“To eat real food you have to make it yourself,” Agatha Achindu, Chief Yummy Officer

March 22, 2012
DUNIA Mag
Posted in Black Stories Journeys

What's your story?

Name: Agatha Achindu
Country of origin: Cameroon
Founder: Yummy Spoonfuls

Tell us about leaving your home country and settling in the U.S.

I was super excited at all the wonderful opportunities – college, catching up with old friends who had moved and making new friends. America was the promised land and I couldn’t wait to get here. Till this day some 22 something years later I still tell my friends that my only disappointment when I got here was there were no real foods easily accessible. For some reason I just thought since America is the greatest place in the world they would also have the best food and boy was I disappointed. I figured to eat real food you have to make it yourself and that is what I did and still do.

How did Yummy Spoonfuls come about?

Yummy Spoonfuls is a natural extension of who I am. As a child I grew up on fresh organic foods harvested from our own gardens or purchased raw and fresh from the local markets. Meals at home were always prepared with the freshest ingredients; fruits, vegetables, meat, poultry, fish, etc. Our use of the refrigerator was mainly limited to the conservation of beverages and the occasional leftover. Eating fresh wholesome food was a way of life for me as a child.

When I got married and gave birth to my son, I knew he would only eat fresh and nutritious food just like us when we were kids. However after months of searching and evaluating current baby food choices, I found only baby foods loaded with fillers, additives, hormones, sugar and salt. These are all the things that babies should not have. I decided there was no other alternative than to make my son’s baby food daily in my very own kitchen using fresh, organic and trusted ingredients.

It was almost immediately after I began creating Jared-Zane’s homemade nutritious foods that our friends started to take notice. I started getting requests for organic carrots, broccoli, and peas, then eventually friends were asking for anything I was willing to make. In a couple of months I was inundated with requests from friends; their babies loved the food and the moms were thrilled with the fact that the foods were fresh, organic and delicious, and it was very easy to feed their babies/toddlers.

What are some challenges you have faced, how did you overcome them and what are important lessons learned?

I think my biggest challenge is the many roles I have to juggle. For there are days that I don’t have time to separate the role of Chief Yummy Officer (CYO), wife, mother, friend and sister, especially when I get pulled in all directions at the same time, talk about constantly being and feeling guilty. I have since learnt to be the best I can be by scheduling everything including date nights on my calendar. I know that I can’t be everything to everybody so prioritization is a key factor – I make time for work and time for family.

What are some aspects of your culture that you feel are most misunderstood or unknown by others?

The fact that the food we grew up eating is by far better than any processed food that you find out here, I tell friends all the time that I never had processed food as a child, and most importantly I knew where every morsel of food I eat came from, people are always amazed at the fact that the farm-to-table life style that Americans are working so hard to experience is what we do naturally at home. I feed my family the same way today because I know it is good for our health and the planet, we still don’t do processed food in my home today; I have a 7 year-old and like me he doesn’t eat box cereal.

What motivates and drives you?

My core belief in healthy eating. As someone who grew up on a strictly organic life style in a world where childhood diabetes and obesity is not common, I strongly believe that changing the way we feed our kids should be the very first step to healthy relationships later in life. Wholesome fresh foods will help to eliminate the known food-related illnesses that occur because of this dependency that our kids have on overly processed foods. Unfortunately, that is what they are introduced to from their very first spoonfuls and we are here to help to totally eliminate that.

I know that when we change the food we feed our children we will drastically change the results we get. As a mother with a child who has never had an ear infection and who so easily would eat a spear of raw okra, I know that children will love real wholesome food if introduced properly. Helping parents understand the importance of real food motivates me.

What are your greatest business accomplishments so far and why?

Being voted best organic baby food out of all leading brands by Cookie magazine, awarded the Ashley Koff seal of approval as most nutritious baby food, voted as the best on the go meal by Red Tricycle; we have won all types of awards but my biggest accomplishment is simply changing the myth about baby food. It feels so good when babies enjoy our meals and you have satisfied parents sending us letters and calling about just how tasty the foods are, “we never thought baby food could taste that good”. Featured on CNN, we have celebs like Jewel, Tia Morey use my products and talk about how it changed not only their lives, but also the way they look at food… there are many highlights. God has really been good to us, my soul forever glorifies His name.

Where do you see yourself and Yummy Spoonfuls in a few years?

As childhood-obesity and childhood-diabetes rates in the United States continue to surge out of control, my hope is that fresh organic food for babies like what we offer becomes the new standard, we have proven that commercial food for babies can actually be made fresh weekly. Yummy Spoonfuls will become a household name and easily available to all parents. To help parents take a closer look into the eating habits that they are teaching their children and make them understand the direct impact of the food they eat on the results they get. Have every parent to start believing in the adage ‘you are what you eat’.

It is unfortunate that for many children overly processed convenience and junk foods are a staple part of their diet. It seams that ‘real’ food is only for adults and that children have special diets consisting of some of the poorest-quality unhealthiest foods available. Looking at menus in most restaurants you will always find the mac & cheese, fries/chicken tenders, etc, while the adults feast on racks of lamb, etc. As parents we all want the very best for our kids. Maya Angelou nicely puts it, “we do better when we know better”.

Final words of advice?

If you are thinking of starting your own business, do the one thing that you are really passionate about. You should also be willing to do it for free since the first couple of years usually are a lot of work with very little pay. Start small but think big because your business will eventually get bigger and you need to be prepared for that growth. Define roles from the very onset, from simple things like dates with hubby, time with kids, work time, time with friends etc, this is imperative as it will help to alleviate any sense of guilt you might have trying to balance work with your own life. Your success depends on your ability to be able to balance your work with your personal/family life.

Assess your company’s core activity, and then look at whatever is taking time away from that core. These might simply be drains on your limited resources that are not bringing in revenue. Proceed to then eliminate such pain points.

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