OHH CAREN...YOU TRIED IT!

Have you seen a 5 year old kid crying out because they want ice cream?

Well if you could channel that same “Me-Me-Me” selfish tone and transcribe their “Waah Waah” spoiled brat sobbing (think Violet “I Want It Now” vibes in Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory) – you’d capture the temperament of the article “Why You Need To Stop Baking Bread” by Caren White.

Caren posted an article on Medium, at the height of the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic, that stopped me in my quarantining Mommy work-from-home/teach your kids-from-home/cook every day for your family-from-home tracks. Caren used her blogging soapbox to call out anybody who ever baked bread from scratch and posted on social media during this time. Caren wanted to specifically call out Mommy Influencers, Chefs and Cooking Enthusiasts…LIKE ME, whom she felt had no agenda during the most unprecedented time of our lives, other than to make the world an even more horrible place by causing a shortage of baking ingredients – to her personal dislike and frustration.

Caren accused us of literally “taking food out of her mouth” because we were bored and couldn’t find anything else to do, other than bake bread and clout chase for likes on Instagram. Caren stated:

“So when you buy up all of the flour and leavening ingredients for the sake of pretty photos on your Instagram feed you are literally taking food from my mouth. And the mouths of other families who also do their own baking so that they can provide healthy food for their families.”

“BREAD? CAREN WE’RE TALKING ABOUT BREAD? POSTING PHOTOS OF BREAD?” (Saying “Bread” In my Allen Iverson “Practice” vox). Ok yall, Caren got jokes!

Caren continued to voice her frustration – saying, “There are not enough ingredients now that we are competing with a bunch of dilettante bakers who care nothing for anyone but themselves.” After encouraging us notorious bread bakers to pick up another hobby like gardening or crocheting, because I guess that doesn’t resort to her panic attacks to see the flour is out of Aisle 7 - her last words in the article were “Please, Please, I’m begging you, stop baking bread.”

Ironically, shortly after posting this article Caren got lit up on social media and caught a backlash harder than Serena’s backhand at Wimbledon. Consequentially Caren not only deleted the article – but several of her social media accounts.

OHH CAREN…LET ME HAVE A WORD WITH YA GIRL?

Caren White – I’m a need you to meet me in the lady’s room. Let me now channel my throwback Fire Marshall Bill voice in saying “Ummm Caren…LeT Me TeLL YoU SoMeThInG!”

Do you know how selfish and self-absorbed you have to be to ask millions of Moms like me to stop baking bread…because you can’t find any baking ingredients at the grocery stores? You must think there’s a posse of IG Mommas who are using COVID-19 as an excuse to plot on you by buying up all the flour before you get to the store? Like there’s a shortage of leavening ingredients because Mommy Influencers are posting pics of the bread they make, before they throw it in the trash, neglecting to feed their kids with the very same bread for dinner.

THE PRIVILEGE PANDEMIC

Ohh Caren, it’s almost comedic how insane your PRIVILEGE meter is. Privilege is not only exposed in matters dealing with race or gender, but new media social perspectives too.  The fact that you can say cooking is not a hobby is a privilege. The fact that you can think this shortage affects YOU soooo much more than any other person dealing with the same global crisis, that you feel you have the privilege to talk about it…is PRIVILEGE.

And for starters Caren, what type of “cook” are you? A true baker knows to stay stocked with flour and yeast ALL THE TIME…LOL. But what’s more disturbing is you think that because you don’t post the bread you make, the millions of others like me who do post couldn’t possibly experience the same inconveniences you do at the grocery store - during a pandemic? Are you as naïve to believe you’re the only one who has a family that truly requires these items, because you don’t post about it on IG? This is the ultimate privilege mindset, which sadly runs just as rampant in our society as the very virus we’re all having to adapt a new normal too.

Newsflash Caren - for anyone who’s shopped at a grocery store within the first several weeks of this pandemic, there’s been a nationwide shortage of baking ingredients. Yes many people panicked, and bought up all the essential baking ingredients, like what happened with toilet tissue. It’s been hard as hell to find yeast, flour, baking powder, active rise and leavening agents in general all throughout the country.

That’s the new normal EVERYONE has been faced with, regardless of if you post the food you bake on IG or not. But Caren seems to believe the supply and demand curve creating a scarcity for bread and baking ingredients is based on people using their stimulus checks to create content via the #PostUrBreadUBakedOnlyForIGLikes hashtag. This hashtag is one that exists in Caren’s mind only, along with the #PostUrToiletTissueForIGWipes hashtag I wouldn’t be surprised she’s conjured up in her mind to attribute for the shortage of Charmin’s on the shelves.

THE COOKING BOND

Caren, don’t be so naïve as to think you’re the only one who knows that you can get all-purpose flour and eggs for under $2 total to make pasta from scratch and feed your entire family. The secret has been out for a while, and during a stay-at-home quarantine, we’re all making a dash to the stores and getting what’s most economical for feeding our families to survive. Plus it’s so much healthier than processed foods, knowing the ingredients we are using firsthand, while making hot meals to best keep everyone in our family’s immune system strong. Caren, I hate to bust your quarantine bubble, but you are not the only person thinking this way, we all are shopping with this in mind more than ever.

Ohh Caren. In case you didn’t know - many of us simply LOVE TO COOK. And this love goes so much deeper than rampaging the all-purpose flour aisles to bake bread as a way to get our follower account up. I’m so insulted Caren. Cooking is a way to create memorable moments, that can be shared. In fact - the whole point of creating my Chef Mommy Influencer brand and pop ups is to show love through food. When we “break bread” with one another, it’s a bonding experience like no other.

Lovestyle ATL Pop Up pic w/Beauty Influencer Kayla MaDonna & Celebrity Hairstylist Derek Jae

Caren may I also remind you that leavening agents are also used to bake not only bread, but family-friendly cookies, pudding and so much more to bond with our KIDS! One of the benefits of this quarantine has been the extra TIME we’ve been given back to spend with our families. And baking is a great way to bond with our kids, finding creative ways to have fun during a very difficult time. It’s can also be a great tool to teach science and math to your kids through baking experimentations.

My boys and I made donuts from scratch, something I’ve never done before in my life. It was so exciting to execute a precise process of exactness. And when me and my boys pulled off a damn good job of baking our own family Krispy Crème style donuts – we created a family memory I will remember for the rest of my life. And did I post it? I absolutely posted it on the gram! And in the 1 second it took me to post, I was able to share a great moment and the recipe with thousands of other Mommies so they too could explore this experience with their kids.

(Click here for my Perfect Yeast Donuts recipe: https://www.saralovestyle.com/lovestyle-blog/perfect-yeast-donuts)

THE POWER OF POSTING FOOD

As a Chef Mommy Influencer on social media, I get to share my Lovestyle passion for family and food with cooking enthusiasts all over. During this quarantine I felt compelled to change my entire influencer business model. Due to the unprecedented effect COVID-19 has had on millions of people and families, I decided to make all of my cookbooks available for FREE on at my Lovestyle shop.

https://www.saralovestyle.com/the-lovestyle-shop

Because of the interconnected social media universe where anybody can access a tribe with shared interests anywhere in the world – I had a mother living in Nigeria download all my cookbooks. Women DM me who have never cooked anything, who have gotten my cookbooks and cooked for the 1st time. How? BECAUSE I POSTED ABOUT IT!

Ohh Caren STOP WHINING! You’re like that troll who gets mad when parents post their Little Johnny’s first day of school pics. You don’t bake bread and post? Ok, then don’t post links to articles you write either.

CAREN’S MISSED OPPORTUNITY

I know the fact that I can stock my fridge and cook every day is not normal. I know making all my cookbooks for free is a privilege as well. So, guess what I do Caren? I use this privilege to inspire others and help, not whine. It’s so important, especially during these times, for the Caren Whites of the world to get out of their feelings and understand the place in which you are, in relation to the greater world and place people are at.

You know how to make bread Caren? Well teach people how to make it. If it’s taking food out of your mouth, teach others how to put food in there’s. If it’s not a hobby for you, teach other people how to make it a way of life. Experiment with a substitute product and learn to make or cook something else. All you know how to do is make bread? C’mon bruh, stop!

And Caren, what happened to the bat call to your friends? Amongst my homegirls, we know to call each other when grocery shopping to tell each other what we found, and where to go if anyone in our crew needs it. Wait..it hit me – Caren needs friends…or new friends.

All jokes aside, Caren your article was so out of pocket. “Congratulations” should’ve been the intro to your article – because you shown people a new way of cooking during this pandemic, when they thought all hope was lost for baking what they needed because the store ran out. I’m sure you have recipes, new recipes in fact if you learned how to make certain foods…without the traditional essentials we’re accustomed to baking with. Caren stop being selfish and share them #ComeOffTheRecipesGirl.

And if you want to be like me, you can even do it for free on IG!