind that I want to share more vegan recipes as well.
Bryan (04:19)
Yeah, I love that story and it reminds me of my journey too. Like I just started the website RealManyPlants just because I wanted to just document my journey into this space, you know, and look at us both. Here we are many, many years later with successful things. And I have to say like I have used several of your recipes. I know we spoke a while back and I printed out a couple of them.
And not only they are like phenomenally amazing pictures on your website, but the recipes are easy to do and stuff. So I hope you keep putting out more vegan recipes for me. And I look forward to trying more on your website here soon. I know the paneer is hiding in lots of those dishes, but honestly, if you find the substitutes for those things, like, I don't know, Indian food has got to be one of my favorite foods on the whole planet. So if you...
Priya (05:04)
Yes.
Bryan (05:12)
Haven't tried it. People that are watching this, please go out and try it because it is just a phenomenal whole selection of recipes. And you have other ones too that aren't just that. So thank you for doing that. I'm curious though, like what, what for the business people that are watching the show really like, how are you strategically figuring out the right content and how do you make it so beautifully looking and how are you making sure it helps promote, you know, the vegan or the
at least the vegetarian lifestyle.
Priya (05:45)
So I do lot of keyword research. if I want to share the recipe, I check as to how many people are searching for this recipe. Is this really in demand right now? Obviously right now holiday content is in demand. So I'm creating lot of holiday vegan recipes for vegan Thanksgiving, vegan Christmas dinner ideas. So recipes like that. Plus vegan Diwali recipes, which is our festival, which is now going to come in a days. So keeping the current season
in mind, I plan my content. Also fall seasons, so soups and know cozy comforting dinners which are again daily free, vegan. So that is how I plan my content. It's more seasonal and keeping in mind what's coming up. And obviously I do keyword research as well.
Bryan (06:22)
Mm-hmm.
Very good. Very good. What, what's been like the most rewarding part of your journey and running cookielicious so far.
Priya (06:42)
So for me the ultimate reward is always when a reader tries a recipe and gives me feedback that they loved it, their family loved it, the kids wiped off the plate. So this is the kind of feedback I live for that motivates me. Anything else like winning an award, I did win an award for best recipe blogger South Florida in 2019.
That was a high moment for me. My husband was in the audience and this was pretty cool. It was quite a nice experience to be recognized for the work you do. And also holding the book in my hand, my cookbook. So that was another high. I always wanted my parents' names on the book, so I got that.
I dedicated that book to them. So that was a major high for me as well. But the number one is always the reader trying out a recipe and giving me feedback.
Bryan (07:37)
That's so true. Yeah. And it's funny because you make me think I was just talking with my family the other day. said, if when this podcast takes off and I don't have to worry about the finances so much, I'm just going to go work at an Indian restaurant for three months so I can learn all the secret ways of making some of these recipes. But really, I probably just need to come down to Orlando and hang out with you for a couple of days in the kitchen. And you'll teach me the secret to making amazing chana masala for me. Okay.
Priya (08:07)
I'll just interrupt you there. That was another reason for me to start Cookielishes was that to tell this side of the world that there is much more to Indian cuisine rather than just the chicken tikka masala or the butter naan. know the basic recipes which you always see in Indian restaurants. there is Indian cuisine is so vast. Every region, every community has their own cuisine. They use different ingredients.
Bryan (08:22)
Mm-hmm.
Priya (08:37)
play with different spices. It's really amazing. So that is what I wanted to bring through Cookielicious to this side of the world. Just for people to explore a different palette.
Bryan (08:50)
I love it. I really appreciate you doing that because I'm going to explore more recipes for sure off of your website. I'm curious, how are you also trying to tie in, you know, it's always that struggle with any of us that are in this creator space of how do we, you know, do the keyword research and the advertisements and all that kind of stuff to help make sure that we are making some money along our journey so we can do more research and put out more recipes.
What brand collaborations are you working on? how, what are the couple of different channels that you're working on to help collaborations with your business?
Priya (09:26)
So, Pockylicious is practically on every social media available. Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest.
Bryan (09:31)
Mm-hmm.
Priya (09:35)
X, Threads, YouTube. I collaborate. So nowadays brands mostly want Instagram Reels. That's what they're going for right now. So I'm working with lot of South Asian brands which want to promote their products for Diwali. So I've been like shooting non-stop for the last three days. Even today I had a shoot in the morning. So I've been...
creating content, all holiday recipes which brands wanted. So that's what I'm working on right now.
Bryan (10:07)
Very, very cool. Yeah. I mean, you, you start planning these things months in advance to help make sure you've got, you've got things. So you, you get to celebrate, Christmas and Valentine's day early as you're creating content for certain things, for sure. You've been doing this quite a while now. I'm also curious, like, how have you seen the food blogger role evolve over the years? You know I mean? Like Instagram wasn't a thing. Now it's the super hot ticket.
Priya (10:12)
Yes.
Really, really.
Bryan (10:37)
We don't know if TikTok is going to survive or not after January. Like there's all these, these things going on. How is it? What's your thoughts on the changing digital landscape?
Priya (10:46)
It's
constantly changing. It's really frustrating to a point.
Because for me, what gives me ultimate pleasure is creating a recipe, creating a new recipe or recreating an old recipe and just documenting it. It was very simple back then. A couple of years ago, used to just whatever recipe I felt like sharing, I would just make it, I would write it and share it. But now it's like I have to really, it's like the science literally. like it takes away the creativity a bit because it's like if people are searching for pumpkin soups, I have to make a pumpkin soup. But then I try to
had my own twist as to how I can make it different because you'll find millions of pumpkin soup recipes out there so how mine is different and how I can make it in the top 10 of the first page of Google so that's a constant struggle and also even with all these social media channels ever changing like Instagram is extremely difficult to crack if I may say so it's like they were first focusing on photographs and now then they move to videos
and creating video content is again another challenging thing. It takes a lot of work and effort and time to create videos. So you have to keep adapting because if you want to stay relevant you have to keep adapting.
Bryan (12:03)
Yeah. Yeah. I think that's a big key takeaway. I appreciate you sharing that. And it's that like, I guess my question is there's, there's probably food bloggers watching this episode that are curious, like, what are some of your top tips to make your food blogger stuff stand out and in a crowded market space? But I really, I really want to go a little bit deeper and sort of ask you like, you've done an amazing job building quite a following in a community almost. So
Talk to us about building the community and some tips for the the aspiring food bloggers out there.
Priya (12:40)
think what worked for me is try to stay yourself, be yourself.
Everybody is unique so I wouldn't say be unique because each one is unique each one brings in their own set of experiences and background so Whatever you offer will be unique so but just stick to that and don't get too boggled up with competition So if you see a fellow food creator who's doing better than you or making more videos, it's okay It's fine. You are on your own journey. You are not competing with them. You will see success in your own way. You don't have to
you know compare and then totally
lose yourself in this bargain because it's really not worth it there are millions of content creators out there and many of them obviously are ahead of you but remember there are many who are also looking up to you so you are in your own unique position so don't compare yourself that's number one for sure especially in today's times because everything was all good on instagram and tiktok but it's a lot of hard work out there so even those who are ahead of you they have really worked very hard to reach where they are
So that's one thing I would say be unique, mean be yourself basically and share recipes which you have fun making and I've noticed that people like recipes that are quick which are not too time consuming, not too hard.
involving many steps so keep that in mind when you're creating recipes that they are easy to follow and they don't involve a lot of difficult ingredients which are difficult to source so that they have to like really travel miles away to get that particular ingredient like what i do in my blog is like even if i get a difficult ingredient or a rare ingredient rather i try to give them at least two to three recipes on the blog itself which they can use that ingredient for otherwise it's like you bought a
Bryan (14:09)
Mm-hmm.
Priya (14:35)
and it's just lying there, you just put a recipe and that's it. And I hate to put it in stage, yeah. So normally I have like three to four recipes on the blog involving the same ingredient. So they know that if they get that, they can use it in multiple recipes. So just think for the reader, basically just think about what the person coming to your page is looking for and delivering that.
Bryan (14:38)
That's right.
Yeah, I agree completely. And I think you you're in one of the harder niches because most Indian recipes I've seen have those that list to 30 or 40 ingredients kind of a thing. So if you have mastered how to make it simple and easy, like, you know, that's that's the trick. So, yeah, I that's an awesome, awesome tip. I really appreciate that one. What what advice?
Priya (15:02)
Yes.
Bryan (15:23)
What other advice would you give these aspiring food entrepreneurs that want to focus like specifically, specifically, especially like the plant based ones, right? Cause there's tons of food bloggers out there showing you all the other unhealthy stuff in my mind, like help inspire some of the other people that are watching that want to get into this, into the plant based realm, especially.
Priya (15:48)
So,
So again, that was when I started pivoting towards vegan recipes on the blog. I also, I hearing different myths from my readers who would write back to me how to make vegan food interesting. How do I get more protein from vegan food? just, you don't have through your emails or through Instagram reels, educate your community as to why vegan food is great. It's not promoting vegan food in any way. We just say it's a lifestyle. If you want to adapt,
Bryan (16:14)
Mm-hmm.
Priya (16:19)
Canada I'm not saying that you have to be vegan just stop eating meat no I'm not promoting that I'm just saying that this is a lifestyle if you choose to follow then I'm here to help you how you can do that so these are the recipes and don't worry about the recipes being bland or boring no they are not the recipes really taste delicious and the flavors are not compromised even though it's vegan there's no meat there's no meat there's no dairy it doesn't matter because thankfully today a lot of brands are also coming up
Bryan (16:30)
Mm-hmm.
Priya (16:54)
I prefer using fresh ingredients over processed foods like lentils and legumes.
Bryan (17:01)
Mm-hmm.
That's right.
Priya (17:19)
meat. I try to provide my readers options of how they can get their protein and their dietary needs just by eating fresh ingredients food.
Bryan (17:21)
Yeah.
No, 100%. And it's that question around, like, if you've had really amazing vegan food, in my opinion, you're like, it rivals anything else out there, but it's 10 times healthier for you. So I love, know, we're, not going to convince everybody to give it up, but like, if, if we can just get a good majority of this planet to eat a few of our type of meals every week, we could definitely help the climate and animals and a bunch of other stuff too.
Priya (18:07)
So even when I had my cookbook, that was a challenge because I had to make like 100 Indian vegan recipes. That was the cookbook.
Bryan (18:08)
So.
Mm-hmm.
Priya (18:14)
And for that entire three months, I am not vegan yet. I am vegetarian, but we have stopped eating, I mean, stopped having milk. We prefer almond milk and oat milk. That's why I make it at home. I don't buy the store bought ones. But for those months, we actually went off dairy completely. And because I was recipe testing and I was making like tons of recipes, I was making them again just to perfect them. And that's when I realized that I would have these taste testings.
Bryan (18:19)
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Priya (18:44)
would call friends over and would have them taste it and they didn't know I was working on a cookbook. They had just come for hangout and I'm giving them the food and they're like, it's like, really? Yeah, there's no dairy in this. So that is how I was testing to see that are people really liking it. I used to give my neighbors, I used to distribute cookies and whatever food I was making, I used to distribute it to my neighbors as well. And I wouldn't tell them that it's vegan. I would just give it to them and they would like it and then I would tell them that it was vegan.
Bryan (18:57)
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Priya (19:14)
just to get feedback but yeah that's the way of I just wanted to say that vegan food is really good.
Bryan (19:20)
I agree completely. I'm curious, what is on the horizon for Cookalicious in the coming years? How are you planning on keeping the interest growing towards these plant-based diets?
Priya (19:34)
I do have lot of plans which I hope they materialize.
Bryan (19:37)
Well, you've got all the
holiday stuff coming. Is there more planning for 2025?
Priya (19:42)
Yes, so right now my focus is just 2024 till December.
Bryan (19:46)
Survive the holidays, right?
Priya (19:49)
So I'm just churning out as much content as I can. then Q1 of 2025 would see more because that's how the shift happens. So Q4 of, mean, every year Q4 is more of holiday recipes. People are not worried about diets. So there's a lot of indulgent food consumed. But the minute it's Q1, that's your January onwards, it's like people shift towards healthy recipes. So they want more smoothies.
Bryan (20:10)
Mm-hmm.
Priya (20:19)
more protein balls and know that kind of Buddha balls and that kind of stuff so my focus with shift on to those recipes in Q1
Bryan (20:30)
And, it's, it's interesting. Like I guess the two questions pop up in my head is, you have another cookbook coming out? What's the next cookbook idea that you really hope you can work on soon?
Priya (20:46)
soon but I would love to have another cookbook out and I don't know I haven't thought much about it but it'll definitely be in a vegan space.
Bryan (20:56)
Okay. I've got a lot of my mom's recipes. I've got a lot of my mom's recipes that are Italian. So I think you could help me take these really nice Italian recipes and help me veganize them since you have some expertise in that.
Priya (21:12)
On those lines, I was thinking that maybe holiday recipes, vegan holiday recipes or something like that would be fun. Because that's where most people find it challenging that how do we make holiday recipes. Like it's easy to make healthy recipes vegan, but when it comes to holiday recipes, people are like how do we make it vegan without dairy, without cheese? How can we make it indulgent? So I would love to show them how.
Bryan (21:18)
Yeah.
Yeah, absolutely. And so we've got, you know, this podcast is part of the bigger network with the real men eat plants.com. So I'm curious. I wanted to ask for all the men out there, you know, what is your favorite recipe that feels very, very, you know, manly on your website? What would you recommend for the men out there that want to try to cook one of these or they would love to eat it? Cause it feels very, you know, hearty and you know,
equivalent to some of the people who trying to change their diets.
Priya (22:10)
So I have this recipe called Soya Biryani.
So it's a rice dish, it's very aromatic and very flavorful and it's take on chicken biryani. So instead of chicken, I have used soy anabits, which is TVP, the textured protein. So that's protein rich and it has that chewy meaty texture. So when you bite into it with the rice, it really tastes very good. So that's something they can try.
Bryan (22:23)
Okay.
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Priya (22:45)
I also have another recipe called Tofu Makhani Bake. So it's basically tofu which is cooked in makhani sauce which is an onion tomato based sauce and then it's baked.
really elevates the flavors and infuses the flavors into the tofu. That's another dish which they could try. Otherwise, my all-time favorite is the Indian curry pasta. I know you're Italian and I don't think you will really appreciate me literally re-ramping your pasta, but it's my favorite. I have it all the time. So it's just, it's like a pasta salad, but with lots of vegetables and different Indian spices, which makes it extremely flavorful.
Bryan (23:05)
Mm-hmm.
Priya (23:32)
So I would highly recommend that people try that out.
Bryan (23:35)
I love it. I am going to make sure I try all three of those in the coming weeks here and I will report back to you and we will make sure we link those recipes that you mentioned in the show notes down below. And so we hope people can click through on those show note links and check out those recipes with you. It's been a ton of fun hanging out with you, Priya, for a few minutes here and learning all about Cookalicious. What can we do as a community to help you and what are the best ways to get in touch?
Priya (24:04)
So I would love for people listening to this podcast to follow me and that way they can be updated on whenever I drop in a new recipe. So my website is cookielicious.com and my Instagram handle is cookielicious. So these are the two best ways to just stay connected with me. Obviously I am on Facebook and Pinterest and all those places, but everybody is on Instagram these days.
Bryan (24:32)
That's
right. That's right. Yeah. Check. And you have to check out Priya's beautiful pictures on Instagram with what she's doing because you have a really strong knack for some amazing photos as well. So.
Priya (24:44)
a self-taught food photographer. So I have learnt it all by myself. I am still learning, but I enjoy food photography. I do enjoy it.
Bryan (24:46)
Yes.
Awesome. So check out cookalicious.com or check out cookalicious on Instagram and some of these other amazing platforms. Thank you again, Priya, for hanging out with us and congratulations on all your success.
That is all the time we have for this episode of the Plant Based on Fire podcast. Thank you again, Priya, for joining us, sharing your insights and experiences with our community. Until next time, everybody, keep that fire burning.
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