As a private chef & health coach I do a lot of juggling. I cook for Paleos, meat and potato folks and those looking for healthier alternatives. I cook celebratory feasts for special occasions, and I cook healthy dinners for gatherings of family and friends. Sometimes my clients are looking to loose weight and sometimes they need to put weight on. Sometimes I cook vegan, even if my clients don’t know it!  And I always get my clients to eat their veggies…one client said she doesn’t know how I make vegetables taste so good; another commented that I’m a magician because I can get him to eat food he normally dislikes.

My own eating philosophy lies somewhere in the middle of all of this, except for one pillar on which I always stand:

Start with the best ingredients possible…

This blog is me in real life and I post recipes and photos of the food I make for myself, my family, and my clients. 

I’ll share… what I’m cooking (and think you should be too), fun workouts I’ve tried (and lived to tell about), interesting health nuggets, discoveries & strategies, my travels to exotic places (and obviously that means everything I eat while I’m there), farmers market finds – like what to do with that weird tangled mess of a root vegetable, and anything else I think will float your boat, as my Aunt Marijane likes to say.

And speaking of traveling, this blog started out as my experiences living in the Philippines and eating my way through Southeast Asia. So enjoy those posts as well!

This blog comes with a set of cooking ground rules to help you get the most out of the recipes I post and to help YOU be the chef of your own kitchen.

Blog Rules

Exact Measurements:

In baking, you need to be precise. For those recipes I’ll give you exact measurements that I strongly encourage you follow. When cooking, throw your measuring cups out the window and let your palate be your guide. I’ll give you some measurements as a baseline, but I strongly encourage YOU to be the chef of your own kitchen.

Pantry Items:

Most days I start off my cooking with an outline of what I’m going to make, but my real inspiration comes as I begin to cook and the dishes start coming together. As I start tasting I add ingredients from my well-stocked pantry. The more you start cooking with intuition, you’ll notice flavors that you gravitate towards or pantry items you’re always grabbing for (if only they were in reach). I’ll help you learn to build a well-stocked pantry of your own, and as I post recipes I will denote ingredients that are part of my own “pantry items”.

Photography, Garnishes & Flourishes:

I love instagram for the captivating pictures people post. My fellow instagrammers set the bar pretty high, and I am always excited when I snap a picture I deem instagram worthy. I firmly believe that we eat with our eyes first (my many years in catering further cemented this principle into my mind) and as I compose a dish, I consider its visual appeal as an equal to its taste. But let’s be real here. I’m busy cooking away, and as much as I would love to fuss over elaborate garnishes, backdrops and lighting, I ain’t got time for that… I leave jaw-dropping food photos to the many talented chefs and bloggers I follow, and present you with real food that is accessible for the home cook.

Dietary Restrictions:

As much as I’ve wanted to believe I was Wonder Woman, I’ve come to learn that some foods just don’t work for me. I sympathize with those who have allergies, aversions, or diets you adhere to. It’s a rough world out there for a GF, V, animal-loving meat-eating Paleo-but-sometimes-eats-dairy. If a recipe falls into a specific dietary category, I’ll denote it as such.

Health-o-Meter:

As a (mostly) healthy chef, the nature of my work means that my cooking spans the realm of the super-healthy to the purely decadent. And I’ll share it all! But as a health coach I also want you to know what you’re getting yourself in for. I’ll rate recipes with a health-o-meter scale – a zero meaning you should make and eat it sparingly, and a 10 meaning eat all you want.