To Grandmother’s TikTok We Go奶奶网红风靡社媒

Older influencers who share laundry hacks and old family recipes are helping Gen Z get through the holidays.

老年网红分享洗衣小窍门和祖传食谱，帮助Z世代欢度假期。

Nothing about Barbara Costello’s favorite Christmas recipe is all that fancy. The overnight breakfast casserole1 she makes every year doesn’t call for much more than eggs， milk， sausage， cheese， and bread thrown into a baking dish—a recipe she clipped from a local newspaper nearly 50 years ago. But in the years since Costello first cooked it， that humble casserole has become a hallmark2 of her growing family’s Christmas celebrations： When her four children were young， Costello waited until they’d fallen asleep on Christmas Eve to assemble the dish and place it in the fridge. She’d wake up Christmas morning and immediately preheat the oven to 350 degrees. By the time her children were ready to open their presents， the house would be filled with the scent of their hearty breakfast.

芭芭拉·科斯特洛最爱的圣诞食谱并不花哨。这道她每年必备的隔夜早餐砂锅菜，只需将鸡蛋、牛奶、香肠、奶酪和面包放进烤盘即可——近半个世纪前，她从当地报纸上剪裁了这份食谱。科斯特洛家人丁兴旺，自她初次尝试制作以来，这道原本不起眼的砂锅菜已成为了她家圣诞庆典的标志性菜谱：她的四个孩子小的时候，科斯特洛会等到他们在平安夜入睡后，才把这道菜拼装好放进冰箱。圣诞节清晨一醒来，她便会立刻将烤箱预热至350华氏度（约为175摄氏度）。等到孩子们准备拆礼物时，家中早已弥漫着丰盛早餐的香气。

Now her eight grandchildren have come to love the dish too—and so have many more people who’ve never sat under Costello’s tree or in her kitchen. A video of Costello making the casserole was one of the first she posted to her TikTok account in early 2020， after her daughter persuaded her to join the app. Costello， whose TikTok profile cheekily identifies her as “everyone’s grandmother，” guides her audience in the art of entertaining， as well as the less glamorous3 work of keeping house even when no one else will see it. And judging by some of the comments on her videos， she has come to play an inadvertently4 big role in some of her followers’ lives.

如今，她的八个孙子孙女也爱上了这道菜，不仅如此，还有许多未曾在科斯特洛家树下坐过或进过她家厨房中的人，也对它情有独钟。2020年初，在女儿的劝说下，科斯特洛终于在抖音海外版TikTok上注册了账户，并首先分享了自己制作砂锅菜的视频。在TikTok的个人资料中，她幽默地自称“大家的奶奶”。视频中她给观众指导，教人请客招待的艺术，以及如何对待完成家务这项默默无闻、不够光鲜的任务。而从她视频所收到的一些评论来看，科斯特洛已然在不经意间对有些粉丝的生活产生了深远的影响。

TikTok is best known as the chaotic domain of Gen Z， but Costello is part of a constellation of5， yes， #grandfluencers. Through profiles most typically run by their children or grandchildren， these TikTokers are tapping into some of the qualities that make grandmas so special. Some accounts， such as Nana’s Kitchen and Grandma’s Garden， focus primarily on showcasing recipes， while others share household hacks and dispense6 life advice. Like the platform as a whole， “Grandma TikTok” has gained significant traction since the start of the pandemic as an emotional balm7 to endless doomscrolling8. That makes a grim kind of sense： Many young users were isolated from their elder loved ones， and some lost them altogether.

人们都知道TikTok是Z世代热闹非凡的领地，但科斯特洛却成为了#奶奶网红群体中一颗耀眼的明星。这些TikTok账号多由子女或孙辈代为运营，他们深入挖掘并展现了奶奶辈独有的魅力。一些账号，例如“奶奶的厨房”和“奶奶的花园”，主要聚焦于食谱的展示，而另一些账号则热衷于分享家居小妙招和传授人生智慧。与TikTok平台的整体趋势相一致，“奶奶类TikTok”自疫情以来爆火，作为一剂情感良药，缓解了人们因不断阴暗刷屏而产生的情绪困扰。这可以理解，但有点残酷：许多年轻用户因疫情与年迈的亲人分隔两地，有些甚至与至亲天人永隔。

For all of the familiar parasocial9 dynamics of the influencer era， the grandfluencers are rare in their cultivation of intergenerational relationships： Especially on TikTok， young people are mostly talking to other young people. Commenting “mom” or “dad” on celebrities’ posts is part of Millennial and Gen-Z internet speak， but it rarely conveys the feeling of an earnest familial tie. The viewer responses on Grandma TikTok are different. Take Nana’s Kitchen， an account that primarily features closely cropped shots of the 86-year-old Iraqi Turkish woman’s hands as she prepares a meal—sort of like an artisanal10 Tasty video. The comments on Nana’s posts， such as this dedication to her “supportive army of grandchildren learning how to cook together，” are filled with something that is decidedly different from the meme-speak that dominates many other corners of the internet：

尽管网红时代的粉丝与偶像间的社交互动屡见不鲜，奶奶网红们在培养跨代关系方面却显得尤为珍稀：特别是在TikTok上，年轻人大多只与同龄人交流。在名人帖子下留言“妈妈”或“爸爸”属于千禧一代和Z世代的网络用语，但基本传达不了什么亲情。而在“奶奶类TikTok”上，观众们的回应则截然不同。以“奶奶的厨房”为例，这个账号主要发布86岁伊拉克裔土耳其老奶奶做饭时手部动作的特写镜头——有点像那种传统手工美食视频。老奶奶帖子下的评论，如这条对她“众多一起学做饭的孙辈支持者”的致敬之词，洋溢着与网络其他许多地方盛行的模因腔调完全不同的某种情感：

Can I become one of your grandchildren， I don’t have grandparents

我能有幸认您作奶奶吗？因为我没有爷爷奶奶的陪伴。

ALL HAIL GRANDMA

向奶奶致敬！

my grandma passed away 20 years ago， she taught me a lot. this account brings me such comfort thats she’s still looking out for me

我的奶奶已离世20年，她曾给予我无尽的教诲。而这个账号，让我仿佛感受到她仍在默默守护着我，给予我莫大的慰藉。

Nana’s Kitchen was the idea of Dina Ibrahim， one of Nana’s eight grandchildren， who lives in Calgary， in Canada’s Alberta province. Like several of the young people running their family matriarch’s account， Ibrahim initially began recording videos of her grandmother as something of a family cookbook before sharing them on TikTok late last year. Through Nana’s Kitchen， Ibrahim shares footage of her grandmother preparing Middle Eastern dishes beyond the select few that are likely familiar to most North American viewers， such as chupa， a traditional meal made from sheep innards， and kalaneh， a labor-intensive bread that can be stuffed with scallions and other fillings. During Ramadan， followers even get treated to footage from the family’s iftars11.