Pickles & Pasta with Steph and Jay
Welcome to Pickles & Pasta—a podcast about living creatively, loving boldly, and staying grounded in a world that often feels anything but.
Steph and Jay met(or as Jay says “reconnected”)just before the pandemic and have been building a life—and a creative partnership—ever since. Together, they live, work, and support each other’s ventures while navigating the messy, beautiful chaos of modern life.
No agendas. No sides. Just real conversations—sometimes deep, sometimes hilarious, always honest.
This is their space to talk about creativity, connection, relationships, and everything in between.
Pull up a chair. Let’s dig in.
About Steph
Stephanie Rado Taormina is the CEO and founder of Have Some Fun Today, a lifestyle brand inspired by her late father's mantra to live boldly and joyfully. With over 25 years of experience in branding, fashion, interiors, and entrepreneurship, she brings a sharp creative vision to everything she touches.
A graduate of Parsons School of Design, Stephanie has reignited her fine art career since 2021—creating emotionally driven abstract work and building a growing marketplace for contemporary art. While integrating her artistic voice into the evolution of HSFT, she also maintains an independent studio practice focused on exhibitions, fine art prints, and creative collaborations.
As co-host of the podcast Pickles & Pasta with Steph & Jay, she brings thoughtful, unscripted insight to conversations about creativity, culture, and navigating modern life.
About Jay
Jay Schweid is a native New Yorker, creative entrepreneur, and cultural shapeshifter with a career that’s anything but conventional. From launching JCS, a bespoke racket service trusted by tennis icons like McEnroe and Agassi, to co-founding The Spot—a legendary South Beach lounge with Mickey Rourke—Jay has always lived at the intersection of bold ideas and real-world impact.
He went on to create high-touch concierge and event services for celebrity and HNWI clients, and in 2012, launched ephelants, a media company focused on streamlining film and commercial production. Built to challenge industry inefficiencies, ephelants fuses creativity with technology to empower storytellers at every level.
Now, Jay is building Village—a visionary entertainment platform that will revolutionize how projects move from concept to distribution. By bringing together creators, fans, and investors,Village is designed to democratize the entire entertainment ecosystem and give everyone a seat at the table.
On Pickles & Pasta, Jay brings sharp insight, unapologetic creativity, and a relentless curiosity for what’s next.
Pickles & Pasta with Steph and Jay
Pickles & Pasta EP18 - Friendship, Change, and Coming Home to You
Episode 18 - Friendship, Change, and Coming Home to You
In this episode of Pickles and Pasta with Steph and Jay, the duo opens up about what it means to shrink yourself to fit in across friendships, small towns, social media, and work. Steph shares how moving from New York’s fashion world to a quiet Pennsylvania suburb caused her to dial back parts of who she was without even noticing, and how divorce, grief, and building Have Some Fun Today shifted her relationships over time.
Together, they look at how different seasons of life change your circle, why some friendships naturally fade, and why others are worth holding on to. They dig into self-awareness, reconnecting with your creative self, and choosing relationships that support who you are now.
Topics Covered:
- Shrinking to fit in and the subtle ways we make ourselves smaller
- Social media self-editing and the pressure to be “just right”
- Friendship seasons and why some relationships fade or deepen
- Life transitions like divorce, loss, and reinvention that reshape our circles
- Returning to yourself through awareness, inner work, and creativity
- Choosing better rooms and people who match your full energy
- Rapid-fire fun on favorite times of day, dream business skills, and movie characters they’d befriend
A reflective, candid, and ultimately hopeful conversation about outgrowing old versions of yourself — and finding the people who love you as you really are.