"For people who chew with their minds open"--The Zenchilada is a gorgeous food and culture magazine.I have written for/illustrated a piece in every issue and am proud to be associated with such talented folks. So far,it is a quarterly along with newsletters. You can subscribe to the first three online issues. Your Kickstarter donation of $25 gets you a print copy of the next issue, in which I discuss upside down dinners, The Rubaiyat,and a friend who traded camels and goods for the most beautiful wife I've ever seen. I love these editors who let my art and writing run wild on their pages.Please support their Kickstarter project

About this project

TheZenchilada.com launched in 2010 as a digital magazine exploring the relationship between food, family, culture and place. With three editions now online, we are asking for your support to print our fourth issue.

: Not just another food magazine…

Our Story
Although there are many popular food magazines in print—and even more wonderful food bloggers, recipe sites and cooking videos available online—none really took the place of the late, lamented (original) Gourmet magazine with its stylish photography and eclectic features that were more than lead-ins for recipes. Dedicated as we all were to engaging storytelling and beautiful design, we decided to start the kind of magazine we wanted to read, a magazine that reconnected the world of food to cultural exchange.
As long-time editors, writers, photographers, designers and arts aficionados, we have the experience, passion and relationships to bring the unexpected and unusual, as well as the everyday, to TheZenchilada.com in a format that respects your intelligence and curiosity. Each 110-plus-page issue of the magazine delves into a single subject—to date: corn, chickens-and-eggs and carnivals and feasts–and includes feature stories, memoir, poetry, artwork, photography, book reviews, drinks and, of course, recipes.
You can check out the digital issues on our website: thezenchilada.com.
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Our first three digital issues, our website and several newsletters have been self-funded. But many of our readers have asked for a print version of the magazine that they can hold in their hands and return to again and again. And, as much as we see the exciting possibilities of the digital and mobile world, we also believe that there is still a place for print. So we are turning to you and Kickstarter to help us to raise the funds to make issue number 4 our first print edition.
Our fourth issue—which we’re calling The Saffron Trail because it explores the lasting influence of Arabic, Islamic and Sephardic foodways on world cuisine—is already under development. In another first for us, we also plan to translate two of the lesser-known stories—one that highlights the Arabic-Northern New Mexican connection and another that searches for Islamic influences on Mexican cuisine—into Arabic for distribution to Middle Eastern media.

How We Will Use The Funding

Our goal is to raise $25,000 to pay the costs of producing our first print edition. Your money will pay our writers, photographers, artists and translators; cover the costs of designing the issue; pay for the printer (a very large upfront expense) and mailing; and update our website to promote the print edition.

Rewards

Your pledge of $25 or more is actually a preorder for TheZenchilada.com’s first print issue.
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Pledge less than $25 and we’ll send refrigerator magnets with intriguing sayings, recipe cards and our heartfelt gratitude (including your name listed as a supporter on a special page of the magazine). These gifts are included in all reward levels. At higher donation levels special gifts include chile pods, spices and other exotic foodstuffs, a one-of-a-kind pysanky goose egg by artist Charles Veilleux, a traditional micaceous clay bean pot handmade by Santa Fe potter Judith Raywood, and special surprise gift boxes delivered quarterly. (See the rewards box in the right-hand column for more details.)
We do ask our international supporters to add $12 to their pledges to help offset the extra shipping charges.

How Kickstarter Works

This is what Kickstarter says about its process:
To pledge to a project, just click the green “Back This Project” button on any project page. You will be asked to enter your pledge amount and select a reward. From there, you will go through the Amazon checkout process. (Note that Kickstarter only supports credit card payments through Amazon Payments—and that you must finish the Amazon checkout process for your pledge to be recorded.)
If the project you’re backing is successfully funded, your card will be charged when the project reaches its deadline (January 13, 2012). If the project does not reach its funding goal, your card is never charged — your pledge will be deleted, and you will have spent nothing but some time helping us pursue our dream.
Please do keep giving even if we meet our goal!
Additional funds will help us design the magazine for future publication on mobile platforms and allow us to translate some of our features into Spanish.

Questions?

To Our Supporters

We really can’t do this without you. Special thanks to all the writers, poets, editors, designers, photographers, artists, museums, chefs, readers, food lovers and friends who have made TheZenchilada.com as good as it is. And thanks to all of you who can’t wait to see us in print—and in your hands.

Who We Are

Although we are all transplants, the Southwest, our current home, is an historic crossroad for world trade and cross-cultural exchange. It’s the perfect place to conceive and produce TheZenchilada.com.
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Pat West-Barker, Publisher, is a former journalist and features editor whose love of all things food has permeated her personal as well as her professional life. As creative director of a communications consulting firm, she provided internal and external programs for corporate clients, always managing to slip a recipe or two into every campaign. Pat also is the author of three nonfiction books, including Healing Spirits: True Stories of the Journey Toward Health and Wholeness.
Ronni Lundy, Editor-In-Chief, is a former editor of Louisville magazine and the award-winning author of six cookbooks, including Butter Beans to Blackberries: Recipes from the Southern Garden and Shuck Beans, Stack Cakes and Honest Fried Chicken, named one of the six essential books about Southern cooking by Gourmet magazine in 1994. As a freelance journalist, she has written about food and pop music for national magazines and newspapers. A founding member of the Southern Foodways Alliance, Ronni received the organization’s Craig Clairborne Lifetime Achievement Award in 2009. Her most recent award, from the Association of Food Journalists, was for Best Internet Food News or Feature Story (2011) for “Old Zen River Tamales” in the first issue of TheZenchilada.com.
Barbara Walzer, Partner and Business Development Manager, built her first career around her love of books: She has been a bookstore manager, antiquarian bookseller and library consultant with clients that included The British Museum, Yale Law School, the Library of Congress and the New York Public Library. A second career that included positions as director of an inner city economic development program in Providence, Rhode Island, executive director of Santa Fe Indian Market and an independent consultant to arts and crafts organizations, further honed her management, marketing, fundraising and public relations skills.
Fernando Delgado, Creative Director, came to New Mexico via Cuba and a successful 25-year career as a creative director for the advertising industry in New York City. He attended The Cooper Union School of Art and Parsons School of Design in New York, where he studied with Louise Nevelson, Milton Glaser, Henry Wolf and Herb Lubalin. Fernando is also a fine art photographer; his work has been exhibited and published nationally and is included in many public and private collections.

“Preparing food is not just about yourself and others. It is about everything.” -Shunryu Suzuki

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MAKE AN ISSUE OF IT -TheZenchilada.com refrigerator magnet (with one of the following sayings) For People Who Chew With Their Minds Open, When The Whole Enchilada Isn’t Enough, Because You Never Dip In The Same Red Sauce Twice -One photo/recipe card from TheZenchilada -Your name listed as a supporter of TheZenchilada in The Saffron Trail issue