E205 Shelley Stuart

From this week's guest is Shelly Stewart, who joins us from the Woodlands, Texas. Shelly is the creator and driving force of Simply Shelly and Cocktails. Shelly's motivation behind starting this brand was that she was not a fan of sweets and sugary cocktails, so Shelly wanted to bring a healthier and easy way to make cocktails and mocktails to others. Plus, this is a fun way for Shelly to show her creative side.

We talked with Shelly about some of the influences that inspire her creations, her love and use of fresh fruit and seasonality in her cocktails, some of her favorite spirits that she likes to use, and the fact that Shelly makes these cocktails adds it's something she loves to do as a creative outlet. You can find Shelly online on Instagram at Simply Shelly and Cocktails2 or check the show notes for the link. Enjoy the show. We are back with another episode of the industry podcast.

My name is Kip. This is Dan. What's going on? Not too much.

Just the usual Monday recording time. So yeah, it's starting to work week off and because we saw something complain about. So yeah, how do things go with you? Great.

Feel like it's been a while since we've done this. Oh yeah, it's been a couple weeks. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I recorded a couple of episodes in advance and that's in time off and then I give my annual summer time visit to the hospital.

Oh, that's right. Yeah, Dan came down with what the raging case of vertigo. Yeah, that was fun. That's fun.

That's like falling to the wall and the step you take. Yeah, I'm vomiting. Yeah, vomiting everywhere you go. That's great.

That was an interesting episode at the hospital. I got to see how nonchalant with the doctors to live in use. Other patients when they have a tumor in their brain. It was just like, what's going on?

You got this going on and I'm like, that's the line to get the news here. What's going on? Luckily, there were no tumors. I didn't find a lot upstairs there in my brain.

I'm not a vacant space, but all good, thankfully. Yeah, you texted me from the hospital and you were like, I'm just going into the phyllis CT scan so they can determine if there's nothing wrong with my brain. I'm like, just tell them to call me. I can fill them in right now.

There's definitely something wrong. Yeah. Yeah. But I'm glad you're okay and you're back to normal for the most part.

Yeah, I was there. All right. Good to hear. Yeah.

So that was a little bit of interest. So that's why we've had a couple weeks off, but we are back in full force. Shelly Stewart's going to be joining us in just a minute. Before we get to her, we should mention that if you're in the Kitchener Waterloo area here in lovely Ontario, you should come check out my bars.

There's Sugar Run downtown Kitchener at Sugar Run Bar on Instagram to find out what's going on there or Babylon Sisters up down Waterloo. That's at Babylon Sisters Bar. Come check that place out. Check both of those Instagram sites and you will find out exactly what's going on.

Lots of different shit all the time. And if you like what we're doing here on the show, then subscribe. Follow, rate, review, tell a friend. Yeah.

Yeah. That's the easiest one to just tell someone else where to get one of the listener on the show. Yeah. But if you want to leave a review, that's even better.

Yeah. Even if it's a shitty one. Yeah. All right.

I got to know that was a life. Yeah. That doesn't apply to my bars, by the way. Enough with the fucking shitty reviews for just like when you could just complain in person.

Yeah, that's true. What else? We talk about our friend Zac Hanna. Yeah, the podcast artwork.

Yeah. I've been to Dallas. Dallas is pretty fun. I actually am from Highland Park.

Oh, okay. So that's really close to Dallas. What is that? A suburb of Dallas or?

Yeah, it's called the bubble. Okay. And then like Arlington is sort of a suburb of Dallas too, right? Not really.

No, it's separate. Okay. Yeah. It's kind of like Arlington is where the Texas Rangers are.

It's outside of Dallas actually. Right. And is that where the Cowboys play too? Yes.

Yes. And but then the Mavericks play in Dallas proper. Yes. I fucking nailed that job.

Right. Good for you. I'm so impressed with my sports knowledge. You should be.

Yeah. That's awesome. Yeah. I got the Canadian down purpose.

Right. Yeah. No. Okay.

So well, let's talk first about the woodlands. Like, well, how would you describe the area that you live in there? It's very wood. It's like, it's very tree-y and it's kind of a, it's very secluded.

Like it's, it's not, it's just, it's nice. I don't know how to describe it, but it's not, it's not Houston. So not everybody's fat. Yeah.

It's, I mean, it's actually a really nice area where, I mean, it's like, it's like, it's like, I mean, you still have to drive everywhere you go and, but I mean, they're a nice restaurant. So it's, you know, I mean, you can walk and it's, it's nice, but I mean, Texas is still hot as hell. Yeah. And in August, it's like living in hell and then a volcano comes in and it erupts and it, like the lava comes in, it burns you.

And then you get to go outside. Yeah. Texas is in August. Yeah.

So that's what we're living in right now. So I mean, like, it's so uncomfortable to go out right now. Right. So you just stay in the air conditioning and drink my groceries.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, it's pretty solid there though.

I mean, you know, to be honest with you, I don't go out and get drinks at bars. Okay. Like, I mean, I'll go get a margarita somewhere sometimes and we'll have beer because beer is beer. Sure.

But I started making my cocktails because I don't go out and have drinks in bars because I like them. I like them. Okay. So let's talk about that.

Do you didn't, did you have any service industry experience before you started making these at home cocktails? Absolutely not. Okay. So how did you, how or why did you think you could do it?

I know I can do it because I make, I don't like sweet drinks. So everywhere you go, it's like just shit all over again and again and again. Like here, have this drink. Oh yeah, sweet.

Oh yeah. Have this drink is sweet. So I created my drinks because I don't like sweet drinks. I don't like, I don't like sugar.

I don't like sweet drinks. Never had my whole life. And so I created them because I don't like sweet. So when I go out, I mean, I'll get a beer or, you know, like, I'll get, you know, like the local beers, like there's car box.

It's only once I know that I actually make beers around here. But yeah, I mean, I'll get, I'll just get beer when I go out because I don't like drinks. I don't like cocktails. They're actually made in a restaurant.

Right. So I'm actually making these drinks at your home for yourself because just you wanted to drink them and you wanted to drink something that wasn't so sweet. Correct? Yeah.

Okay. So at some point, somebody must have, any must have started making them for friends or I don't know if you're married or for your husband or wife or whatever. But if you, okay, so did you, did you make a husband and so did you, were you making drinks for him or you? No, not at all.

Just for yourself. Yeah. Yeah. He loves sweets.

Like I came from a mom that like fuck these sugar drinks. Yeah. If I'm mom, if I'm mom can eat a chocolate cake by herself, she would. If my husband could eat a chocolate cake by himself, he would.

I don't like it. I don't like sweets. Sounds like a good candidate for Houston. Right.

Exactly. But see, he's from Highland Park. So here's from that, like my mom is a, my mom's that southern woman that's like, I just like sweets. I like everything sweet.

I was lucky enough to not be that person. So when I created my drinks, it was because I don't like sweets. So I found a way to make my drinks not so sweet and it came from like natural like fruits and juices and things like that. So I didn't, I'd like none of my drinks have sugar on them.

So do you have like a, like we always a good cook or a baker? Like how do you know how to put the flavor profiles together properly? I'm creative. Just experiment.

I'm going to go out the aragnet right now. No, that's not what I do. Yeah. Well, you must be because with no like bartending experience or anything and just knowing how to do this on your own, generally people either come from the culinary side or from the bartending side, but you just kind of picked it up.

So obviously you're creative. And, and okay. So once you're obviously making drinks for yourself that you're enjoying, at what point do you discover that this is maybe something you can turn into a bit of a career? I never thought about doing it as a career, to be honest with you.

So it's like a side project for you. It was. Okay. So I kind of like I come from like a sweet background of my mom, whatever.

Okay. So I'm going to count. Okay. So I wanted to do something to show my creative side.

So I'm not much creativity in accounting. I'm trying to go away with something. But you can. Yeah.

Well, we'll talk about it. I want to delete that. It's a spot. Whatever.

But so I wanted to find something to do just for fun. So I created a YouTube account and I started Instagram probably about four years ago. And I just started doing it for the hell of it because I'm like, look, I can do this. It's fun.

I can show my creative side. And like all of a sudden my YouTube blew the hell up. And then Instagram blew the hell up. And then why do you think that was like, do you have it?

Do you know why? Like, because there's lots of people putting cocktails on YouTube and Instagram. Why do you think you're specifically blew up? I don't know.

I don't know why. The pictures are beautiful. Like I've seen your page like it looks great. So that's obviously a good part of it, right?

But you can't taste the drinks on your fucking Instagram page. So you have to understand I had to start over from three years ago. This Instagram page is my second page because Instagram screwed me over. How?

They shut me the fuck down two years ago because I unfollowed people and they're like, oh, like you got to stop. They didn't like what I did. Apparently they shut me down. I tried getting in touch with them.

I did everything I could. I had 2,500 followers just for fun and they shut me down. I had to start over because you were unfollowing other people. Yes.

Oh, that's good. I never even heard of them. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. And this Instagram, this simply showing cocktails too is my second page. I had to start over. So this is me starting all over again.

So you started doing it. It's been a pain in the ass. Yeah. Well, you obviously like it though.

You wouldn't start but it's starting over, right? Yeah. I actually do have kind of like a mixed bag of do I still want to do this? Right.

Do I not? Yeah. Because you know what? I have a creativity and you know what?

I'm pretty fucking good at it. Yeah, but you also have a job. Yeah. Yeah.

You know, you don't need to do it. Yeah. I don't need someone's approval. No, I'm just saying.

Like people drink my shit. They love it. They love it. I mean, people see myself and they love it.

I don't have to do it. I don't have to do this. So. But I do because I enjoy it.

So you post the recipes on your pages, right? So people can make them for themselves at home. And then you're starting noticing you were getting like really positive feedback because at first you're only feedback with yourself. But everybody has different palates, right?

So like what happens if you could have discovered hypothetically that your palate was just weird and everybody hated your cocktails, but that's obviously not what happened. So like when did you start getting the positive feedback and be like, okay, I'm on to something here. Oh, that came on my first page. Oh, okay.

People love the fact that I make healthy cocktails. I know it sounds stupid and redundant that it's healthy cocktails because it's still alcohol in it. But I do, but I do a lot of natural fruits like berries, raspberry, you know, I do juices. There's nothing in my joints that use simple syrup.

If it is, it's like monk fruit or it's a natural. It's not sugar. It's nothing like that. I'm 52, by the way.

I do my shit. Like I enjoy myself and I have a good time doing it. And if you don't like it, don't drink it. I've actually had people like, that sounds weird.

Like, did you try it? No, try it before you judge me. I'm just saying. But it's an interesting thing that you've chosen to do because you can't get like the direct feedback of like, say you were working in a bar, right?

And you just, you make a cocktail for someone handed to them and you get immediate feedback. You're like, you're creating something cool. And then you're posting it on YouTube or Instagram and then you're sort of waiting for people to comment on it. So it's not just.

Not really. Well, I mean, I don't mean like that's what you're doing it for. I just mean like to get any feedback at all. That's the only kind of feedback you can get.

I do it. Actually, I do it for fun. Honestly, I don't give a shit of people. Yeah.

I mean, I do it because I enjoy it and I want to show people kind of like my creative and I'm doing it more for me, more for like to do my creative side. Right. Because it's like, yeah, I can do taxes and I can fuck you over with the IRS all I want to and I can have you audited. But look at what I can do over here.

Here's my creative side. I refuse to do videos. Like, you know, they want people to do videos. Like I don't want to see someone doing this.

Yeah, it's very it's very much about the videos. People want to see videos on the reels. I never my own businesses. If I don't post like reels or like or video footage all the time, we get like almost no traction.

So it's amazing to be getting the traction that you're getting without doing that. Yeah. I know. And I'm like, I'm not a follower and I'm not this person.

Like I'm going to do my shit the way I want to do my shit. You don't like it. I'm sorry. I'm off.

Like that's how I feel. You know, I mean, like I think I think I think myself is pretty good. And if you like it, great. If you don't, I don't care because I'm doing it more for me to kind of do my kind of like, okay, like I did this, like I did this.

I love it. I love this drink. This is how I feel. And that's that's what I'm going to do because that's who I am.

And I may never get more followers and I'll give a shit. Right. And you do all the photography yourself, obviously. I do.

Absolutely. Yep. And it looks good. This being like way to express your creativity.

I'd some has it ever become like I know you're doing it for fun and you don't care. It probably at some point, if it was stopping fun, you just stop doing it, right? But like, do you ever feel pressure to add more content? Like you're, that's a lot of cocktails.

No, no, just do it whenever you want to. Yeah. Yeah. And what was your creative outlet before you started doing this?

Because you don't strike me as the person type of person who didn't have one. I just work out a lot. That's all I did. I work out.

I have a kid. I have a grandson and I mean, like before that, like that's all I did. This came later. This was just, this was later when I'm like, what do I want to do that where I can express it?

I want to have parties. Like I have, I love having parties and I love creating things and everything I do is like I have, I have these little like things where I say, this is what this is. I mean, I just, I've always had that as an outlet because Instagram came from me way later in my life. I was like 46 maybe when discovered Instagram.

So I mean, it wasn't even about anybody else but me. So when you threw the parties, but you would make the cocktails for your friends who you had over there. Yeah. Absolutely.

And they were clearly into them. Like that was some direct feedback you got right away. Yeah. So you did have someone telling you, okay, shit, shall he make some amazing cocktails?

Yeah. Yeah. And food. Oh, yeah.

I'm a big, I'm German. I don't bake. Why is that a German thing? Yeah.

German baking is like very, very detailed. Yeah. Now I like to throw shit together and that's what I do. That's how I make my drinks is how my food.

All right. Cause baking is like science and cooking is more creative. Right? I don't know anything about you.

Those things, but I did hear that. Yeah. So I'm probably on the show is where I go. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Baking just can't store things together. I hope it turns out.

Yeah. Yeah. Baking is not my thing. No.

I don't like to measure. Yeah. But you can do that with cocktails. I'm glad about the heat earlier.

What are some of the favorite cocktails like to make that kind of help you cope with the heat? Lemon raspberry. I love a lemon raspberry cocktail. Strawberry peach.

Oh, yeah. Peaches like a strawberry peach and lemon vodka. Mix them together and add a little bit of lemon lime water. Perfect.

Yeah. I love. Sorry. Go ahead.

I didn't mean to do you get into like doing sangrias and punch bowls and that type of stuff as well. Or do you more focus on like individual cocktails? I don't like a sangria. I don't like the red wine, but I will like I do have a Christmas punch that will knock you on your ass.

I actually had people fall down from my Christmas punch. Yeah. It's awesome. Can you give us some what do you put in the Christmas punch?

This could come in handy actually. There's cranberry vodka, lemon vodka, ginger ale, and then lemon lime water. Yeah, it's a lot. You know what else in either recipe?

I'm like, I'm going to shut away. Yeah. Okay. Yeah.

Just give it to us for. Paying. Yeah. And okay.

So you're, I mean, I'm kind of impressed because like your page, you have like tons of cocktails. So obviously you're creative. You're pumping out these ideas all the time. Like, how do they come to you?

How do the ideas come to you? You know, I can actually, oh my God, it's so funny because they ever watch like the baking championships. I've seen like those baking competition shows. Yeah.

Okay. I can actually watch one of those and take a drink idea and make it from like a cake. Okay. Yeah.

That's cool. So you do get like you get influenced by stuff that you see or something. Yeah. Yeah.

I can also take like if I'm eating like, you know what? I think time, lemon, strawberry and rhubarb would be great in a cocktail. Like, just, I mean, I can think of shit just sitting here right now. Like I just thought of that one.

Going back to what Dan was saying earlier, do you find like, do you find for yourself when you're making cocktails just for yourself even like do the seasons affect like what you want to drink? Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah.

Absolutely. And it's just like the flavors of fall or like what's available to you at that time. What's like for Texas? Cause like you're mentioning earlier, it's so fucking hot there all the time.

And especially in August, like does that affect the kind of fresh ingredients you can get? No. I mean, you got peach, strawberry, raspberry, blackberry, lemon, like no, it doesn't affect it. It's just hot as fuck and you don't want to go outside.

And you want to be probably want something for refreshing most of the time, right? As opposed to, yeah. Yeah. I definitely do like a blackberry, raspberry or strawberry do like a lemonade.

Definitely lemonades are kind of what I love this time of year. Yeah. Cause it's kind of refreshing and like, oh, yeah, it's good. Yeah.

But then come October, November. I mean, we're talking maple syrup. And like a pumpkin spice ish. Yeah.

I love our sireen. See, I know, but I'm like, spice gets a bad rap. Pumpkin spice is delicious. Let's just admit it.

It is, but it's a lot. Sometimes I mean, like it gets overdone, but like I want to do like maple and like bourbon and throw in some apple. Yeah. A little bit of rosemary.

What are your, what are your favorite spirits to work with? Vodka is my favorite because it's so easy. Right. It's so easy.

And then bourbon, but it's more kind of toward the winter, like the cooler because bourbon's so deep and it's, it's kind of that. So you want to be like red wine, like you want that October, November, December, January. So vodka gin, I mean, chins. Okay.

I feel like rum is, is heavy and sugary, but I use that to use rom. I'm not gonna lie. I do use rom a little. That's right.

The sweetest thing that you would ever use though, right? Do you have specific brands that you are more go to's for you than others? I do. I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna put them out there because I'm not going to give anybody praise because I don't get paid.

Right. So I'm not gonna give anyone praise. Can I, well, maybe I'll ask you this way then. Do you like to use smaller distilleries or do you prefer the bigger brands?

Like, is that something you can answer? I do have some smaller distilleries that do give me things as an influencer and I'm all about helping smaller people build up, but you kind of get to a point as a, as like somebody that doesn't like you create the recipes, you create shit for these people and you do these like pictures and they don't give you credit. Right. Then you're like, I'm done.

No, and that's what we're here. Yeah. Like what you're doing would be like re advertising for them if you chose to do so, right? And that's not really fair.

Like, no, because that is funny. We were mentioning before we started recording about one of the distilleries that sponsored our show for quite a few episodes and like I'm still happy to give a lot of distilling a shout out because the product is good and they supported us, but there has to be sort of that back and forth, right? It can't just be a one way street where you're, you're an influencer on social media platforms and you're just promoting a brand that's not returning the favor. Right.

Yeah. Because they give you a bottle and then they expect you to help them and I get that. I mean, thank you. I appreciate it and I will do that for you, but then you're making money and I'm not.

Right. Like, I don't think it's fair to certain people that we do shit for you and you don't help us. So what's your favorite spirit to drink if you're just hanging out at your house? Like I know you're drinking beer right now, but like if you were going to drink a spirit, would it be like a bourbon, a gin, vodka?

Vodka. Yeah. It's very simple and it goes with everything. But would you drink it on its own?

Vodka. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Okay. Well, tell us a little bit more about the, it's simply Shelley cocktails. Correct. I get that right.

I'm not. Simply Shelley and cocktail. Sorry I missed the end, but tell us a little bit about what about the page itself, the idea and like, do you have any plans to monetize it in the future or what, or you're just happy doing what you're doing? You know, like I said, I created it four years ago and it was simply Shelley and cocktails and it was just to be for fun because I wanted to just kind of show people like, look, you can have cocktails that are fun, but you don't have to have sugar all the time.

You don't have to have simple sugar. You don't have to have this and they just, it kind of came out of that and it blew up and then that's when Instagram shut me down and I had to start over. I don't think I have any plans to monetize it. I just, it's just to me, it's just for fun.

It's kind of my creative outlet to just kind of show people that you can have fun, simple, healthy cocktails at your disposal. Like for single moms that just want to go sit by the pool and have a drink here. Here's some lemon vodka and some lemon lime water. Boom.

There you have it. Like to me, it's all about hydration. Well, that's why like, and in your area of the world, it's pretty much got to be, right? But I do like that about your page is that it's just like, it's exactly what you say is simple, refreshing cocktails that anyone can make for themselves.

But you deliver the recipe essentially and you take beautiful pictures of the cocktails and that's great. So how often do you post a new cocktail? I do it kind of whenever I want to. Like you see it with every day.

And then it's kind of like, you know what? Yeah, it's like, fuck you kind of. Then it's work. Yeah, it does a lot of work.

I mean, you don't, I don't see the rewards that you get from it. Like, I don't think you like reap the benefits from like here, here, here, here. It's like people like, you know, whatever. So I mean, I do it whenever the fuck I want to.

I'm just saying. I just do whatever I want. But that is exactly how you should be doing it because it's just your creative outlet. It's not a job.

It's like, what you do for fun, right? So of course you should be doing whatever you want to do it. Yeah. Well, that's great.

I think it's really cool what you're doing. And I like the idea of it's just like the, like I said, are mentioned earlier the simplicity of it. Like anyone can easily recreate these recipes once you post them, they get to do a great job with the photography. And, and yeah, like it's just, and especially for your area of the world, just using like refreshing cocktails that are basically healthy.

It's a great resource for someone who just wants to, you know, maybe even throw a party at their house and make a bunch of cocktails for their friends. Right. Yeah. I mean, you can make them actually into like a leader or a pitcher.

Yeah, it's just put vodka, put some fruit and then you just put some water in there. Perfect. Yeah. Let alone.

Let alone. There's no one more time where they can find you online. Simply shelly and cocktails too. Too.

Like, is it the number two or spelled out too? It's too. Like, yeah. Number two, yeah.

Thanks, Instagram. I'll put a link to that in the show notes. Well, this was a fun conversation. You're a fun person.

Yeah, yeah. Awesome. That was good. That was fun.

And I really did think you're providing a good service for people. And the fact that you're just doing it for your creative outlet is great. Like you're not trying to make a buck off of it. Most people are.

Yeah, you're not, you're not, you're not a impressing buddy. Just looking to do for yourself. Yeah, I am. And I'm trying to help people and like try to show people that I mean you can, you can like for the moms out there that want to drink skinny margaritas, you have skinny drinks all the time.

See you again. Exactly. Well, thanks so much for giving us some of your time, Charlie. We appreciate it.

And stay cool down there. All right. Thank you so much. Thank you.

Bye. Bye.