Don’t forget to Eat Your Crust with Crystal Jiao and Jeesoo Kim

By Alyssa Chiang and Alexis Constantino

Photos Courtesy of Eat Your Crust

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED Sept/Oct 2023 BY LOTUS MAG

Eat Your Crust Podcast is one of our team favorites, noted for its authenticity and openness about very relatable topics. We had the opportunity to interview Crystal Jiao and Jeesoo Kim, the founders of the podcast. They were inspired to start the podcast to elevate regular people’s voices and talk about everyday topics, and have been more recently further motivated to empower the AAPI community.

You can find their episodes on Spotify, Apple, Overcast, and any of the other major podcast streaming platforms. They also spotlight their guests on Instagram. More info can be found at their website here.

Lotus Magazine (LM): Can you tell us what Eat Your Crust is all about?

Crystal (C): Eat Your Crust is two things - one is our desire to increase ours and our friends' voices and the second thing is that it just so happens that we are Asian Americans. In the very beginning, it was more about elevating regular people's voices and talking about everyday topics. But as we continued to develop the podcast, we realized identity was also a huge part of it, too. 

Jeesoo (J): I almost feel like Eat Your Crust started off as a personal fun project for us. It became a community of listeners, a lot of whom have just graduated from college. Crystal and I are just regular people who talk about stuff that might seem so regular, like moving or how we talk to our parents. But for us, they’re pretty big topics in our lives. It makes me happy when people can relate to our stuff.

LM: How can people tune in to your podcast?

J: You can find our podcasts on Spotify and Apple podcasts. It should also be on any of the other podcast streaming platforms like Overcast. We also started posting behind the scenes or guest spotlight stuff on our Instagram a lot more, so you can find pretty funny and cute details about all of our guests. We also have a website. 

C: On our website, we link to most of the big podcasting platforms as well. The player is also on the website.

LM: What inspired you to get started?

C: Part of it was the ease of starting a podcast, because you only need a microphone and a computer to get started. At first, there was a little bit of uncertainty because it felt so day-to-day. But hearing that other podcasts were able to do something similar to our general idea and make it engaging for listeners was really big. Seeing that more of these conversational podcasts were coming out made it more feasible.

J: Another thing that inspired me was that at the time, I was consuming a lot of media that I felt was very filtered and didn't cover some topics I wanted to talk about in the Asian American sphere or the post-grad craziness. I wanted to see more coverage on that. There were a few podcasts we were inspired by--Asian Boss Girl was one of them. I wanted to churn out more content that people in their early 20s could really relate to that wasn't curated.

LM: What more do you hope to accomplish with the podcasts in the years to come?

C: Our biggest hope is getting more and more voices elevated on the podcast while also being able to highlight people who are doing cool things within the community, even if they already have a bit of fame or recognition, but also bring them down to a level that feels relatable.

LM: How do you come up with the topics that you decide to talk about?

J: I feel like we never run out of ideas. It's kind of crazy. But I think what we look for is: 1) inspiring people who are doing really cool things, but also 2) inspiration in our daily lives. Personally, I look for small details that really inspire me. At my parents’ house, I was digging through the bookshelves and I found a collection of journals. I suggested, “We should do an episode on our journals.” And that gave birth to our episode, “Mid-Twenties Check In”, where we went through each year of our 20s so far, and described what it was like and our mindset at the time. 

C: Sometimes we'll also have conversations and it'll take a serious turn into some topic where we get really absorbed. And after, we realize, “That was such a good conversation. Maybe we can translate that into a podcast episode.” Because it feels like we were both so engrossed that I'm sure either other Asian Americans or women or other people in our similar situations would relate. 

J: Another one is our friendships with other people, because the friends around us live such interesting lives, even if they're not huge celebrities! 

LM: Are there other podcasts you listen to that you really look up to?

J: I am obsessed with Asian Not Asian. I've listened to every single one of their episodes, at least once if not two or three times. I think they do a really good job of talking about difficult topics while being frank. They're really raw and emotional on the podcast. It's two Asian comedian guys in their 30s, so I get to see a cool, different perspective. They're entertaining and bring on such diverse guests. 

C: I listen to that one too and I really enjoy it. There’s a lot of inspiration in how they're really good at interviewing and navigate situations so well. There's another one I listen to called Pop Culture Happy Hour. They talk about movies and TV shows that have recently come out or are a big topic right now. Since I personally really like watching movies and watch a decent amount of TV, listening to them discuss and review things I've watched is pretty cool because they'll usually bring on a diverse panel to talk about it. And they'll make commentary on what the movie tried to do beyond just the story. It makes me think about shows and movies in a different way sometimes.

LM: Do you have a dream guest for your podcast?

C: Any of the Asian Americans who are really breaking into the media and making their mark would be really cool. If we could get Asian Not Asian, that would be pretty funny.

J: I feel like my dream guest would probably be Min Jin Lee, who wrote Pachinko and also Viet Thanh Nguyen, who wrote The Sympathizer. Both of their episodes on Asian Not Asian were so good. They talked about such serious things, but it was so funny to listen to. I would love to bring that energy on our podcast.

LM: How do you manage the podcast, your full-time jobs, your personal lives, and your friendship all together?

J: I feel like there are times when it catches up to us a little bit, especially when we're traveling and we're busy and we have to record a bunch of episodes in one weekend. I think the most we did within a seven-day span was three recordings, which was pretty crazy. But at the end of the day, I feel like it's been a fun and relatively effortless journey. It just feels like I'm hanging out with Crystal and a bunch of our friends and recordings are always really fun and not super formal or business-y or anything like that. I think we've been doing a pretty good job staying inspired and keeping up with our episodes. I don't think we've accidentally skipped a week or were forced to not post because of our schedules or anything like that. We've been pretty on top of it. 

C: Yeah, I think we treat it like, “This is obviously a part of our lives,” almost like that kind of attitude where it's not something we would just cancel. I think there's only been maybe once or twice where we were like, “Can we reschedule this recording? Because I woke up feeling kind of shitty.”  Otherwise, we schedule stuff and we stick with it. It's as serious as a job in that sense. In the very beginning, I think it was a little tougher to adjust as we were also figuring out the workflow. But now that we're two years in, it just feels like second nature. As we've done it more and more, it's almost like a muscle that we practice because in the beginning, when we had recordings, we actually used to text each other, “Oh my God, I'm so tired after that recording.” Or we'd be like, “I passed out after recording.” But nowadays, after recording, we're like, “Oh, that was really fun” and we just carry along with our day.

LM: Do you ever disagree on anything? And if so, how do you resolve any sort of disagreement?

J: We've definitely disagreed on stuff. I feel like what helps is that our base is our friendship--we're not just project partners. We resolve it through having a pretty honest conversation. I don't think it's always an easy conversation, but it helps because I know all of the positive qualities of Crystal and I know that we've talked through and worked things out before. So I feel like when we do talk through it, it's almost like, “Well, at least we know how we feel about it.” And then we come to some sort of agreement. I feel like the differences between us aren't super big--these arguments aren't life or death. And I wouldn’t say they happen super frequently, because I think Crystal and I have this compatibility as friends, but also as project partners where we have qualities that complement each other. Usually it works out.

C: One time, we saw something from different perspectives. And we got on a call, talked it through honestly, and it ended up being more of a teamwork thing, because I was like, “Now that I'm hearing it from your perspective, which I didn't even consider, certain hesitations made a lot more sense to me.” And I realized these things we definitely needed to consider and dig more into.” And for Jeesoo she was like, “I also see your point now because you're looking at it from a bigger picture.” And then we ended up collaborating even more to solve it. We were like, “Let's put our perspectives together, write a little document about the steps that we need to take, and think and talk about it more next time now that we have a whole perspective.”

Alyssa Chiang is Co-Founder of Lotus Magazine - and she’s also working on her Ph.D. in bioengineering at UC San Diego! She loves to try new foods and bathe in the SoCal sunshine. You can catch her whipping up tasty meals, dancing in heels, reading in her Cave, or listening to sad music. Perpetually juggling a bunch of things, but it’s all by choice and passion. 

Alexis Constantino is one of the co-founders of Lotus Magazine where she enjoys working with the team as well as connecting with people within the community. She is also a local piano teacher in San Diego, teaching kids from elementary to high school and anyone who's willing to learn! In her free time, Alexis loves immersing herself in books, traveling to new places, and eating great food.