030 Spotlight Episode: New Contributors

This episode, we’re spotlighting some of the fresh voices in our Weekly Recommend segments. 

First, we chat with Emily Struhala, a freelance journalist from the Greensburg area. Beyond her dining picks, Emily writes about small business and tourism throughout Western Pennsylvania. Find her work on notable outlets like Visit Pittsburgh and Next Pittsburgh.   

Next, meet Julie Engelbrecht of @girleatsburgh on Instagram. An active member of Yelp Elite, Julie brings her love for food and events into every post. Stay tuned as she teases some exciting Ukrainian recipes. 

And of course, we wrap up with the Hungry Huffs, a husband/wife team who never leave us without stellar restaurant recommendations. Tune in for an episode packed with culinary passion and community spirit!

Transcript

Doug: 0:00

Hey everybody, it's Doug. Welcome to a special spotlight episode of The Pittsburgh Dish. Over the last couple weeks you've heard a few new voices in our Weekly Recommend section and we thought we'd shine a spotlight on some of those folks today. First up is Emily Struhala. Emily is a freelance journalist and she covers a lot more than just food, including small businesses and travel throughout southwestern Pennsylvania. Hey everybody, we're joined today with freelance writer Emily Struhala. You hail from the Greensburg area, mm-hmm, yes which I don't get out to all that often, so I'm so glad to get some pics from a local. Thank you so much for being on the show.

Emily: 0:40

Oh, thanks for inviting me.

Doug: 0:42

Emily, if people want to find and follow you, where can they find you?

Emily: 0:46

So I'm on Facebook and Instagram and my handle is ems_experiences_pgh.

Doug: 0:53

Yeah, so EMS underscore yes, experiences underscore PGH.

Emily: 0:58

Yes.

Doug: 0:58

All right, emily, if people want to find some of your writing.

Emily: 1:04

where can they find the articles you're publishing to? I do link my articles on my socials, but some of the other places you can find me is visit Washington County, Go Laurel Highlands, Visit Pittsburgh and Next Pittsburgh Amazing. Emily, thank you so much, thank you for having me.

Doug: 1:19

We're looking forward to a lot more from Emily in the coming weeks. Up next it's Julie Engelbrecht of Girl Eats Burgh on Instagram. Hey, Julie, thanks so much for coming over and being on the show.

Julie: 1:31

Thanks for having me, Doug.

Doug: 1:33

And how long have you been posting on Instagram at Girl Eats Burgh?

Julie: 1:40

So I started last November.

Doug: 1:43

But you had an account before that. Yes, girl Me. Before that, yes, girlm eetsburgh. Yes, because you moved here from the Philly area.

Julie: 1:51

Yes, Westchester.

Doug: 1:52

Was that a pivot because you were doing more food? Why did you change the name?

Julie: 1:57

Yeah, my account was hacked.

Doug: 1:59

Oh, no yeah.

Julie: 2:02

So it was just like a phishing scam. Yeah, so I had to make a new account, and this one's girl eats Berg, so I still kept a lot of the name before that. I had that account for about three years.

Doug: 2:14

So you've been doing this for like yeah, close to four and a half.

Julie: 2:17

Oh my gosh yeah.

Doug: 2:18

And I also have noticed, since the name changed, you've actually probably gotten more traction on your account.

Julie: 2:25

Yes, it's crazy. I don't know why or how, but it's been awesome.

Doug: 2:29

Yeah, outside of this, I also saw that you do participate in Yelp Elite, and we talked with Raquel Holiday about that.

Julie: 2:36

Yes, and oh my gosh, I love Raquel. It's funny that you brought her up. She's one of my good friends. Yeah, so I've been doing Yelp Elite for also four years and absolutely love it. I think it's so fun, it's so great to go to all the events, meet new people. I like the overlap. A lot of people like do Yelp and they have a food account, so it's cool to see them on. You know, double the events.

Doug: 2:58

Do you do any other things on Yelp, like spas or anything outside of the restaurant scene?

Julie: 3:06

Some other little activities, like if there's a comedy show or like some skit or some you know another activity, usually if it's like a date night. I like to do those types where there's a plus one and you can both do like a thing together. Yes, cause I did notice you're engaged. Yes, congratulations, thank you. Thanks, julia.

Doug: 3:39

I'm just going to say I love your last name because it's it's pretty German sounding and that, like you know, resonates with me, for you growing up, in terms of food or any other cultural significance.

Julie: 3:49

Definitely yeah, there's a lot, so I would like to share a recipe with you sometime.

Doug: 3:54

Oh my gosh, I would absolutely love that.

Julie: 3:57

Great yeah, me too.

Doug: 3:58

Let's do it.

Julie: 3:58

Okay.

Doug: 4:00

I cannot wait to talk about some Ukrainian recipes with Julie. So much fun. Finally, we check in with the Hungry Huffs and we can't leave you this week without a restaurant recommendation, so I promise they'll have a few. So, Alex Chantal, you guys are the sort of unique foodie couple that I know and you share an Instagram account. Can you tell our listeners what is that handle?

Chantal: 4:28

Yeah, it's Hungry Huffs on Instagram.

Doug: 4:30

And that's because it's your last name, right? Okay?

Chantal: 4:33

Someone asked us or asked you recently, right, if it was for Hufflepuffs?

Alex: 4:36

Yeah, someone asked me. I was out to dinner the other night and someone asked me if I was a big Harry Potter fan, of what house I was in. I was confused by the question. He's like your Instagram handle Hungry Huffs. I thought it had to do with being a Hufflepuff and I was like, no, it's just my last name, no Hufflepuffs involved.

Chantal: 4:54

Although I probably am a Hufflepuff.

Doug: 4:58

All right. So you have been on fire with this account for like a couple of years.

Alex: 5:05

When did you start this account? Yeah, so I think we started, probably officially. We made some posts almost about two years ago, just more static posts, and we took some time off and didn't make any posts for probably like six or seven months, and then I think we last started in March, february or March of 2023. So once, I guess, reels are taking off, chantal had a good experience with that with her other account of how to create reels, and we kind of parlayed that into you know food content, since we're always going out to eat to you know different places.

Doug: 5:32

And I noticed your Instagram is up to like almost 16,000 followers. But, Alex, as you said, Chantal, you have a totally different business that you've had for a while very successful as well. Can you tell me a little bit about that?

Chantal: 5:47

Yeah, I have a digital planner creative tech account and I have been doing that for a few years now I think, like three years full time last week. So oh, wow, congrats, thank you. It's very exciting and it's taught me a lot of skills that it's fun to parlay into Hungry Huffs.

Doug: 6:03

And the handle for that is Paper N Roses, and that's literally the word paper, the letter N and the word roses. So if people want to find you and see some of those services, that's where they can go right. Yep, now do you have a website? I do, it's papernrosescom, and do you guys have a website?

Alex: 6:20

I do, it's paperandrosescom. And do you guys have a Hungry Huffs website? No, but that's something on our radar, I think, to create sometime this year. We want to do something before the holidays to create more of a bloggy-style post and maybe some of our favorites, or best of the best. Let me back up how long have you been married?

Chantal: 6:33

Seven years.

Doug: 6:34

Seven years, oh yeah, and so Instagramming together for two? Yeah, but has food always just played a big role in your relationship?

Chantal: 6:42

Yes, so I'm Indian and Alex grew up in a small town and you're from Toronto. Yeah, so when we first met, he had not tried a lot of-.

Alex: 6:50

Any food. My palate was very immature. I used to think everything was spicy. I wouldn't eat anything. I was more of just a I don't know chicken fingers and fries type person. But Chantal being from big city, you know being Indian and her and her family introducing me to different foods really, I think, led to us like loving and wanting to try different restaurants, different foods and different things like that.

Doug: 7:10

I love this influence, chantal. So, alex, you had sort of like a flavor awakening by having this great relationship.

Alex: 7:19

Very much so. Now there's nothing that I won't try, at least once, and I tend to you know like everything now which is so different from how I grew up.

Chantal: 7:24

Now he has a wider palette than I do by far.

Doug: 7:26

I also heard you guys like spicy, right High spice.

Alex: 7:29

Love spicy food. All right, that's that's quite the evolution. I was a zero out of 10. Now I'm probably closer to a seven, or up to an eight now, which is crazy for myself.

Chantal: 7:40

He used to think that McChickens at McDonald's were spicy.

Doug: 7:41

Now he could be on hot ones.

Emily: 7:44

Literally.

Doug: 7:45

And Chantal has your palate always been pretty wide, considering your family cuisine.

Chantal: 7:50

Yeah, I ate a lot of Indian food and then Asian food in general. In Toronto it's very prevalent. So then when I first moved to Pittsburgh, there wasn't a ton of choices. I felt like and that's kind of how we started going out to eat, we would find as many Asian restaurants as we could, and it was just like a really fun experience.

Doug: 8:05

You know I was just talking with Kanika of That Curry Smell. She sort of had the same experience. You know she was around Carnegie Mellon, she knew a couple of places and she's really on the quest to find Indian and Southeast Asian places and also highlighting what they do best and do you kind of find the same thing?

Chantal: 8:22

Absolutely, and it's really fun to follow people like Kanika and Sophia eating, because it's fun to see, like, what other people are eating. That's Asian and those are the places I'm most influenced to go.

Doug: 8:32

Yeah, are there like a top, like one or two go-tos for you now that you live here in Pittsburgh?

Chantal: 8:37

Um, yes, Noodle heads at the top of my list by far. I don't think you could spend a better $12 anywhere.

Doug: 8:44

I know Reasonable right.

Chantal: 8:45

Yeah, no, for real, and it's so good. If you are going there, you need to get either the Kee Mao, the See Yew or the Chiang Mai.

Alex: 8:51

I would say you like the street noodles? I get the street noo dles every time, but the the Pad Kee Mao is definitely their best dish there.

Chantal: 8:57

Out of this world. And of course, I like Pusadee's Garden too, but that's a lot more.

Doug: 9:02

Oh my gosh, everyone loves Pusadee's Garden.

Chantal: 9:04

And, of course, they're owned by the same people.

Doug: 9:05

Yeah.

Chantal: 9:06

Yeah, I think that place is incredible, but obviously it's a lot more expensive, and I like the places that are a little bit less. I find that they're more accessible and often these like more accessible places taste better too.

Doug: 9:18

We want a range, right. I mean, there are times that you want to have like the full tilt experience, but we also need to eat every day.

Chantal: 9:24

Yes, speaking of every day, another one I would say is Everyday Noodles. Yeah, everyday.

Alex: 9:28

Noodles in Squirrel Hill is, I think, one of the best spots. They do the hand-pulled or the hand-drawn noodles, yes. So I think there's really nothing you can go wrong on their menu as well.

Chantal: 9:38

Although, if you're looking for something specific, their spicy wontons are out of this world, so good.

Doug: 9:44

And now I just have a curious question. We sort of established where you both came from from your food journeys. Was there anything that Alex turned you on to as you started to date and get married?

Julie: 9:56

Kielbasa the.

Chantal: 9:57

Polish food oh yeah, I don't think you guys should eat much of that. Growing up, I thought I would never like kielbasa.

Alex: 10:03

And now it's like one of my favorite foods. You like kielbasa pierogies.

Chantal: 10:05

I love pierogies.

Doug: 10:06

Oh well, that also goes really well with the Pittsburgh area for the old guard of cuisine.

Chantal: 10:12

So good.

Doug: 10:12

Yeah, guys, thank you so much for taking a little time to give us some restaurant recommendations and thanks for being on the Pittsburgh Dish. Yeah, thank you for having us. That's our show for this week. We'd like to thank all of our guests and contributors, and to Kevin Solecki of Carnegie Accordion Company for providing the music to our show. We'll be back again next week with another fresh episode. Stay tuned.