We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Gary “Coco” Lira a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Gary “Coco” thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Can you take us back in time to the first dollar you earned as a creative – how did it happen? What’s the story?

100%of my first months royalties from my cookbook goes to charity. I throughly enjoyed the process of writing my cookbook Now it feels great to not only share my creative work, but to also give away the profits from my endeavor.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

My cookbook “Coco Cooks” is a direct reflection of who I am. Being a Gay, Senior Citizen with a multicultural background directly influences everything in my book.
I’m an indigenous Californian. My roots are here. This really is a food memoir of my cooking and eating experiences in the diverse landscape that is Southern California. New ideas don’t stop at a certain age. We must embrace all cultures and we all have something to to share and learn at every age.

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

I most certainly had to pivot in my career many times. This cookbook came about from just that. I had worked at Barneys New York for 20 years. They closed their doors in February of 2020. One week later was the Covid lockdown. I had to figure out something to do with my time. I had always cooked , so I thought it was time to gather all my recipes and put them in one place. I wasn’t thinking about a cookbook. It evolved into that. If it weren’t for the job loss and the lockdown, I may never had started my cookbook journey.

For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?

For me the most rewarding aspect of being a creative is the unexpected journey. I had no idea where my gathering up my recipes from years of cooking was going to take me. When I started to organize and write them down, I then realized I had stories to go with each one. Now that it’s out I’ve had people sharing their stories of cooking my recipes. I was surprised when people told me about their experiences. I never thought people would be cooking with my collection of recipes. We creative’s never know where the road will take us.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: Gary Lira, wehococo.
• Facebook: wehococo Gary Lira
• Linkedin: Gary Lira
• Tiktok: garylira3

Image Credits
Gary Lira