Cooking Without Recipes & Living Without Limits with Makenna Held

In this flavorful and fearless episode, Tracy sits down with culinary entrepreneur Makenna Held, the powerhouse behind the Courageous Cooking School and the bold new platform Recipe Kick. Makenna opens up about her extraordinary leap of faith—buying Julia Child’s summer home, La Pitchoune, sight unseen—and the revolutionary path she’s carved in the world of food since.

From embracing recipe-free cooking to redefining the culinary classroom, Makenna shares how creativity, courage, and criticism have shaped her journey. She reveals the magic (and madness) behind running an immersive cooking school in the South of France, the challenges of building a sustainable food business, and the pressure of being tethered to Julia Child’s legacy.

Get ready for a refreshingly honest conversation about what it takes to cook, live, and lead on your own terms.

What You’ll Learn in This Episode:

• Why Makenna bought Julia Child’s home without ever seeing it
• How a movie (The Hundred-Foot Journey) inspired her life-altering move to France
• The philosophy behind her recipe-free approach to cooking
• What it’s like to run a cooking school inside a culinary icon’s home
• The deeper meaning behind The Courageous Cooking School
• How Recipe Kick is shifting the future of food education
• The unexpected impact (and pitfalls) of fame and TV exposure
• Why sustainable business models are essential
• How Makenna is building a legacy of culinary creativity and personal empowerment

00:00 Introduction to Makenna Held and La Pitchoune
02:52 The Journey to France and Buying Julia Child’s Home
06:01 Risk-Taking and Culinary Aspirations
08:57 The Courageous Cooking School Experience
11:53 Immersive Culinary Experiences and Cooking Philosophy
14:51 Recipe-Free Cooking and Creativity
17:58 The Evolution of Recipe Kick
20:47 The Cookbook and Culinary Education
29:24 The Spirit of Julia Child
30:43 Sustainable Business Models in Culinary Education
31:51 The Journey to Television Stardom
32:49 Navigating Fame and Criticism
40:03 Future Aspirations and Business Shifts
47:04 Defining Legacy Beyond Julia Child
51:54 Looking Ahead: New Ventures and Opportunities
Guest Bio

Makenna Held bought La Pitchoune, Julia Child’s summer home in Provence sight-unseen in 2016, when she came across a listing for it in The New York Times. Today, she operates the home as a vacation rental and the Courageous Cooking School by RecipeKick.   She was the host of La Pitchoune: Cooking in France on Max and Magnolia network, a seven-part show that featured Makenna and her team as they welcomed guests to their recipe-free cooking school.  A graduate of NYU and Smith College, Makenna is also the founder of Your Leadership Recipe and Conscious Commerce:  two frameworks for building businesses and leadership paradigms that are hell-bent on shifting away from the problems of patriarchal capitalism and into a more holistic ethos of joy, presence, and play.

Connect with Makenna

Instagram
@makennaheld @recipekick.tv @lapeetchfr

https://okay-perfect.com/

Find tickets for her tour:  MakennaHeld.com