Darius Williams Has Got Something Cooking on Threads

Darius Williams knows how to throw down in the kitchen. Following him on social media feels like Thanksgiving every day—he’s constantly serving up new recipes, reviewing hot spots, or blessing us with pure, mouth-watering goodness.

Food is easily one of the best things about social media, and Darius has perfected the art with high-quality photos, engaging videos, and recipes that hit every time. And that may be because of how long he’s actually been online. Creating blogs and posts even as far back as the mid-00s, Darius has successfully found his way to navigate through social media by living through it in all iterations and forms. He’s perfected what it is to post and promote on social media.

But on Threads under his @dariuscooks username, you’re not just getting culinary gold and expert social media navigating—you’re getting the unfiltered Darius Williams, too.

Born and raised in Chicago, with stints in New York and Atlanta, Darius brings a mix of flavors and opinions shaped by three iconic regions of the U.S.—and he’s never shy about sharing them. That’s what he brings to the food community on Threads: realness. Oh, and dishes, too.

Darius is a major force on Threads because of his ability to connect with people. He’s always jumping into discussions and making space for diverse voices in the kitchen. His posts spark dialogue that goes beyond the plate, touching on the cultural roots of dishes and the shared experiences that make food so special (and to be honest, chopped boiled eggs definitely don’t belong on cornbread dressing). Darius’ whole vibe on Threads is like sitting at a family dinner—there’s always something to learn, plenty of laughs, and an open invitation to join in.

With millions of followers online, a full-fledged business, and a number of cookbooks under his belt, we managed to sit down with Darius to talk about the food community on Threads and why he feels most comfortable, while also sharing some gems and what he’s got cooking up next.

(This interview has been condensed for clarity.)

Alright, Darius, what got you started on your content journey?

I'm an OG in the Game, man. I've been out since 2005, 2006, man. I started posting recipes and food back on Blogger and Blogspot way back in the day. You probably were still in grammar school?

[laughs] Well, yes I was.

There you go. So anyway, I was just doing it and then I was creating recipes and building a repertoire while I was still working. I had no idea that entrepreneurship could even be for me. And then in 2015, things just aligned. I had an idea, I made an announcement, people bought tickets. I made more money than I had ever made in five minutes. And then the next thing you know I was like, Okay, well I'm quitting this job. And that was in 2015 and we're now about to go into 2025.

That’s so inspiring, man. So when Threads came along, what were your first impressions of the platform? Were you one of the first day signups?

I don’t know if I was a day-one signup. I may have reserved and peeked it out. That first week, it was hot—people were talking about it. As an influencer or content creator, you want to be aware of anything new on the cusp and see where you fit in. So, I dibbled and dabbled, but it really wasn’t until a couple of months after Threads went live that I said, Okay, let me put together a strategy to use this in my everyday work.

Absolutely. What were your first impressions and the platform when you did log on?

Basic. It can be good because it limits all the extra stuff, so you have to focus on the characters and communication—text, photos, whatever it is. That was my initial impression, Oh, this is kind of basic. But I like basic because everything else is so involved.

You cook and you review food, which I think is important. Which one of these do you enjoy the most and how has this kind of influenced your content overall?

I like them equally, but not at the same time. When you're tired of cooking for a little bit, I can review restaurants. When I’m tired of restaurants, or working on weight loss, I can go back to cooking in the kitchen. It’s like apples and oranges. My livestreams on social media are full-on productions—by the time I’ve had a couple of cocktails, it’s 45 minutes in, and it's full on production. That’s a very different approach from restaurant reviews which are more documentary style. So I like them both. I just operate from the area of community. So these are my community. This is the way the community gets a hold of me. If this content, after I have repurposed, retooled doesn't perform better, then maybe it's just a bad piece of content and I'll move on to the next thing.

Okay. So, does this freedom to switch between formats mean you’re not boxed in by your content?

I wouldn't say that. It gives me a sense of freedom because it's not limiting. For me, it’s about what I want to say and get across. If that is a lemon pepper, honey fried chicken recipe, then that's what it's going to be. So I might do that as a livestream. I might do that and turn that into a Reel that I can post on Threads.

Speaking of posting on Threads, what would you say is the best part of the food community there?

The best part is probably there's still a sense of innocent communication. So there's still this sense of you guys, I'm just trying to learn who can help me, or I see that you had success in this particular area. What did you do to get success? There's still this sort of hunger and thirst. I like the fact that there's still a level of communication, and this doesn't exist on any platform. For example, Suzy The Foodie on Threads, she asked me the other day, Well, what kind of meat did you put in those greens? You can't do that and get that level of conversation pretty much on any other platform.

What's a food trend that you've seen emerge on Threads? Or one that just happened that you were on board with?

Reviews are pretty hot. I think it is nice to get it from different perspectives. But the part that is probably the worst for me is the pressure there is for everybody to perform at a high level. As creatives, it's not really about what level you perform, but it's about how well you communicate. So that's kind of hard to watch, but I try to be as encouraging as I can with some of those people.

You have so many recipes and so much content. How do you choose what to share on Threads?

It goes back to what I want to communicate. Right now, obviously we're in the spirit of holidays, so everything I'm sharing is around the holidays and just taking familiar ingredients and presenting them in brand new ways. Then most other people, when January rolls around, it's lighter content, salads, soups, stews, things that are not super heavy. Then when spring rolls around, you're using fresh vegetables a lot more. When summer is out, how do I stay cool? How do I eat light? Things like that. When you have a community like I do, you can pretty much, at any given point, dictate what you want to say, how you want to say it, what you want to focus on.

Well, what's one thing you want to see more?

A livestream function, and not an audio, but a video livestream function. For those of us who are heavy video content creators, that would be nice. Also if there was some sort of cool feature in some kind of way that links this or a person could save this to their bookmarks or something like that, that would just be an extra added nice to have inside of the app.

Final question, and this will be a fun one: If you were hosting a dinner party with your Threads community, what would be on the menu?

It has to be a salad. I make a salad with this white balsamic vinegarette, and the only reason I know this is because I've done dinner parties throughout the country for eight years. And so part of the people who are in my Threads community, I know what they're going to say. They want that salad. They want their mac and cheese. They want those collard greens with that butter pecan pound cake cornbread, right? They want that watermelon, chow chow. And I'm sure if there was a braided short rib with a tomato crunch feel on top of that, they would take that as well.

I love that.

I know what they want, man. I can already tell.