Meet Lacristy Johnson of The Cooking Effect in South Atlanta

Today we’d like to introduce you to Lacristy Johnson.

Lacristy, let’s start with your story. We’d love to hear how you got started and how the journey has been so far.
When I reflect back, cooking has always been a central theme in my family as far as I can remember. Holidays, birthday parties, family reunions – it always centered around food, and I often found myself in the kitchen helping prepare the food so it seemed only natural that what once felt like a chore became a passion.

I once owned a smoothie bar and bakery in South Atlanta. As you can imagine, entrepreneurship was quite an experience, but it taught me so many lessons about myself, about running a business but more importantly, about the importance of being passionate about what you do and how that translates into everything else in your life.

The Cooking Effect was born out of that passion, which was an idea to share pictures of the food that I cooked. I didn’t really decide to turn it into a blog until much later on. It was merely just picture sharing. As a mother of 3 boys (yes, 3!), I am/was constantly cooking food. And if you know anything about having boys, you know that they can eat…A LOT. So, here I am with all this food that everyone says tastes amazing and looks great, why not share it with the world? Thus, The Cooking Effect was born.

Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Launching The Cooking Effect has been eye-opening and fun. You wake up one day and decide that you want to start a blog, only to quickly realize that you have no real idea what the means. Balancing content creation and coming up with recipes can be work, but when you truly love it, it doesn’t feel that way. I’m also finding tools to help me cross-post content because switching from platform to platform was such a pain! It’s a learning process but I’m loving every moment of it. I have quickly learned the importance of creating a schedule, using social media posting tools and having fun with it. It should never feel like a job.

Alright – so let’s talk business. Tell us about The Cooking Effect – what should we know?
The Cooking Effect is divided into three focus areas: cooking – which highlights easy recipes that pack a major flavor punch that anyone can prepare (my tagline is “cooking made easy”, after all); lifestyle – which focuses on event and party planning, as well as showcasing all of the little gems that Atlanta has to offer; and travel – I am an avid traveler and love to share my journeys to various places near and far.

I am really proud of all of the amazing connections that I am making because of The Cooking Effect. I’ve lived in the South Atlanta area my entire life, and every week I learn about a new restaurant or store that is located in the surrounding areas that I never knew existed. The Cooking Effect has been instrumental in helping me realize that there are so many people out there who also love to cook and travel and event plan, just like me. It’s nice to finally have found my “tribe” on platforms like Instagram and Facebook, who give us an opportunity to showcase our neighborhoods and our city.

Is there a characteristic or quality that you feel is essential to success?
I wish I could take all the credit for the idea of The Cooking Effect. In retrospect, it really was given life through my mother and grandmother. Both of whom are amazing cooks and the two women that I admire most in my life. Through their support and that of my sister, brother and so many others, I wouldn’t have finally taken the “leap of faith” to welcome strangers into my kitchen. Knowing that I am supported and constantly cheered for in this journey keeps me motivated and inspired; not to mention every time someone leaves my table with a full belly and a smile too.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.thecookingeffect.com
• Instagram: thecookingeffect
• Facebook: thecookingeffect
• Twitter: cookingeffect

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