Add Passion and Stir

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Chef Curtis Duffy on Inspiration and Resilience Aug 06, 2025

Show notes

Chicago chef and restaurateur Curtis Duffy recounts some of the revelations in his new book, Fireproof: Memoir of a Chef on this episode of Add Passion & Stir. Duffy writes about surviving the tragic loss of his parents at a very young age. “If it's helping somebody else get through what they need to get through… and if it helps them, in some way, or if they're able to relate to it somehow, then that's a win for me. That is a big win,” he says about sharing his story.

“I think some of my darkest times are when I've created great food. I've been in a really, really dark place and I will spend the next three days nonstop hauling over an entire menu by myself with zero help from anybody.”

Listen and be inspired.

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Noreen Springstead on Good Food in Communities Jul 23, 2025

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Partnership for a Healthier America President and CEO Noreen Springstead discusses how to make America healthy again through high quality food and empowered communities. “Is the food system broken, or is it designed in the way that it's supposed to be operating today, which is around profit?,” she posits. “There is data that suggests if the food supply is healthier, it's available, it's affordable, it's accessible, we can actually change this. Apathy does nothing.”

Listen to this conversation between two powerhouses in hunger and food security.

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Superstar Author John Grisham Examines Share Our Strength’s Long and Winding Road From Garage Startup to Global Impact Jul 09, 2025

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Bestselling author and No Kid Hungry supporter John Grisham gives listeners a behind-the-scenes look into how Share Our Strength founders and siblings Billy and Debbie Shore built their successful childhood hunger nonprofit from humble beginnings and a great idea. “In my memory, we knew that we had a really big and powerful idea… we just didn't know the path," explains Debbie.

“We also weirdly had a sense that this was going to take a long time to accomplish, that we were going to be committed to it for a long time. That actually took some of the pressure off of those very difficult early years where we didn't honestly have a lot to show for people,“ Billy adds. “I don't think we've ever had a year that felt like the year before. We've always added new initiatives, new ways of raising funds, new programmatic impact efforts, and it's just always felt different and growing,” he continues.

From a $2,000 cash advance and a sub-basement office, the Shores persevered to feed millions of hungry kids. "Childhood hunger in the United States is a solvable problem," both Shores often say. "Just two years ago, only 3 million kids were getting fed in the summertime. Today, with 37 states having opted in to that program, that number is 18 million kids,” Billy reports.

Grisham marvels at the Shore siblings’ ability to work so closely together for decades. "I have two sisters… we could not stay in the same room and work together for 40 minutes. I can't believe you guys have done it for 40 years,” he says. Listen for a rare opportunity to learn how impactful organizations are built and sustained.

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Stacy Dean and Zee Zaidoff on Fighting Summer Hunger Jun 25, 2025

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Well before the school year ends for American children , advocates like former USDA Deputy Under Secretary for Food, Nutrition, and Consumer Services Stacy Dean and Hawaii-based consumer advocate and substance abuse counselor Zahava “Zee” Zaidoff are planning how to feed kids over the summer. “The experience of hunger, in and of itself, is a terrible thing. But hunger amongst children is so much more devastating... They don't need food just to maintain, but also to grow and thrive,” says Dean.

Many layers of government, organizations, and individuals are ensuring that kids get access to meals during the summer months. “This is not just about the kids that we're trying to feed. This is about - fortunately and unfortunately - systemic change that has to happen around the entire system,” Zaidoff emphasizes.

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Encore: Gauri Devidayal and Pankaj Jethwani Fight Hunger in India Jun 11, 2025

Show notes

India’s children are hungry. Gauri Devidayal, Co-Founder and Director of The Food Matters Group, and Pankaj Jethwani, physician and Executive VP at W Health Ventures, are working to solve that problem. Devidayal is using her platform to draw attention and funding to the cause while Jethwani is helps run holistic nutrition programs.

“I think India's one of the greatest nations when it comes to hospitality. It's just something that comes innately to people,” says Devidayal. “That's ridiculous, as a child, to go through eight hours in the morning before a first meal and still expect to learn, still expect to thrive,” Jethwani believes. “We've served 400,000 children. It's a drop in the ocean. It's not even a drop in the ocean - it's a micro-drop in the ocean.”

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Two Staunch Child Advocates on the Potential of Every Child May 28, 2025

Show notes

Two staunch child advocates, Bruce Lesley of First Focus on Children and Phoebe Boyer of Children’s Aid, talk about the detrimental impact of poverty on children and the crucial role of social safety nets and nonprofit organizations in mitigating this harm.

“Every aspect of the life of a child is negatively impacted by poverty. It impacts their health, their education, their early childhood, their nutrition, their housing situation, and also abuse and neglect,” Lesley states.

“I look at every child that comes into our programs as having incredible potential, and there are all these barriers in their way, and our job is to remove those barriers,” says Boyer. Both guests stress that all of us have a role to play in protecting children against proposed changes and cuts to safety net programs that threaten kids’ wellbeing and ability to thrive.

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Fearless Philanthropy Helps Nonprofits Meet The Threat May 14, 2025

Show notes

Three social changemakers -

Jeff Bradach of The Bridgespan Group,
Daniel Stid of Lyceum Labs, and
former US Treasury advisor Clara Miller-

discuss the impact of the current political climate on the nonprofit sector.

“It was a huge shock to the system to have international aid just cut like that and it created a whole ripple of fear. I felt it; I think we all did,” says Miller. “We’re in this very strange place where people are saying, ‘we’ve got to stop this disruption and the cutting of programs,’ and simultaneously saying, ‘but maybe there may be some opportunities to rebuild, resurrect, change the system going forward in some important ways,’"Bradach explains.

These experts do have hope for a way forward. “Private foundations have all the resources they need and aren't reliant on outside parties for their operating expenses, so if any entity in civil society could mount a spirited and sustained defense of their constitutional prerogatives and act on behalf of all of us who care about these freedoms... I would expect and hope they would,” states Stid. “We just have to stop being prairie dogs and going down into our hidey holes. I think we have to stand up and resist,” Miller believes.

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Martin O’Malley on Social Security Lifting Kids Out of Poverty Apr 30, 2025

Show notes

Why would anyone cut 7,000 employees to save 0.06% of the budget from one of the most important agencies in the federal government? That’s the question Congressman Tom Swasey asked at town hall with former Social Security Commissioner Martin O'Malley. Over the past few days, O'Malley has warned that the 89-year streak of Social Security sending monthly benefits could come to an end.

That is why we are reprising this important episode of Add Passion and Stir featuring O’Malley who talks with Billy and Debbie Shore about how Social Security is lifting kids out of poverty, and what more it could be doing.

“Social Security is the difference between almost a million kids living above the poverty line or below it,” he says. During this conversation, O’Malley and Share Our Strength commit to a renewed partnership to help reach eligible children who are not currently enrolled in Social Security benefits.

O’Malley also debunks some common myths about the program. “The other big myth is that Social security is going bankrupt. Totally false. Social Security cannot go bankrupt because Social Security is a pay as you go program, which means that so long as Americans work, Social Security pays benefits.”

Listen and be inspired.

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Ruth Reichl on Food and Joy Apr 16, 2025

Show notes

On the very special episode of Add Passion and Stir, we revisit or conversation with chef, food writer, food critic, and author Ruth Reichl. Ruth discusses the transformative power of food and culture. “One of the great things to me about food is that you have the ability to touch these moments of grace throughout the day simply by biting into a perfect peach and going, ‘oh my God, I'm glad I'm alive,’" she marvels.

Her new book, "The Paris Novel,” explores the connection between food and joy. Reichl’s love of food and culture and food writer background shapes the book’s main character, who travels to Paris and rediscovers herself through food, art, and other cultural experiences. She also talks about the recent changes in the restaurant industry. “Food has always been my way of seeing the world. I have always looked at the world food-first,” says Reichl.

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Mayors Sharon Weston Broome and Mattie Parker Set the Table for Feeding Hungry Kids in their Cities Apr 02, 2025

Show notes

In this very special episode of Add Passion and Stir, we reprise an episode from May 2024 with two powerful leaders of the Mayors Alliance to End Childhood Hunger. The Mayors Alliance is a bipartisan alliance of almost 400 mayors from across the country.

In this time of turmoil, local leadership is all the more important to protecting and helping those in need. Mayors Sharon Weston Broome of Baton Rouge, Louisiana and Mattie Parker of Fort Worth, Texas are committed to feeding hungry kids in their jurisdictions and setting an example for mayors in every corner of our nation.

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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