Episode 303 – Robert Brownie Jr

Meet Molly Kohrman, founder and head chef at Brownies Brownies Brownies! a local baker and you guessed it, brownie specialist. Molly is from the east coast, Philadelphia to be precise, and came to Utah, following the rest of her family moving here. Molly is a strong supporter of the community and a great inspirational local Utah business woman.

In talking to Molly we were all shocked at how she started her business here in Utah. She tells us all about how she got into baking and a love of brownies of course, but it is the actual adventure in starting a business that is worth hearing about. She spent a lot of time prior to starting, getting help from a wealth of amazing small business resources available for free in the state of Utah. From the Utah Small Business Development Center to the Women’s Business Center of Utah, to the public library, she talks us through all the resources she had available to get started the right way. Needless to say Chris and Jeremy wished they knew of such resources.

Molly is also a strong community advocate. She has helped give back in numerous ways through the years she has been in business. She tells us a lot about the community fund raisers she does during the show. We also get to hear about how she likes to collaborate with other businesses since Utah is such a loving business community.

Of course no show about brownies would be complete without talking about the brownies themselves, and we do a lot of that. From Molly’s favorites, to how she decides what to make to our suggestions, and we all leave very hungry.

The New Utah Podcast · 303 – Robert Brownie Jr

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Episode 301 – Fireball

This episode we sit down and talk with Alexi Fisher, the owner of Hammered Copper, a local bartending company. We talk through a ton with Alexi, from where she started, all the way to how she has become so successful as a business woman of color, in the booze business, all while in a white conservative state like Utah.

We take a deep dive into her experiences as a black woman growing up, and how they have had an impact on her business and her choices. She has been through a pretty insane life, and has come out on top. She is very inspiring for anyone, but especially empowering for other people that want to do something in their lives and stand up for themselves.

She has been expanding her business, and now has an educational setting, The Cocktail Collective, where she teaches everything from how to make glorious cocktails to pairing drinks. She has relationships with other local businesses that make the experience for her students even better. She offers group courses, online classes and will even customize for your needs. She’s a great mixologist, and you won’t be disappointed taking one of her courses.

She also has a podcast, The History of Drinking. So needless to say she knows her stuff in terms of liquor. It makes for good conversation about Utah liquor laws and how they have influenced her. We really had a blast with her, and hope that you enjoy the conversation as well.

The New Utah Podcast · 301 – Fireball

Episode 297 – Salt City Barbecue

Jeremy is still recovering from covid. It seems to have completely put him down, with 5 days in bed, and still trying to recover, we have him join us remotely for this show and Julia is off on another fun trip. Bre tells us about the death of her biological father, and recounts the funeral and amazing new found family she has.

The bulk of the show is devoted to our guest though, Rusty Monson, the owner of Salt City Barbecue. He is also cohost on The Pitmasters Podcast. We get to talk a ton about his business, but before that we hear more about his life. Being our age, we all wax poetic about the awesome 80s and 90s in the Salt Lake area. I’m real happy because we get to nerd out on Magic The Gathering and Dungeons and Dragons with Rusty.

In talking with Rusty we find out how much he really does love his cooking and his state. He wants Utah to become a place people can find truly amazing barbeque even if that isn’t really the case right now. What he won’t say about the other locals, the hosts of the show don’t back off from. While Utah has an amazing food scene, barbeque is one area we don’t have a large selection of, and are certainly not known for. Rusty wants to change all of that.

Rusty started doing competition barbeque, before deciding to open his own catering business and food truck. Now the truck can be found wandering the Salt Lake Valley and delivering amazing nachos to everyone. Long term the dream is to open up a great brick and mortar restaurant and teach everyone who wants to know how to make good barbeque.

The New Utah Podcast · 297 – Salt City Barbecue

Episode 293 – Dead Trees

Utah turned 126 for this episode. So Happy Actual Birthday Utah! Jeremy tell us he’s going to go to Monster Jam to see the trucks, and Chris complains about indoor monster truck shows.

The real meat of the show though, is our discussion with Cody Chamberlain, a local Utah artist inspired by all of the vast beauty and often emptiness of the state. You can find all of his work on his website.

We find out quickly he was born on September 11, and have a long discussion on how that impacted him as a person. We talk about where he was when everything happened, and how he found out hours after most of the world. It’s an interesting take you will want to hear.

We get to dive into his love of art, and how after deciding to get his GED, he went to college to pursue a degree in Fine Arts at Utah Valley University We talk a lot a good deal about his experiences in college actually prepared him to be a full time artist and make a living selling his art work.

We also dive into the focuses of his art. Very much influenced by the landscape of Utah, his art features a take on dead trees, and mortality, and life. Utah summers are featured predominately in his very large scale custom pieces. He’s spent a lot of time in the great nothingness of the Utah desert finding inspiration for his work.

And when I talk about the grandeur of his art, I would be remiss to show you some images. His stuff is as big as a full grown man in many cases. He doesn’t hold back in the scale of his work.

Boulder Mountain Ponderosa: codyrexchamberlain.art

The New Utah Podcast · 293 – Dead Trees

Episode 290 – Utah Ugandan

This episode we find out Chris and Bre likely have a mouse in the house. We also get a full recap on the annual ugly sweater competition and the white elephant gifts that ensued. This may become an annual recap, who knows. Lastly before our amazing guest, Julia tells us about getting suckered into a time share on her vacation. It took about 2 seconds before Chris called what it was, and the team listens and gives advice on time share purchases.

The meat of the episode though, is our discussion with Jermain Magandazi, a Ugandan immigrant to Utah, and the owner of Bombini’s Own a local Utah business, specializing in candles, lip balm, perfume and other locally sourced care products.

We get to dive deep into his story in our discussion. Growing up in Uganda with his Aunt, and then moving to the UK, and finally making it to America. At age 11, he essentially met his parents for the first time in his life. They had spent all that time setting up a proper life for their children here in America.

Of course we get to have a long conversations about the different things he thought of and experienced moving from place to place with such big culture differences. We hear about the first thing he ate in America, and you will be surprised by the reaction.

He came to Utah for college, attending the University of Utah. He talks about how he started the business, on a whim, because he was tired of always having to replace lip balms he lost. So he learned how to make them, testing on his friends. Eventually someone told him to sell them and next thing you know he has an Etsy shop, an Amazon store and now a Brick and Mortar location at 7700 Maple Street in Midvale, Utah.

Episode 286 – Blown with Fire

There is a bit of local catching up to do this week. Real Salt Lake made the MLS playoffs, barely and with some help from other teams, but hey, that’s what started their only MLS Championship winning run too. Of course 2009 was very different from 2021. Jeremy tells us about a new bar in Riverton, big news for a town full of Chili’s. I don’t think he will be a customer though.

Also the group talks at length about at home medical testing, it’s ties to Covid and why we can’t do more tests, like Rapid Strep at home. And then comes the discussion about the ridiculous Utah State Legislature, once again bucking what the public has voted for, and instead of using independent redistricting maps, has decided to once again Gerrymander the borders to keep Republicans in power. It’s honestly a shame, and we all feel like there isn’t much the public can do about it, mormon Jesus knows they tried.

The meat of the show is devoted to Emma Archuleta (no relation). Emma is a local industrial glass blower and all around nice person. We find out a lot about how and where she grew up, and how she got into glass blowing.

We get to dive deep into a lot of things in an industrial glass blowing shop. From the amazing lathe, to the Hydrogen/Oxygen welding and torches they use. Sorry, this isn’t your artistic glass blowing location with a glory hole. And yes glory hole is the actual name of the furnace artistic glass blowers put the glass in to heat it.

We also talk about the safety involved. With so much heat, tanks of flammable and explosive gases nearby and even super dangerous acids, the shop is a really serious environment. She has truly found her love though, so early in life. She is even helping make glass jewelry with her coworker.

This really is a run conversation, and we hope you enjoy it as much as we did.

The New Utah Podcast · 286 – Blown with Fire

Episode 283 – Religious Architecture

It’s the last week of the month, and for October we are focusing in on 2 religious buildings that have a lot of historical significance for the State of Utah; The LDS Temple in Salt Lake City and The Cathedral of The Madeleine also in Salt Lake.

The show begins though, with some grumbles from Jeremy and Chris about the small election this coming week, and how folks continue to be running unopposed in the state, especially in local elections. We also complain about the need to mail ballots for a single position in a district, that is unopposed. A real barn burner of a choice who to vote for if you ask us.

Now into the good stuff, where we start with the LDS temple, in Temple Square, Downtown Salt Lake City. While not the first Mormon temple built, it is the largest in the world. It stands 210 feet tall, is covered in Utah granite as thick as 9 feet at the base and took 40 years to build.

The land the temple would be built on was recognized quickly and snatched up. A wall went up in 1852, to conceal the area to be built within. On April 6, 1853, the cornerstone ceremony occurred and work began in earnest. Local sandstone was initially used in the construction, which took years in foundation work. 14 years before walls appeared above ground to be exact.

In 1857, the site was buried, and hidden, in an effort to prevent the US Army from identifying that a temple was being built. When work resumed on the temple, after the military left and the Utah War was all but over, it was discovered that sandstone was just not the right material. So in 1860, the builders swapped to granite, which had been recently discovered in the nearby canyons.

In the episode we talk about the design of the temple, the symbolism used within and outside and many of the structures in temple square itself. It took 40 years to the day to complete, and on April 6, 1893 the temple was officially dedicated. Today, the temple is undergoing a massive renovation, and visiting it is not possible for the next 4 years.

We then move to a much quicker project, but equally significant to the State of Utah. The Cathedral of The Madeleine in downtown Salt Lake, just a few blocks form the LDS Temple, is a bastion of Catholic presence in the Salt Lake Valley. Built in 1/4 of the time, the Cathedral features similar architectural greatness.

Built on land purchased and donated by the first Bishop of Utah, Bishop Scanlan, it features tons of beautiful stained glass, sandstone and granite. With a very gothic interior the cathedral is open for all to see. Bishop Glass, the bishop that took over when Bishop Scanlan died, really added a lot of his flair to the cathedral after it was complete.

The cathedral was completed in 1909, but consecrated after it was paid off, during the Great Depression in 1936. The masses in the cathedral were all in Latin until 1965, when the first English mass was celebrated. The Cathedral also has slivers of what is supposed to be the cross that Jesus Christ was crucified on inside.

Hopefully you enjoy this episode, we had a good time making it.

The New Utah Podcast · 283 – Religious Architecture

Episode 281 – Conch Blower

Even though us Podcast peeps are in beautiful Hawaii for Bre & Chris’s wedding we are still so dedicated to our listeners that we continue to bring you quality shows!!!! HAHAHA. Okay it’s all pre-recorded, BUT STILL.

This episode is brought to you by the Letter ‘B’ and the color green. We start out the episode talking about sardines, liquid ass, and Koran Corn dogs. Don’t worry it gets better .. Chris talks about what would happen if someone broke into his house, (He sleeps in the buff so any intruder will be in for a real surprise) We highlight several of the cool haunted houses here in Utah (See link below for the list)

Funtober Utah Haunted House List

Our guest this week is Bryton Bluth (Julia’s long-time boyfriend), and a loyal follower of the show). Bryton has been helping the podcast behind the scenes with his amazing photography for a while now.

Bryton was born in Vergina Beach, Virgina but like most military brats moved around to a number of places, including but not limited to: North Carolina, South Dakota, Utah, and the list goes on.

Bryton decided at a young age to follow in the footsteps of his father and join the military. He participated in the JROTC program in high school and officially joined the armed forces right after graduation. Bryton went through his basic training and then requested to be transferred to a National Guard unit in Utah. Nearly 8 years later and Bryton is still here serving in the Utah National Guard. Bryton’s duties have included transportation specialist, color guard, and photographer. Getting to perform Color Guard duties for the Utah Jazz, Real, graduations, etc. has been one of the coolest things he has done.

Bryton has also taken his love for photography and turned it into a nice part time job doing 3D photography for architects, engineers, contractors and homeowners, he is also a licensed drone operator.

Photo T3

We had a really fun time talking to Bryton and we think you will really enjoy this episode as well.

The New Utah Podcast · 281 – Conch Blower

Episode 280 – The Braun Method

Aloha and Greetings!!! This episode is coming to you for the beautiful Island of Kauai….(Okay not really) we pre-recorded the episode before we left. In this week’s riveting episode, we want to remind you to go to the City Weekly website and vote for the Best of Utah 2021.

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1GyLFAb3BBL1F_S-eLOXTKazCkNkG4SuSzpWaoCNEIqs/viewform?ts=612d548f&edit_requested=true

Best of Utah 2021 link (click on me)

Please take the time to fill out the ballot. Vote for The New Utah Podcast, Julias new business The Pleiadian Altar. Jeremy’s business Salt City Home Designs, and any of the amazing business we have interviewed over the past 5-1/2 years.

We also want to give a shout out to Utah Body and Soul. (Aerial Turner) our Botox specialist and friend of the show is a certified Nurse Injector work there. They are having a HUGE fall event on October 14^th with free swag and the first 25 people to register will get membership pricing on everything they offer!

This week we are privileged to sit down and chat with Travis Braun

(Pronounced Brown) He was Julias Jr. High School art teacher and the creator of the ‘Braun Method of Art’. What is the Braun Method of Art you ask? It’s taking an abstract background and placing it behind a portrait. Both are created by Travis (the background and the portrait) and then married together in a digital format.

Travis grew up in a small-town west of the Twin Cities MN. He spent much of his childhood drawing, doodling, and discovering his love of art. Music has always been important to Travis and in high school he plaid guitar in a rock band Star Lava.

After a year of schooling in MN. Travis moved to Utah (in his mid-20’s) to study art at BYU. This was where Travis was able to hone his skills in art. Even though he was not sure how he would be able to support himself and a family with an art degree Travis figured he would spend four years studying something he loved.

After graduation from Collage teaching art was something that just sort of found him! Travis went back and got his teaching certificate and then spent 7 long years teaching jr. high school. After spending his time in the trenches, he was able to take a position as a high school art teacher and that is where he is today. We really enjoyed talking to Travis and I want to highlight a bit more of his art.

You can find Travis and his work at the following….. Tbraunstudio.com

The New Utah Podcast · 280 – The Braun Method

Episode 279 – Bonneville Salt Flats

It’s the last week of September and that means it’s time for Historically Significant Utah Week! Bre and Chris provide a review of Sicilia Mia, and at least according to Chris, it is well deserving of the City Weekly Best Of Awards that it has won. Between the atmosphere and food, it’s really worth the price of admission. Speaking of City Weekly Best Of, don’t forget to vote while you still can for the 2021 awards.

With Hawaii around the corner, its a relatively short show. Jeremy does let us know about Operation Here Kitty Kitty, and it sounds like it is a success thus far. Only time will tell if he can permanently scare off the rats, by feeding the neighborhood strays. Don’t worry, we make sure he plans to keep feeding them through winter.

But the main thing we talk about is the Bonneville Salt Flats. Formed out of the remnants of Lake Bonneville, a lake pretty young in terms of the Earth, the salt flats, and the shoreline in general offer a wealth of history and scientific testing abundance. The lake was at it’s peak maybe some 25,000 years ago is all, and really formed most of what we now think of as the Salt Lake Valley. Reaching as far north as Idaho, and south as Sevier county, it was a massive lake. The Great Salt Lake, Utah Lake and Sevier Lake are what are left of the old lake.

It left us with a pretty massive gem of a landscape though. Due to the way the ancient lake receded, mostly by evaporation, we have been left in some areas with massive beds of really flat salt. These are known as the salt flats, for obvious reason. Here we have a crust from inches to many many feet deep of just plain old salt. It’s crystalized and hard, and the winter snow keeps it smooth.

Many folks explored the area, and the poor Donor party fell victim to the hospitability of the flats, eventually arriving so late to the Sierra Nevada range, that they ate each other. It didn’t take long though for people to figure out, that the flatness and length of these areas, lent their hand to going really fast. So in 1914 the first land speed record was broken roughly where the Bonneville Speedway now resides. A quick look around online and you can see just how many records were broken at the salt flats.

Of course there is more. Many films have been shot at the Bonneville Salt Flats. Independence Day, Con Air, and the Amazing Race are all things that have scenes from the flats. Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End and Star Wars VIII: The Last Jedi are two of the most famous. Whether your in Davey Jones locker or on a foreign planet trying to stop the First Order from killing the rebels, the salt flats are amazing.

You can visit them any time. Our recommendation is to drive to the rest stop on I80, just east of Wendover. You can walk out on the salt, and the rest stop even has a place to wash your shoes off after. Please don’t drive on them, they are very fragile in most places, and your vehicle will do long term permanent damage to them. They are managed by the Bureau of Land Management, and you can find lots of information on them here.

The New Utah Podcast · 279 – Bonneville Salt Flats

The New Utah Podcast

The Utah you really want to know about.

Author: Chris Burch