The Liz Moody Podcast - Anna Jones — The Best Healthy Cooking Hacks, What Happens Behind The Scenes Of Writing A Cookbook, And A Simple Trick To Find Your Life’s Calling

Episode Date: May 15, 2019

Anna Jones (@we_are_food) is the award-winning author behind three mega-popular cookbooks, A Modern Way To Cook, A Modern Way To Eat, and The Modern Cook’s Year. The Guardian columnist came up in the industry as one of Jamie Oliver’s proteges, and now is a household name revered for her delicious, accessible (but never boring!) plant-based fare. On this episode of the Healthier Together podcast, Anna shares a ton of tips that got me excited about cooking vegetable-forward food again, including how she adds umami flavor to vegetables, her go-to breakfast, her weeknight dinner hacks, the ingredients she always has in her pantry, and more. She also shares what it’s like to actually write a cookbook and develop recipes, and the productivity method that helped her along the way. Finally, she lets us in our her unusual career path, that led her from a desk job to starring on a TV show with Jamie Oliver and ultimately penning her own books. This is a great episode to listen to if you want to get excited about cooking healthy food, or you want simple tips to take your cooking to the next level (and make it way easier and less time consuming in the process). It’s also a great one if you’re thinking about taking a new step in your life and career but feel a bit stuck as to what that might be. Enjoy! This episode is brought to you by ButcherBox, a brand new sponsor that I’m so excited to have on board. ButcherBox sends grass-fed and finished beef, pastured chicken and pork, and wild-caught Alaskan salmon directly to your door. I’m such a huge advocate for healthy eating being accessible to everyone, no matter where they live or what grocery stores they have access to, and I think ButcherBox, which ships nationwide, is a huge step in the right direction. If you want to try ButcherBox for yourself, go to ButcherBox.com/lizmoody. With this link, you’ll get $20 off your first order, PLUS 2 packs of bacon and 2 pounds of breakfast sausage. DM me on Insta if you need ideas for what to make! This episode is also brought to you by one of my favorite food brands, Love Beets. Love Beets, which is found in the produce section of most grocery stores, makes cooked beets with no preservatives, that taste really fresh, just like a beet you would actually make yourself. They have plain beets, but also a ton of different fun flavors, including Beet Salsa, Wine & Balsamic, Honey + Ginger, and Sweet Chili. You can find Love Beets in most retailers nationwide, including Whole Foods, Kroger, and Costco, and you can also buy their beet juices and beet powder online at lovebeets.com—use the code LIZ for 20% off. You can also follow @lovebeets on Insta for more recipe ideas—and as always, you can DM me if you need recommendations or ideas for what to do with them! PS: Healthier Together is officially a number one best-seller! You can get your copy right here or at lizmoody.com/cookbook. Please keep sending me your creations on Instagram—they make me so happy! Healthier Together cover art by Zack. Healthier Together music by Alex Ruimy. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hello friends and welcome back to the Healthy Together podcast. I'm your host, Liz Moody, and I'm a writer and cookbook author living in Brooklyn where I am finally, finally back after two weeks on the road. I think I recorded my last intro in my friend's closet in her house in Venice where I was staying with her. I was in Montana for a week. And then I went to L.A. for a week to do a bunch of press and promotion for healthier together and also to host my L.A. event where I got to meet so many of you guys, which was absolutely amazing. I did a panel with Sophie Jaffe and Courtney Swan. We talked about the things you're not supposed to be. to talk about. So things like money and sex and body image and just answering really specific, gritty questions about things that people are often really uncomfortable discussing. And we recorded

all of that for the podcast. So definitely look out for that in a future episode. I think you guys are going to love it. I have a ton of events coming up. I have a Nashville event. I have a Seattle event, a Portland event. So if you want to see me in the future, I'm hosting amazing panels with fabulous women at all of these events. So definitely check out Liz Moody.com. and click on the event tab to stay up to date, and you guys can come and hang out with me. I'll sign your book. We can drink a glass of wine. We can eat some snacks.

It'll be really, really fun. And I love getting to meet you guys in real life because you guys know that I am all about community, community, community. I know I'm like kind of boring about it now, but I think it's the most important thing in the world. And I think real relationships are the most important thing in the world. So speaking of that, healthier together is still doing really, really well. I'm so loving, seeing all of the recreations of the world.

recipes you guys are making. So if you are making recipes, please, please send them to me on Instagram, tag me in them so I can see them. Also, if you happen to be making your recipes with like a cute kid or a friend or a romantic partner, send picks of that. I love seeing like the real people cooking the recipes in addition to the food. I just think it brings the whole thing to life and I can picture you guys in your kitchen and having a great time. And I don't know. It just like warms my heart. And if you haven't left an Amazon review of the book yet and you are loving it, I would massively appreciate that. Like the podcast. those reviews, I don't quite understand it all, but it definitely helps with the algorithms and it

helps people find the stuff better. So if you like the podcast, leave a podcast review. If you like the book, leave an Amazon review or one on Barnes & Noble or wherever you bought it. And if you bought it at your local bookstore, good for you. Local bookstores are the backbone of America. And I really appreciate you supporting it. All right. Let's get into today's episode. I really like this one. So I feel like the vibe of this one is if you want to get excited about cooking healthy food again, this is the episode for you. I was honestly feeling a little underwhelmed by the idea of cooking healthy food when I recorded this one because I'd just been in nonstop cooking mode and promo mode and I'd just been so deep in the food world for quite a while

by the time that I sat down to actually record this in my kitchen. But my guest, who is Anna Jones, if you're one, you're like, who is this person? she's talking about is Anna Jones. She is a best-selling cookbook author. She wrote the modern cooks year, which is her newest book, and also a modern way to cook and a modern way to eat, which are her two previous books. She's also a columnist at The Guardian, which is like a really major newspaper in England, which is where she's from. You'll see she has a very soothing, calming, ASMR-A-SOMRI accent this entire time. So I think you guys will like that. I felt very calm and anxiety-free listening to her and very much like, oh, it'll be okay.

I can handle myself in the kitchen. She came up under Jamie Oliver. She was on his TV show for a while, and he kind of, I don't know, tutored her as a chef. So she worked for him for a while, and she's a very famous vegetarian chef. She's won all kinds of awards. And so in this episode, I sort of grill her about a bunch of different things that make somebody, you know, make it easy for people to get into the kitchen and cook really healthy meals on a normal weeknight or a normal day.

So we talked to Anna about her top tips for adding a ton of. flavors to things. We talk about like the pantry staples that she always has on hand. We talk about how to make vegetarian food taste really, really good. We talk about her go-to breakfast that she always makes, which kind of surprised me, honestly, but it has a ton of flavor and I'm definitely going to try it. And she also talks about how she mod—she now is the mom of a three-year-old son. And we talk about how that's completely changed her approach to cooking and eating, and it's broadened her perspective generally. So I found that really, really interesting. So she talks about her breakfast, but then she also talks about how she modifies it for her three-year-old. She also talks about what, like her go-to

10-minute dinner. Like if you have to make dinner super, super fast, what does that look like? And just lots of, like, fun little cooking secrets and cooking tips and ingredient tips and things that are going to make you get really excited about including vegetables in your daily diet again. We also talk about how she got into her dreamy, dreamy career. She was working a desk job, like a 9-to-5 desk job. And she gives me in this episode, I think the singular best tip for figuring out what your passion career would be, which she actually used. And then within three days, 180'd her entire life and now has this completely different career where she's a best-selling author and she potters around in her kitchen all day. So that sort of blew my mind. And I'm

definitely taking a lot of inspiration from that. And we talk about what her day-to-day life is like as a recipe developer. Like, what is it like developing recipes? Where do you get your ideas from? What Is it like writing a cookbook? What are things people don't know about writing a cookbook? So it gives you a fun little sneak peek into that process. And then finally, we talk about some of her own health struggles, why she became a vegetarian, how her general feeling and her body changed after being a vegetarian in the ways that she expected and the ways that she did not expect and different sort of wellness practices that

she incorporates in her life, including a fabulous organizational sort of time hacky wellness method I'm very into and I'm 100% going to try. So if you guys are interested in that, definitely come, you try it and then come hang out on Instagram. I'm at Liz Moody and you can tell me how it went and I will tell you how I'm doing and we will see if we're more organized, productive people together. I have medium hopes for myself because I'm truly the least organized human on the entire planet. But maybe it'll work for me and maybe I'll be super productive and I won't waste so much time browsing Instagram and watching YouTube videos that don't do anything for my life. So we'll see. If you guys like this episode, tell a friend, listen to it with somebody,

get in the kitchen and cook something while you're listening to it. Go tell Anna. She's at We We Are Food on Instagram. I think there's like an underscore we underscore our underscore food. And come tell me. I'm at Liz Moody on Instagram. I love talking about these episodes. I love sometimes you guys will like post photos of where you're listening to it if you're on a walk or if you're foam rolling or something like that. And I love just picturing how the episode is fitting into your life. So that's super, super fun for me. So please, please keep doing it at Liz Moody on Instagram. And that's it. I'll let you guys listen to it now. And I hope you guys really enjoy. Anna, thank you so much for coming to the podcast.

Oh, thank you. I'm very, very happy to be here. Yeah. Let's kick it off with your book because your book is like spectacular. And I don't want to just like weave it in as like, this is a promo for the book because the book is one of the best books. I see probably 10 cookbooks a day. And your book is like one of my favorite, favorite, favorite books. Oh, that's so kind. Thank you. So can you tell me a little bit about it and the development process for it?

So yeah, this is, so this is my third book. And the kind of, I guess, difference from my last book is that this book's all about kind of seasonal cooking. It's like a year in my kitchen. So following the fruits and vegetables, all my recipes. all my recipes are vegetarian, so vegetables are kind of at the centre of everything I write about. So it's following kind of the arc of the year in terms of fruits and vegetables and seasonality, but also the kind of mood in the kitchen and those moments in the year when you want to eat different things. Maybe it's the more indulgent time kind of round Christmas or Thanksgiving or it's like a, you know,

fresher, cleaner time, like round about where we are now in spring. So yeah, it was, it's my biggest book yet. It's like 250 plus. It's a toll. It is like, it's, it could be like a coffee table book. It could be like a doorstop. Yeah, yeah, it could be a doorstop. I also feel like when people carry it home, I need to maybe give them an additional

chiropractic. Free chiropractor is it. In case it hurts their back. So yeah, it was a really, I kind of wrote it over a year. So it was actually a really lovely process because quite a few of my other books have come together a bit quicker than that. But I wanted to kind of be rooted. in the different ingredients as they were coming up and the different times of the year.

Oh, so did you write spring in spring? Yeah. Oh, wow. As much as possible, there are a few switches and, you know, a few times I had to buy asparagus in December and test a recipe. But as much as possible, I tried to like be true to the kind of, yeah, the ebb and flow of the year because it felt like it would come across more naturally there. And yeah, I didn't intend to write actually such a massive book, but I just kind of like,

I just kept going. It just kept, the recipes kept coming out. And I actually have divided the book into six seasons in the end just because... Because you thought the calendar, like the normal seasons wasn't enough. It wasn't enough. Yeah. We're not doing it right. I thought it was my responsibility to just add up for the seasons.

No, I think more just in cooking, I felt like the, you know, winter, I've kind of put winter in two sections because I feel like especially, you know, in the UK and here because you have Thanksgiving as well, that run up to kind of Christmas, that first. turn to when you get excited to eat a soup and you really want to eat root vegetables and there's like a slightly more indulgent kind of spin on your cooking, even though most of my recipes are pretty, you know, healthy and definitely vegetable focus. I think it's a different energy in eating that time of year and then. I think everything's a different. Like I'm excited about winter until January 1st and then I deeply hate winter and I just want it to be over. Exactly it.

Yeah. You know, I don't want to carry on eating roasted root vegetables like through January and February. So then I switch things up. It's not necessarily, I'm not a detox in January person. Yeah. It's like the worst possible time of the year to detox. Wait, why is it the worst possible time of the year to detox? I just feel like there's, I feel like short days. It's quite dark. It's just too harsh because you've gone from this like massive celebration of Christmas. Then all of a sudden you're like taking everything away. And so for me like spring this time of year, it's a much more natural time for me to like step into eating some, you know, soup, salads, like more. fresh, clean, healthful food.

Well, you have a spring clean in your book, right? Like a gentle spring clean, which I love. And it just feels, it feels much more natural to me because those green foods are coming about, you know, all the shoots and leaves. And it's bright and there's lots to be, you know, super excited about. Yeah. So if you are taking away, you know, some of the parts of your diet that are not serving you, but you maybe still really enjoy and, you know,

And I feel like winter is a much more homely time. It's much more, you know, it's much more sitting on the couch. It's much more having friends over for dinner. Okay. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So, yeah, I cook really differently in January and February. Even though I don't do a detox, it is more broths.

It is more, you know, yeah, like warm salads, that kind of thing. So I wanted to separate those. And then the other season I've separated is spring because I feel like definitely in the UK if you walk into like, you know, a farmer's market or a store in kind of the 1st of March and you were walking on the kind of 28th of May, they're both kind of under the catchment of spring, but the things you will get will be completely different. So I kind of have separated that out as well. Yeah, I mean, I don't think I have licensed to add an extra two seats.

Yeah, well, should we like name our extra seasons? Like good winter and bad winter. Yeah, exactly. Early spring and summer spring or something. Yeah. Yeah, well, I called the beginning, this bit we're in now, like the Herald of Spring. Because it's got so much.

Because you're classy and British. You're just like, the Herald of Spring. I just think it's got so much potential. Yeah. There's an energy here in New York at the moment about, you know, there's blue skies. It's the first couple of warm days. Like people are feel excited about, you know,

the change in what they're going to eat, the first asparagus, whatever, and it's the same in London at the moment. And I do feel like it's a time of a bit of promise, but it's promise and hope. And then the end of spring is completely different because you've got all those fruits, you've got all those vegetables, and it's much more abundant. Can you walk us through what the process of developing a recipe actually looks like? Yeah, absolutely. Well, so if I'm writing a book, I'll generally try and sort of work the book out into rough chapters already and I'll write recipe titles and I do the same with the column I write for The Guardian every week as well. I'll kind of agree some titles with my editor and then

And where do you where do those come from like you may? Sometimes for my columns sometimes it'll be a theme like a recent one I wrote was on tahini or cauliflower or birthday parties. It can be quite random. For the books it depends on you know which book it is and what it's going to be but I just I try and look at it and in each chapter have a balance of, you know, soups, stews, pastors, tray bakes, like, or sheep hand dinners, which I think is probably a better way of describing it here. So I try and make sure each chapter has a balance. And then there's always, I just keep, I keep a long list of, like, recipe ideas or have, like,

you know, shots on my Instagram things. I think I would love to kind of recreate or list stuff from restaurants. So that's kind of how. Do you get the idea, though, ever? Like, I feel like we see so much food. You have exposure to so many recipes these. days on Instagram, in cookbooks, on websites, whatever, that sometimes I'm like, there's nothing left to make. Like, everything's been created at this point. I do definitely get that

feeling. And I think I'm actually working on another book for the UK that's going to come out in a year or so. And so I've been at home sort of writing that. And I did definitely feel a bit of writer's block around that. So how do you break through that? I think it's just sitting with I think I read this brilliant book and the starting quote was like, you know, actually 60% of the writing happens while you're doing that thinking while you have that block, you know. And definitely, I know it's going to sound really ridiculous and fairly trite, but, you know, I do think writing is a bit of a stream of consciousness. Like, I don't wake up with like 260 recipes in my head and know the like layout of what's going to happen. It's, you know, it's sitting down, it's getting, you know, the pans in my hand, it's sitting at the computer, it's kind of thinking about all the nuances, thinking about the boring stuff of like, is this recipe going to be easy for someone to make? Right.

So, yeah, I think that's kind of how I break through it. And I think more and more I'm finding my inspiration is actually from like really mundane things. I think when I started as a young chef, I wanted to be like a really weird ingredient, like using ramps or pink peppercorns or whatever. and I still bring those in in certain ways. But I think my inspiration has become much more humble, like, to actually just help people get dinner on the table in a life-friendly way. So do you, like, think about, would you, like, survey your friends and be like, what are your problems with getting dinner on the table and try to sort of solve those problems? Yeah, I actually, I do with my friends. And I have quite a good, like, conversation with the people who follow me on Instagram as well.

What's your Instagram hand? My Instagram is, we are food. But if you type an an anagones, it will pop right up. Wonderful. So, yeah, and I have a really nice dialogue. And I think that's one of the really wonderful things about Instagram and social media in general is this ability to kind of really connect with your audience and the people who buy and make your books and understand what's... What are some of the problems that have, like, people have told you that you've tried to address?

I think a lot of people, I think time is definitely. Definitely the major one. I think people just don't schedule the time to cook that they use, myself included. I can cook all day and still when I have to get dinner on the table, you know, for my family, I still want to do it in like 25 minutes. So I absolutely understand that pressure. So I think time is a major one. I think, you know, the ease of buying ingredients, I think is another one that people are really, really keen on. I think people just want to be able to like remember what's in a recipe rather than. and walk around a grocery store, like scrolling through recipes. Yeah, that's the number one feedback I've gotten with my book is like, oh, this is a manageable looking number of ingredients. And so many people were like, you pick up a book. And I think because chefs have that instinct to be like, this is so crazy, this is so different. And they'll do like 15, 20 ingredients.

And then it feels really intimidating. I think it does feel intimidating. And I think people just, also it feels economically. It feels like a lot to spend. if you're buying like dried lime powder or whatever are you going to use that again right it takes up cupboard space it's in considering all of these things and i also think people are really keen now on just having some you know having one pan having one yeah like those things where you're not using like everything in the kitchen cleaning sucks yeah that's like if i had a little gnome that came in and cleaned my house every day my husband and i would never fight yeah that would literally be my dream if someone could just fold also fold all the washing once a Oh yeah, the no one would do that. I don't mind doing the washing. No, same.

We just have a big pile that like stacks out to our ceiling. Yeah, I'm so glad that you have the same situation. Okay, so you have your list of titles and then where does it go from there? So from there, then I will sort of focus in on what the main ingredient is or what the, you know, the style of recipe might be. So, you know, to take an example, if I was like making like some kimchi fried rice or something, the first thing I will always start with is a massive. massive Google search of everything that already exists. I don't do that because I'm so afraid of like getting something in my head,

not being aware it's in my head and then copying. Yeah. Well, I already have a really strong idea of what the recipe I want to have in the title. So I'll usually write a few ingredients that I think are going to be there. But I'm always really keen on my recipe not being the same as anybody else. So I do like quite a big Google search and just check that, you know, it's not an idea. that because with the way we consume food media, sometimes I'll like come up with an idea

and realize it's something I've seen on Instagram or whatever. Without realizing. Without realizing. So I just try and make sure that there is a level of originality. And then from there I'll... Wait, and so what if you do that Google search and you've like come up with like a cake or something,

like a dark chocolate cake? And then you realize that that exists. Will you try to twist it or tweak it? Yeah, maybe I'll try and sometimes I'll just, if it's too close. I'll just let it go. But if it's something that I feel like can be different enough, or I'll perhaps take it down another flavor route,

or I'll, you know, just turn it from, you know, a chocolate cake into some brownies or I'll add some teeny. It just kind of informs what I'm doing. I feel like, you know, there are enough cookbooks in the world. And if my cookbook is a cookbook just full of recipes that already exist, then I actually have no interest in writing. it, you know, so I want to always bring something that feels fresh and new and different. So, which, so, yeah, I'll kind of do that Google. And then once I feel like I've got the

all clear creatively, I'll, I'll sort of write like almost like a bullet point recipe. So I'll write down the ingredients I think I want to use, not necessarily all the quantities, but just a list of those things. And then a couple of, you know, quick notes on what I think the recipe will be and then and then I'll get up and cook it um and try and kind of like I'll cook it without writing anything down because I sort of have a bad memory for most things but quite a weird um a weird sort of photographic memory for 55 grams you're a you're like a measurement savine measurement like I have a weird I have a weird memory for numbers but not much else so I kind of um I'll cook it and I'll tweak it and then sometimes I'll cook it again and then I'll write the recipe up so

And sometimes it won't be good and it will just, you know, we'll eat it, but we won't necessarily go in the book. I just like, I don't, how do you emotionally? I just find it so terrible when I make a recipe and I spent like 10 hours in the kitchen or whatever and it's just like a fail. It's so depressing. Yeah, it is really quite depressing. And I feel like, you know, that definitely, the more I write recipes that happens less,

and less. And even before I started writing my cookbooks, I developed recipes for other people for seven or eight years. So, I mean, it does happen much more in the baking sphere than the savory sphere because I feel like the savoury thing I've usually, unless I'm really taking steps into a cuisine I don't know about. Well, and savour, you can save it. Like, savory, you can be like, oh, I'll add a little more acid or something. And baking, you're just, yeah, yeah, baking is just done. So, yeah, so sometimes it just won't go in the book, but we'll have it for our dinner. sometimes it'll be like a straight off hit and I'll just write it up as it is and then sometimes it'll need like another test or another couple of tests and I have a couple of really trusted

friends who are recipe testers and sometimes if I'm really stuck on something or if I can't work out if it's a real winner I'll just like send it to them and say that can you have a go at this tell me what you think because I really appreciate that feedback because I think writing in any medium can be quite a solitary thing and sometimes you can like get stuck in a in a kind of spiral. And recently, I realized, like, all the recipes I was writing, I was writing had, like, lemongrass, like, limelies. Like, I was stuck in this kind of, like, tie sort of, um, situation. And I looked at everything I'd written that week. And I was like, I mean, I'm definitely supporting the lemongrass interest. How many do you do in a week?

Uh, I, on my recipe writing days, I try and get like four or five recipes during the day. So I just kind of like, lock myself away. Don't do anything else. Like, I'll do it. I'll my emails for like half an hour in the morning and half an hour. That's amazing. But I, I have to have that focus because I, I'm not a piecemeal person. Yeah. I'm a real all or nothing sort of character. So I have to like dedicate the whole day to it, get myself totally into it. And I feel like, I feel like my best work comes out of that. I feel like if I'm just like doing one recipe and then doing some emails and then doing something else, I can't quite get myself in the kind of space. Well, they say that the multitasking is like killing us as a society.

trying to do a little bit of this, checking our email, blah, blah, blah, blah. Yeah. I actually have read quite a lot about that kind of way of working. So I try and do at least like a four-hour stretch. And if I'm doing writing where I'm not standing up and cooking, I've started using this thing called the Pomodoro method. Have you seen that? No, what's the Pomodoro method?

It started because the guy used a timer that was shaped like a tomato, obviously Pomodoro, who was an Italian guy. And you basically work in these short chunks of time. So like 25 minutes and then you basically have like a five minute break. And then once you've got to like four blocks of that 25 minutes and five minute break, you have like a longer break. So it's kind of it kind of maximizes your productivity. Then you have a little break.

Do something else. Make up to you whatever. It's just quite a nice discipline actually because I'm not a discipline person. That's so interesting. I'm like trying to think of how much I could get done in 25 minutes. But I bet it would be a lot if I wasn't constantly like going to my Gmail tab. Exactly, exactly. I just try and turn like all my wife, like everything off that 25 minutes, and then you know you can make a cup of tea or just have a walk around the room or get some fresh air for a

couple of minutes and it refresh us. So yeah. No, it's really good. You're listening to the Healthier Together podcast. I talk a lot about this in my book, but my diet is around 80% vegetables with the other 20% being animal protein, legumes and grains. I am super picky about my meat though, and there are literally zero stores in my Brooklyn neighborhood that have the grass-fed and finished and pasturized products that I want. And honestly, I would rather eat no meat than eat meat that's inhumanely raised or filled with the kind of hormones that I do not want my body. That is why I was so excited when I discovered Butcher Box a few years back. They sent incredibly high-quality animal proteins frozen directly to your door. And this stuff is really frozen too. Sometimes it would

sit out all day while I was at work. And when I came home, it was still rock solid. Beyond being far better for the environment, this type of meat is way better for our our bodies. Grass-fed beef, for example, has lower levels of unhealthy fats and higher levels of omega-3s than other types of meat in addition to vitamins A and E and a ton of other health benefits. And if you want even more omega-3s, Butcher Box now carries wild Alaskan sack-eye salmon. While we sometimes defrost our products in the fridge, more often I'll actually cook it straight from frozen, which I love because then no matter what, if plans change or if you're too tired to cook, your meat never goes bad and you never waste all that money. I'll pop the frozen

meat straight into my instant pot, which is like an amazing life hack, or I'll use the ground beef to make my way more veggies, bolognayes, which is a weeknight staple in our house. I'm such a huge advocate for healthy eating being accessible to everyone. I'm sure you guys have heard me talk about this before. It's why I don't use fancy ingredients in my recipes. I want everybody to be able to make them no matter where they live or what grocery stores they have access to. And I think Butcher Box, which ships nationwide, is a huge step in the right direction. If you want to try it for yourself, go to butcherbox.com slash Liz Moody. That's butcherbox.com slash Liz Moody, like my name.

I'll also leave a link in the show notes. And if you use that link or you use the URL that I just said, you get $20 off your first order plus two packs of bacon and two pounds of breakfast sausage, totally free. I love Butcherbox. Having a stash of healthy animal protein in my freezer just makes it so much easier to have dinner on the table on any given night. And I hope you love them too.

DM me on Insta at Liz Moody if you need ideas for what to make. Now, let's get back to the episode. So your recipes are vegetarian, do you self-identify as vegetarian? And when did that start? So I became vegetarian about 10 years ago now. Okay. So I was working at the time for Jamie Oliver. Who's that?

Yeah, I know. He's like this British chef. He's written a few cookbooks, you know. Yeah. I'm actually, I love in London, flying out of Gatwick, because I don't like go to his restaurants normally, but he has his Italian restaurant in Gatwick, and it is such a treat to go there and, like, get his food. Yeah, on my way out here, I got a little snack from there. I felt very nostalgic. No, he's a, he's a fantastic guy and makes delicious food and was

wonderful to work for. I was working there for him, like, doing food styling and recipe development, and I just felt like a little bit jaded with food. I think I was cooking all day, every day, working quite hard, quite phonetically. It was when his business was like growing exponentially. It was such an exciting time to be there. But as with any business that's growing fast, it required quite a lot of commitment from the people that worked at it. So I think I was like just tasting a lot of food and felt a little bit jaded

and a little bit unexcited by food, which I know sounds very spoiled of me. But it was the reality. So I just decided to for six weeks be a bit more conscious about food, give up meat, fish. I actually gave up like dairy and tried to just. Oh, you went like full vegan. Yeah, just be a bit. Just to make yourself think about food more essentially. Just kind of, I guess, reset things.

Like press that reset button and kind of I thought I could just go back to it with like, you know, a new kind of like appreciation of flavor, texture, all of those things. And, you know, it was great, but it worked really well. But the moment I took kind of meat and fish out of my diet, I just felt much better. in myself. In what ways? I think I just felt a bit lighter. I felt that my digestion was way better. I think I lost a bit of weight, but that wasn't necessarily the aim. It was just, I think that, you know, that is extra, like, few pounds that just kind of hang around seem to just like go away without me even thinking about it. And it wasn't, it wasn't in any way meant to be a

diet because I'm not a diet person. But yeah, I just felt really good. And I think the thing that I felt really excited about was it kind of opened up my cooking in a different way. I think I'd always, you know, thought about dishes with like meat or fish at the centre and then what the vegetables were going to kind of do around that. And all of a sudden I was kind of just didn't have that blueprint anymore. So I was thinking about, you know, what mood I was in or what country I wanted to go to, you know, on my plate in my kitchen or my inspiration just became much more nuanced. And I think I just had to think a bit more about kind of layering flavor, you know, that kind of sweet, salty, acidic, you know, that verdant green flavor, bring an umami,

which obviously you just don't get naturally as much. What do you do for umami from like a vegetarian or particularly like a vegan perspective? because I think of it as like parmesan, sardines. Yeah, there is lots of that. I mean, great now that there are actually legitimate vegan cheeses that you can eat. Yeah. You just a try wretch. So I use those sometimes, but definitely like miso.

I use a lot. I think that's a really, really brilliant way of bringing in some umami flavor. Which is a fermented soybean paste. So it also has gut benefits, which is nice because it's a fermented food. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's absolutely. delicious and I feel I always feel really good when I have lots of me so in my diet but so I use

it in broths but I'll use it in dressings I'll toss roasted vegetables in it um you know there's lots of different ways of bringing that in I think um mushrooms particularly like dried mushrooms those Asian ones are a really brilliant way of bringing in um that umami sort of note I think things like mustard are brilliant they have you know they have that heat but they also have that kind of grounded, you know, I think umami is just that flavor that you can't quite put your finger on, isn't it? It's that flavor that kind of, you know, you've got all your other layers, but then the umami just kind of is like, you don't know what you're tasting, but it's like the bass guitar. It's like you don't really hear it, but it kind of just brings everything together. Um, so yeah,

I think those would be some of my like, you know, big hits. Like, um, I also think like, I really, really like didn't like the idea of it. when I first got a pot of it, but that nutritional yeast stuff, when you're picking vegans, is actually delicious. I love it on popcorn. I have a popcorn recipe in my popcorn,

and I'm just, like, obsessed with it. And I tried, so I made these cheesy biscuits, and I tried, I'm not opposed to cheese, particularly like a good grass-fed pasture and cheese, and not, like, eating a block of it. But I tried these biscuits, and I tried them with cheddar, like seven times, and the nutritional yeast gave it a more cheesy, delicious flavor,

which blew my mind. mind. Yeah, and it's really rich in B12, which is one of the things that lots of vegetarians and vegans, like, don't have in their diet. So it's kind of a win-win. And I think that brings like a really interesting umami note. How do you use nutritional use? I use it like in lots of different things. Like my brother and a sister are both vegans. Quite often like I'm making like a pasta situation where I would have put parmesan in. I'll kind of like just, you know, make something with that. I make quite a lot of like, um, you know, Mexican food. Apherson food. by making like a cashew cream or something, I'll add some bit to that.

But equally, like, I think, like, sometimes when I, like, will just have loads of the ends of bags of nuts left over and roast a load of nuts with spices and then puts some nutritional yeast over for the last bit. And I do think it is, it's one of those great products that, you know, it sits in your pantry. It doesn't take up that much space. It doesn't really go off. Yeah. And it's like, it's like a flavor win.

We were, I was talking earlier about like, Harissa. that being another one of those things or, you know, a tablespoonful of that, you can make a really, really average, like, chickpeas or have a pretty average hummus or have a sandwich without much flavor, but a little slick of horissa. And I love those things.

Yeah. Because I think they, someone has done a bit of the work for you and it just is a really quick, easy fit. So your sister and brother are both vegan. Were you guys raised in like a healthy household? Um, I mean, yes. No. I spent the first few years of my life in California in San Francisco. So there was a definite kind of... Where in San Francisco? I lived in Palo Alto, which was before like...

Silicon Valley and all that, yeah. Before Silicon Valley really took off. So it was definitely quite a different place. But we were in and out of San Francisco a lot. And obviously that kind of, you know, the kind of health food sensibility there definitely rubbed off on us and my mom. My mom was always like no sugar. She was quite, you know, she cooked healthy food for us. She's not someone who in labors over cooking or particularly enjoys it, but we always had pretty, you know, pretty healthy food and no sugar, which actually meant that. That's amazing. At about 11, me and my sister were like, what, we can buy our own chocolate and then we went a bit wild, but we've come back around now, luckily. So, but I definitely, you know, we definitely had sort of a healthful lean, but I'd say

we were a pretty standard family. It was very much kind of meat. two veg. We weren't vegetarian. But my brother actually was the first out of all of us to kind of become vegetarian. He's been vegetarian for like 15 years vegan for like 10 years. And then me and my sister kind of for different, all for very different reasons followed suit. And it's quite funny because it's kind of trickled upwards in our family. Now my mom and dad are vegetarian. Mostly, my dad will eat a steak like twice a year. But apart from that, he's pretty much a mom and dad a tiny bit of fish, but it's really changed how they look at food. And, you know, just by seeing how you guys feel with it or are you guys like nagging them?

I think seeing how we feel, we all have very different motivations. Mine has really been, I love cooking this way. My sisters has always been much more for health. My brothers is very ethical. So I think they've seen all of our different reasons. And they're, you know, my parents are, I'm very lucky that they're wonderful people and they're inquisitive people. And so they've kind of picked up the China study, read those things. And, you know, I hope that I'll be as open to change when I'm like, you know, 65 as they are.

But it's quite interesting because often I feel like the family decisions around food are made from the top and trickle down and never really go the other way. So although I'm so impressed. I feel like there's been so many more like, I know because of like YouTube or what, but like eight, 10, 12 year olds being like, I'm going to eat this way. I'm a vegetarian now. And then they're like just sticking to their principles around it, which I think is fascinating. No, it's, it's really cool. And I think, you know, we sort of all, I definitely think there are just these inherent decisions that aren't even made for you around food.

Like I didn't make the connection that animals were animals for a very, very long time. Like that what you were eating was. That meat I was eating was an animal for a very long time. And, you know, I'm not someone that cast judge. on anyone's food decisions. I feel like people have to do what is right for their bodies, for their lifestyle, for how, you know, the food they can afford. So, you know, this is my choice. Yeah, when I do see younger children making that connection, in some ways, you know, I do think that is a level of education we need to give to children, you know. So you started doing this,

was that your first, the recipe development and all that for Jamie Oliver? Was that your first sort of job job? Or how did that? It seems. seems like a dream job. Yeah, it was a pretty dream job. No, that wasn't my first job. I worked, I worked in, like, consumer PR for a bit. And I was kind of, um. That's like a different.

Yeah, it was kind of a different angle, definitely. And because I did like an economics degree, which obviously is nothing to do with what I do now, um, I kept getting given like all the financial clients because I kind of understood the graphs. Do you like that sort of like the money world? Um, I do. I don't think the money world liked me that much. I had a few jobs in my banks

And I mean I think I'm just a little bit too Free and easy for the money world I used to turn up like six minutes late And they'd be like You're six minutes late And I was literally like No I know the train was late

And they're literally you know No It was just so You factor that in It was just so hard lying And it just wasn't my My cup of tea So no I was working

Doing consumer PR Which was interesting But it just didn't It didn't flow my boat I wasn't like passionate or engaged or really that into it. So I was reading an article one day in the paper about how you determine your calling. And it was in, yeah, one of the British papers that said you determine your calling by which part of the Sunday supplement, you know, the Sunday papers with all the bits you turn to first.

Oh my God. I love that idea. Which is such a cool thing. Oh, my God. It was always the restaurant section. It was way before there was these big polished food sections within all of the papers. But for me, it was always like the restaurant review. It was this amazing guy called A.A. A. Gill, who sadly passed away now, this legendary British restaurant reviewer.

And a kind of light bulb went off of my head. And I was like, of course. Like, this is what I get excited about. This is what I've always done at home. This is what I've always done for my parents. Like, I was that geeky kid, like, mom, dad, can you invite some of your friends around so I can cook them a dinner party? I mean, like, literally, who does that?

So. Did you, how did you, just rolling back to that, how did you know how to cook? My mom was, she's not, like, as I've mentioned, someone who's really into cooking, but what she was amazing at is encouraging our interests. So when I expressed an interest in cooking, she bought me loads and loads of kids cookbooks and loads and loads of ingredients. Oh, that's amazing. So she, like, empowered me to, like, cook the family dinner when I was quite young. Not all, not every, not every night. Occasionally, she'd be like, you know, you make dinner tonight. So it was.

It was very much something that she was encouraged by her and by my dad. So that's where I started. And actually, I think my mom, because it was something I could do that was helpful, you know, my mom had my brother when I was about 10. So I think I could like actually, like, yeah, I could help and do some responsible stuff, which I loved. So I think that's where, you know, the spark really started like, you know. So you hear this thing.

about like what section of the paper do you turn to? And were you like, all right, that's it. I'm going to culinary school. Basically, yeah. I got into work. So that was on the way to work. I got into work and I kind of, yeah, I like Googled like cookery courses in London. And this thing popped up, which was like Jamie Oliver's 15, which was a restaurant that

Jamie Oliver started quite early in his career where he took 15 young people from varying different backgrounds. I mean, it's still going now actually. And he works with solely people from very disadvantaged. background. Yeah. So it's kind of changed shape. But, um, uh, and the, I think the, the interviews were like the next day.

So I was like, did like a bit of a cheek thing, bunked off work the next day, went to an interview. And they were like, yeah, come and do this weekend. So I went and did this selection weekend, which was so weird. It was like half cooking, half kind of like team building like outward band. Exactly. Yeah. Like here's 19 twigs build a bridge.

Really? And I was a bit like, and it was all being filmed for a team. TV show as well. So I was suddenly thrown into this very strange situation. Wait, so when you went to the interview, were they like selecting you for the TV show? Yeah, they were, they were selecting you to be one of the 15, but it was being made into a TV show. Oh, wow. So were they like looking for personality and like on camera and readiness and all of that? I think they were in a sense, but I don't think I actually maybe hit those notes for them. What do you think you hit? I think they wanted people to like be naughty. They wanted to people, you know, to create drama to like,

not show up so that like, you know, Jamie could get mad. You know what TV companies are like? And I like absolutely towed the line. So why do you think they picked you? Well, I think they just, it wasn't just the TV company. It was actually people who worked for Jamie who were picking as well. And this, this dear friend of mine now, Pete Begg, who I think just saw something in me that I was like really super excited and geeked out totally about food. And I guess I had a few cooking skills. So, yeah. And that selection, we, weekend happened then on the Monday they said you've got a place the next Wednesday so literally within a week

I quit my job and I was cooking full time in a kitchen so were you nervous this is like a huge life change I was a bit nervous like I feel like if you could flash forward and be like you're going to get a guardian column and write all these books it's one thing but you there's no way you would have thought that was even a possibility back then right no well I you know I think I've always been good at like trying to set myself goals I definitely don't think then I'd set myself those goals but I was a bit because obviously, like, I was earning a reasonable wage. I was going down to, like, a training scheme thing, which, you know, was not very much money. I was kind of doing something that, you know, I had quite like an academic sort of education.

And I was suddenly doing this thing, which was like going to be a chef in a kitchen, which no one had ever told me was like something that you could do as a job. Yeah. And so it did feel a bit funny. Also, I was a bit like, I, you know, Jamie Oliver. of her was like this funny this like big celebrity sort of chef guy and you know he was definitely appealing to a certain demographic in the UK that perhaps wasn't me so I was a bit like what's this fit going to be like yeah it's going to be right for me so I was I was a bit nervous I think but I think more than that I was I was just really excited I was just I literally couldn't believe my luck and

I was like in the kitchen I was like repeatedly pinching myself like I'm just cooking all day every day and I just felt like I would pay you to do this. So you were on this TV show and is that sort of documenting the process of learning how to cook? Yeah, it was just documenting the process of how it worked with Jamie like bringing in lots of different people and trying to take them from zero skills. I had I guess a few few cooking skills but still very um you know homemade cooking skills into people who could run a restaurant. And it was I mean it was like a one hour special. So it It wasn't any major series or anything. And it kind of came and went.

And luckily it wasn't something that, you know, had a major amount of coverage. It had obviously had a lot of coverage because it's Jamie Oliver and he's a big deal. But yeah, so I worked, I did the 15 course and then I worked 15 for a couple of years. And then I kind of saw Jamie's business kind of growing and changing. And I could see that he was writing these books or all this stuff was happening in these magazines. And there was this whole media outlet. And I think I just had a moment where I kind of like just sped forward in my mind a bit. And I just thought, you know, if I, the life that I want to have, which might include kids,

it might include, you know, seeing my friends from time to time. It might include doing things at the weekends. I was like, I'm not sure that like chef life and how I want to live my life go totally hand in hand. I think a lot of people aren't aware of the hours that chefs have to keep, which are, I don't know how any of them have families honestly it's crazy i did it for like three or four years and it was intense but i only had to look after myself i didn't really have you know i had obviously my mom and dad and my sister and brother but i didn't really have any dependent people and so i could give it my all but

um no it's definitely hard and i just don't understand how i think kitchens have changed thankfully but i think it must be really really tough to be you know a mom or a dad of a very young child and work in a kitchen So I did that for a few years And then I kind of saw this opportunity To kind of move sideways into Jamie's sort of a very fast-growing business And help him with So did you pitch that?

Were you like Jamie? You need my help. I'm the lady for you. Kind of. He, I think one of the British food magazines called Good Food Magazine came in and they asked some of us to write recipes

for this feature they were doing and I was literally like, you know, like something went off. I was like, right, here's the opportunity. So I kind of, I loved writing. I've always loved writing. So I kind of wrote loads of recipes as well as I could,

like took everyone else's recipes, like transcribed them, sent them to them and then said, can I help on the shoot? And then on the shoot, I kind of like just made myself as useful as possible. And at the end, I was like,

do you want to give me a job? And, you know, it was brilliant because it was, as I say, like a very fast growing place. So there was space to then jump over and, yeah, do some visual stuff. and writing and things that I really, really enjoyed.

What's Jamie Oliver like, like, behind the scenes? I really want to hear that he's, like, a miserly depressed man because he's so cheery and happy and, like, saving the world. And I'm just like, come on, give me some dirt. Yeah. I mean, there's really not, there really isn't that much. There isn't really, he's just, he's a really, really good guy. Yeah.

He unfortunately seems that way. Yeah, he kind of, he is kind of as he comes across. Yeah. It's just, he is, he's genuine. He genuinely, so deeply cares about what he's doing about the recipes he and the, and the kind of content he puts out into the world and about the kind of, you know, social projects and health projects that he works on. And I mean, he could very easily, I mean, he's a very wealthy man now.

Yeah, he could just start. Sit on his laurels and not bother about like, go to South France. You know, talking to the government about reducing sugar. or sugar advertising or any of these initiatives that he takes on, which are actually really hard. They take a lot of energy from his staff. And yeah, he's just a really good guy. And he was really good to work for, actually.

He's one of those people who kind of, you know, if you work hard for him, he obviously has these incredible opportunities and access because he's, you know, a major worldwide celebrity. Yeah. And especially I feel like in England, it's such a small country. train everybody does know each other so if you're somebody of jami oliver's stature like he would know everybody oh yeah he literally knows he literally knows everyone i mean he's you know he's on a level with like the prime minister like he's like everyone knows him everyone you're too most people like him yeah yeah

i'm not sure they're in that that regular contact at the moment but that's a whole nother conversation we'll do our breakfast podcast later um but no he's just a great guy and um you know a real jay genuine family man. Was he involved in you getting your first cookbook deal, your garden column? Or was that, how did that all come about? No, that was completely separate. So I basically did, I did a bit of work writing and doing some media stuff kind of on behalf of 15 and that initiative. And met a couple of people through that who I think saw that, you know, I could speak coherently, which.

Congratulations. Thank you very much. I'm really packing myself back to that. Yeah, no, I mean, I guess I had that sensibility. And then this opportunity came up with the publishers to write a cookbook on behalf of a British brand called Innocent, who makes smoothies, who were quite an iconic British brand. They were the kind of first British brand who spoke directly to their customers on the bottles, like saying, hi, you, this is your smoothie rather than, you know, in a brandy way. So they were really quite pioneering. And they wanted someone to write. a cookbook, you know, ghost write a cookbook for them. So I did that and then met my publisher and I think she saw something in me. She was like, these recipes are great, let's do your own book and it kind of went from there. So it was really, really amazing and organic because I don't have to pitch, I didn't have to write any proposals. Yeah, it's amazing. And I know lots of my friends who are really talented writers and write cookbooks. I have had to do that and it can be quite a process. So yeah, I am really lucky that this whole journey has been quite organic and I know not to sound like too much of a hippie, but it definitely feels like it was the right path.

Right. There weren't any major kind of barriers or stumbling blocks in my way, which, yeah, I'm super grateful for. Did publishing the cookbook change your life? I think it did change my life in quite a lot of ways. It was something I've always wanted to do. Like I literally used to do like cooking shows to pot plants in my mom and dad's kitchen. Like I think it's always been something in my psyche that I knew I wanted to do. So it was really empowering to have achieved something that I really, really wanted to achieve in my life. It's definitely given me a different platform.

Now, all the work I do is stuff that I really care about. So when I worked as a food stylist and recipe rice before my book came out, I was still having to cook, you know, meat, recipes, fish recipes, you know, work with brands who shall remain nameless, who perhaps didn't align with my beliefs. And so it's definitely changed that for me. A lot of the work I do now feels very, hashtag authentic. But, you know, that sounds ridiculous, but that was a big shift and a big change and has really, really, you know, I'm grateful for every day because it's whilst I work down hard, it's, you know, it's, you know, it's, you know, it's, you know, It's nice to be able to stand behind all of the work you do and say, you know, with total integrity that you believe in it.

Was there anything that surprised you about publishing a cookbook? How long it takes. I don't know why it surprised me because I worked on lots of Jamie's cookbooks and a couple of other people's cookbooks before. But it was always in a bigger team. So my cookbooks are me and, you know, my editor from my publishers. And I think I thought that once I'd done the recipes, once I'd done the pictures, I was like, you know, this is kind of nearly a done deal now. But the rounds and rounds of edits, because cookbooks are so interactive. Like every bit has to be right, you know. Like a recipe needs to fit the layout for the page and stuff like that, which surprised me.

Like I had people, I didn't realize that like if a recipe was long and they had allocated like certain amount, I had to cut the recipe just to fit the page layout, which is. Yeah, a little bit. which is all of those little tweaks. And my cookbooks have become larger and larger by about 50 recipes every time. And so you don't really factor that in. You kind of factor that into the recipe writing process and the shoot. But then you don't realize that actually you're going to be spending an extra like 25% of your time on every single edit.

And when there's eight edits, it's like, what? But, yeah, I mean, it's kind of a dream job. So I love every bit of it. But I guess what else is. been surprising. I think I was just not that I don't back myself because I put everything I had into my first book, but can I cookbook and I have for every book? But I think I, you know, I put it out there with quite low expectations, like just because maybe I was scared of having bigger expectations, but I was just thinking, you know, my mom, a few of my aunties, a couple of

mates might buy it. And luckily it really connected with like perhaps the zeitgeist of what was going on at the time and people connected with the visuals of it. So, you know, a lot more people than that have bought it. And so that was a bit of like, hold on a second. Um, you know, and I'm super grateful for that and seeing people that like post recipes on Instagram and cook the food that I've like come up with in my funny little kitchen. Yeah. Their family is like, you know, yeah, it's, it's, It's a matter without wanting to sound like too over the top. It really is an honor, you know, that people are doing that. You're listening to the Healthier Together podcast.

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Is there any other sort of like wellness practices that you do to feel good? I have a three-year-old son, so my wellness practices are less prevalent than they used to be. I've been doing a kind of pre-a yoga meditation and some asinus for about eight or nine years now. Is that a moving thing or a breath thing? It's both. So it's based in, it's called Eisha Yoga, ISHA, and it's based out of an ashram that the guy who started it is this. incredible, funny, uh,

offbeat Indian guy who like drives motorbikes, but is also a kind of, I guess a guru at this ashram, even though he's not the kind of guy who, you know, he actively asked people not to kiss his feet and doesn't want to act in that way at all. But yeah, so I've been doing that for sort of about,

yeah, eight or nine years now. And it's like a, it's a little breath work meditation practice and then some asanas as well. And when I did it almost every day for five years and, I've felt amazing doing it since I've had my son. It's definitely more infrequent. But that's something that I do try and definitely knit into my day. I just, I definitely notice that it allows me a little more reaction time between like shouting at someone out of the window if they've like cut me up in the car or, you know, it definitely helps. Other things, I think for me it like quite often you know cooking can become my meditation like just trying to like turn you know

have a quiet kitchen like turn all the music off and actually just like really really connect um with the process yeah as the mom for like a three year old there's not that many other self-care practices that's going at the moment has a three-year-old changed how you cook it all it has a bit um he's very cute i mean i like him I like him. Thank you. He's not like the most adventurous eater, which has been a bit of a shock to me, actually, because I thought... He's three.

Well, yeah, but I just... You thought he'd come out wanting your lemon grass? I thought he would just be having, like, green smoothies, spirulina shots with me. I think I just, I was actually quite ignorant about how sensitive children's palettes are. And I just, you know, so many people had told me, what, if you just get them to eat everything, if you put it in front of them, eventually they'll eat it. And I can categorically say that that with some children is not the case. I harbor fantasies of when and if I have children like telling them broccoli as dessert

and getting them like, oh my gosh, you get to eat your broccoli now. Is that you can't do that? I've tried that. It hasn't worked that well with Dylan. But I mean, maybe some kids would be into it. But yeah, it's really interesting because I had very little sympathy for people who just Oh, I don't like chili. Oh, no, I don't like vegetables.

I don't like fruits. Like, I'm more talking about adults here than children. And I just thought, how can you, like, just give it a try? Like, stop being so kind of, like, you know, closed in your views about it. But having seen how sensitive Dylan's palate is and his reaction when he eats something that he doesn't like, it's given me a lot more sympathy for people who do have, like, versions to stuff. And, you know, Dylan, it's funny because he was almost. when I was pregnant with him, I couldn't eat any of the things I usually eat, like squash, kale, sweet potatoes, any kind of pulse, like totally turned my stomach.

And now the things that I didn't want to eat when I was pregnant, he doesn't want to eat. That's so interesting. He was almost like tapping on my, like, you know, tummy from the inside being like, no, no, no, mom, let's have a plate of pasta. Oh, that's fascinating. But I also, like, he does have a balanced diet. you know, I'm kind of making this maybe for a bit of humour, probably more exaggerated

than it is. He does eat vegetables. He does eat fruits. He does eat protein. He does eat, you know, nuts and some legumes and stuff like that. Which is more than most humans on the planet. Yeah. So I think my bar for what is a really, really balanced diet is probably set pretty high. But yeah, I also think it's one of those things. Like all of us in life set our standards so high for so many things. And I think when you're a parent, those standards, because they're not,

about you, they're about someone else. They're almost more important and higher. And there are so many things every day we can give ourselves a hard time about, aren't there? Yeah. And so I just try and be a bit free with Dylan and his diet and just think, yeah, you know. Yeah, exactly. It's enough. He's hitting all the food groups and we'll get that when we get there.

So. All right. I have some cooking questions I want to ask you. What are some ingredients that everybody should be using in their kitchen, but they're not? Oh, that's a really good question. I am using it in their kitchen, but they're not. Just going to have a think about this and make sure I have a good developed answer. I think one of the things that is a real win for me in the kitchen cooking quickly is like really great spice blends.

I think lots of people have like different spices and they might have like, you know, a curry powder or something like that. But I think there's loads and loads of decent like spice blends available now from like that Razal Hanu. I don't know if you have that. It's like a North African spice. Yeah, we have it. You know, to kind of delicious garam masala to like Sri Lank and curry powders. And for me, they are a really great way of kind of like adding like a rounded flavor to something without having to either have 20 different spices in your cupboard or, you know, have to get like 10 jars down

and put loads of little bits and bobs in. And even, you know, like Duker, which is a spice. blend, you know, that has kind of hazelnuts or sesame seeds at its base, you know, I think little pots of those are a brilliant thing to have around because even if you've got like some hummus or some yogh or whatever else that you might be putting on the table to top things, you know, a little sprinkling of that on top, completely changes what you're eating. So I'm really into those at the moment for my own home cooking as well because it just kind of speeds things up and means that you've got a lot of flavour. I think...

Where do you buy those? Just... I buy them from lots of different places. There's a brilliant British company called Routed Spices. Here, I know there's, I just saw a company in a shop down the road called NY Shook. Yeah, New York Shook, they're amazing. Yeah, they have lots of. I have them in my... Yes, they have great spice blends.

They have a really amazing harissa, which I'm also totally in love with. Other things that people, I think people should be using in their kitchen. I mean, I think seasonal veg is a major, major, major thing. and I think perhaps we are in a bit of a food bubble, the people like us who work in food, and we think that everyone knows about seasonality and everyone knows that asparagus comes around in May and that strawberries are actually only in season for like two months of the year. Because your grocery store wouldn't tell you that. Exactly. And it's not in their interest to tell you that necessarily because they can sell you asparagus all year round.

But it's, I think, up to us as consumers to kind of like ask those questions, even if you are shopping at a grocery store, you know, look at the label. Where is it from? Is it, you know, is it U.S. grown? Is it flown in from Peru? Obviously, here in the U.S., you have a much bigger catchment in the UK. We're small on island. So, you know, we have to, you know, sometimes we, in the winter, I definitely buy things that have come from Spain and Italy, because otherwise I'd be in Sweden all year, which love a Swede. But, and I think there's lots of humble seasonal vegetables. Sweden is a really, really good example. Actually, you know, if you kind of roast that whole. It becomes this delicious. I think Swede is not, it's a British. I think is it is Ruta Vega. I think it's Ruta Vega. Yeah, I was trying to remember it's Rubega. Or something, you know, very simple like that or a cauliflower,

which obviously is a bit of an easier connect for people because so many restaurants here and in the UK have like cottoned onto this whole rose cauliflower thing. But they're so cheap. You can buy one of those incredibly cheaply, put it in your oven, you know, cover it spice. I've got a recipe in the modern cooks year for a kind of alugabe which is like cauliflower potatoes, a big

roasted cauliflower in the middle with a kind of coconut milk, lemon, mustard seed thing that soaks into all the potatoes. And, you know, that like, you know, sheet pan dinner is so cheap and I think, you know, there are all these far-fangled, like, interesting kind of farmers market ingredients, but actually I think

some of the really humble vegetables that we can buy very cheaply can be just as amazing. And what's your take on like the whole superfoods being like Aschaganda and collagen? I know you said Spirulina Shads. Like how do you feel about all the powdered superfood stuff? I'm not someone who really buys into that too much. I think for some people they can definitely be quite helpful. I do think that Ashtawanga and some of the mushroom, the cordyceps things are actually

those things have been helpful to me with like balancing out some like hormone situations I had after Dylan but I use them quite selectively and not all the time for me I'd much prefer if I can to eat an actual food you know meal and equally I'd prefer to eat a bowl of fruit than necessarily juice it into a juice or a smoothie I do have smoothies sometimes just for speed and ease and sometimes I feel like them but um yeah I'm much more about kind of trying to eat like the biggest rainbow of fruit and veg you can, the biggest, you know, sort of rainbow of grains, legumes, pulses, you know, varying kind of like the bread you eat, you know, obviously all within the remit of like delicious homemade, kind of like

grass fed when it comes to dairy, eggs, etc. So yeah, that's more how I look at nutrition rather than trying to bring in like powders and stuff. And I think I'm, But I guess for some people, it really works. And what do you eat for breakfast every day? I generally eat porridge for breakfast, oatmeal, oatmeal. Just because it's quick and easy. And with my son, he's really into it. So we eat oatmeal sometimes with like chemo flakes, sometimes with oats, try and vary up.

Sometimes I do a mixture. Dylan has his pretty straight up. But all, especially like through the winter at the same time, I put the porridge on, I'll just like get some frozen fruit out, whether it's blueberries or cherries or whatever with a little dash of maple and vanilla. So I'll just make really, really quick frozen fruit compote and then we'll have, you know, it's quite fun because it's a breakfast that I feel like can be taken lots of ways. So even though we're having a pretty similar thing most days, we can like tweak it in different ways with different fruits, different

seeds, you know, different nut butters, you know, bit of maple, bit of honey, you know, sometimes even take it down like a savory root with like, you know, some togarashi or chili oil or something. That doesn't happen so often. I'm definitely a more kind of sweet tooth in the morning person. But generally that's what I have. I usually have like, I try and steer away from coffee just because it makes me a bit jittery and crazy. But I, like when I've been traveling over here this week, I definitely have been having some coffees because the jet lag, I use coffee, I guess, kind of more medicinally. than it is. It's a hugely powerful medicine. And we,

we, it's, I had a professor once who said it's the number one drug addiction in the world. And I don't think we view it like that at all. No. And I know, like if I drink more than one coffee, like,

I'm just not a great person to be around. Yeah. I just, my, it creates brain fog for me. It does exactly the opposite of what I think it does for some people. Yeah. So,

but I do like, I do like matcher or marcher, however it has said. So I'll have like, like an oatmeal marcher and usually have that in the morning. So yeah, that's my, that's our breakfast deal. And if you have 10 minutes to make dinner, what are you making? If I have 10 minutes to make dinner.

So one of two things, I think, I'm quite down with like one pan pastors. There's two recipes for one pan pastas in my book, one, which is a spring one, one which is a more wintry one. And you literally just dump everything into a pan. It might be over 10 minutes. It might be like 12 minutes. are cooking in the water. So the vegetables cook in the water.

You don't use two pans. It's like an absorption way of cooking, essentially. All the water absorbs into the pasta, and it creates this kind of quite silky sauce. It's a different way of cooking pasta. And I'm pretty sure that a lot of Italians are like, uh-uh, uh-uh. But I did do some research on these recipes. And it is actually an old Hulian way of cooking. And Pia is very trendy right now.

Yeah, yeah, exactly. So I would make that or there's a recipe from my very first book, which is just my total get out of kind of like trouble dinner. It's like, you know, just a can of black beans warmed up with some Chipotle, cinnamon, and then we just, you know, use whatever crunchy veg, avocado, make in some tacos. And that is like, you know, the beans warm up in like five minutes. So that's quite, and Dylan actually loves that. So that's something that comes out quite often.

I think any, I think tacos are one of the most underutilized foods on the planet. Because I'm just like, whatever vegetables you have, whatever beans, beans, legumes, whatever you have, you can make taco. Like, everything's good in a taco shop. Yeah, exactly. And that's like, yeah, I keep like, because corn tortillas are not as widely available in the UK as they are here. There's a few businesses.

You can get them at Waxaca. You can get them at Waxaca. You can. And there's a great place called the Cool Chitty Company that makes them. But so I just keep a load of my freezer and then you can just take one at a time. It's a one hand. Yeah. Okay.

And then a few questions I ask everybody. Have you ever been somewhere in the world where you're like, these people really got it right in terms of living like a happy, healthy life. And if so, where was it? Yeah, I went to this place in Ecuador quite a few years ago, just after I'd finished university and went to this valley called Villa Cabamba. It just sounds fun. The town's called Villa Cabamba, but it's like this, I think they called it, I don't know the exact translation, but it was something like the Valley of the Young. It was this beautiful, lush green valley in Ecuador, this really sweet little town with a square, like lots of amazing

fruits, lots of amazing vegetables, quite verdant, you know, and they can grow quite a lot of stuff compared to the other places in Ecuador and I guess South America. And, you know, they had beautiful, jungly kind of countryside, waterfalls and everyone there just felt like so, it felt like quite a simple life, but it felt very, very happy. And it just seemed really chill. And when I think about that place, like just a kind of sense of calm just comes over me. And I don't think I'm going to be moving to Ecuador anytime soon. But it was just a very, very kind of fertile in lots of ways, place. And just the people were so nice. And actually since then, I think it's been picked out as one of those blue zones, you know, the places in the world that people,

People live the longest. People live the longest and are the happiest healthiest. That's so cool. So you found it first. I mean, I basically discovered it. Yeah. I just happened upon it when I was sort of like mindlessly traveling around South America. You have to go back with your family.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. No, I'd really love to go back one day. Yeah. What is something that you've purchased that's made your life healthier or happier? What is something? I mean, I think my bike, I ride my bike around London a lot. You're brave. Yeah.

Well, you know what? London is quite clever in that there's lots of little kind of alleyways. There's lots of places where you don't have to drive on the main roads. Because driving on the main roads is scary, 100%. But I drive, like, my little boy Dylan to nursery on it. He sits on the back. It's like, it's super, super fun. And it's a way of kind of getting exercise into my day without having to, you know,

get my sweatpants on and go. to the gym or lift weights. Do you work out? Yeah, no, I do. I do. I do a bit of yoga and then I have like, I've actually just started working with a trainer just because I am not that disciplined. I'm with exercise and I think definitely my self-care is quite often the bottom of the list. And I'm very aware that it shouldn't be. So I've started working with a trainer doing lots of weights, which I really, really enjoy. I really want to try weight lifting, but I haven't taken that step. Yeah. No, it's really. And I think it's so great. for female health as well.

Yeah. Because, you know, for bone density and all of those things, you know, later on in life. So I'm just really conscious that actually that it will be a really good investment for me, you know, long term. So yeah, but I'm really enjoying it. I didn't think I would enjoy lifting weight. I was like, what? But it's really fun.

What do you think is the best way to spend 20 minutes every day? The best way spend 20 minutes every day. I think having like a really connected conversation with the people. that you care about. I think we can all just like flip through life. And, you know, especially in the phase my husband and I are in now, you know, it's like, who's picking up Dylan? Who's doing this?

He's doing that. Who's doing the other? But to actually like sit down and really connect with the people you care about and really like just, you know, even if it's five minutes, just really work out where they're at, what's going on with them, are they okay, you know? And that could be five minutes with like a few different people who are important in your life. It doesn't have to be like a partner or family. It could be work colleagues.

It could be, you know, a friend who lives far away. And I think that, you know, if it can be done over food, kind of all the better. But I think that is something that we are kind of like lacking a bit now because everyone just is in such a hurry, you know. And I crave that connection. I had a therapist once who told me instead of asking just like, how is your day to ask like a specific question. like what happened with this thing today or what was the most exciting thing that happened today or something like that.

And I found that that's led to so much more connected conversations versus just like, oh, it's like fine, like whatever, you know, like inviting people. That I really realized that with my son. If I ask him like how his day at nursery was, he's just like, it's like he can't, he always can't, he can't.

It's too much. It's too much. Yeah. And I think, but us as adults as well, how can you like sum up in a sentence? Oh, my day was like really great five minutes like so horrible for like 25 seconds when that man was

like really horrible to me on the on the subway or whatever um so how can you and i do think but when i ask him like who did you play with like did you how was the playground like did you find any worms it's like oh my gosh i love the idea of like re-learning conversation from a three-year-old essentially it is it's like the journey of being a parent is is little kids just shine a spotlight on you and absolutely are your teachers. Well, I consider Dylan totally my teacher. I mean, most of the time, when he doesn't want to go to bed,

like there's less teaching going on. Which is fair. All right. Last question. What is one mistake you've made in your life and what's one thing you really got right? Okay, that's a really good question. So one mistake I have made, I think one mistake I've made is perhaps not valuing the people,

the relationships that I have created. around work enough and I've definitely remedied that over the last few years but I think when you work quite hard you spend more time perhaps with the people that you work with than you do with your family or your partner and I really think that those relationships are so important and should be given you know almost as much gravitas as the other relationships in your life you know you don't you know with your work colleagues you don't kind of sit down and say like are you okay like what's going on like how can we remedy this it just kind of you're supposed to just like work with them and everyone's supposed to be okay and well and you dismiss them you're like those are just my work

friend yeah exactly and I think that is definitely one mistake I made early on that I didn't like understand how valuable and how formative and how much part of my life those relationships were and I think that meant that you know it just became much more difficult to work and I think if I'd started from a place of openness from a place of like appreciation from a place of treating that person as I would, my mom, my dad, my friend. I think it would have, it would be, yeah, and that's what I do now. You know, I invest as much emotionally in my work relationships as I do with my other relationships and it works out so much better.

One thing I guess I've done. Well, I think a few times I've been quite brave reaching out to people who I really, really admire and just saying, I think you're great. I love what you're doing. Like, can I meet you, learn off you? Yeah, kind of engage with you. And I've been really, really amazed. You know, this was long before, like, I've written any cookbooks or had kind of like anything like that going on. But I've always been really amazed by people's kind of generosity. And that kind of, you know, you don't ask, you don't get. It's like a horrible phrase. But I think sometimes if we have like the bravery to ask and to actually step out of like the comfort of where we are and say,

you know, I love what you're doing. Can I learn from you? I think it, it's a really, really empowering thing. Are there steps specifically you would have to that? Because I think a lot of people would love to do that, but they're like, this person's super busy. Like, what do I ask them for? What do I offer them? Like, what, what is, what does that actually look like? Well, I think quite often I've like email people and just said, like, hi, I really respect what you're doing. you know, I'm around or come and work for you for free for a day or a couple of days. Or like, I think I've just more packaged it like that. And I think.

I love that because it's not just like take the time out of your day to have lunch with me and give me advice. It's like I will work with you for a few days for free and I will learn all the stuff you have to teach me in that time. Absolutely. And I'm a big advocate in people being paid for what they do. I think there's only a certain amount of time you should give for free for sure. but I think definitely relationships are much more built when you're kind of like round a table like putting peas or, you know, clearing up like a room for the crap after a shoot or something. You know, that's much more bonding than kind of sitting necessarily over a coffee and kind of asking someone questions. I love that.

Well, thank you so much for taking the time to be here. Oh, it was such a nice conversation. I really enjoyed it. Wonderful. How soothing is her voice? Her accent is just studying. and I want to just like lay back in my couch and let it run over me like cold water and bring me to a place of zen and happiness.

And also she just shared such wisdom and inspiration. You can tell that she deeply loves food and deeply loves flavors. And she definitely inspired me to get to my kitchen and play around with some spices and play around with some cooking techniques. So I hope she really inspired you guys too. If you are inspired and you do make anything from this recipe, definitely tag me on Instagram and tag her on Instagram so we can see and we can share it. and we can enjoy that you got something real and tangible that you can bring into your lives

out of this episode. And if you did enjoy the episode, if you wouldn't mind leaving a little rating or a view on iTunes, it massively helps the podcast and it's always so, so appreciated. That's it for today. I can't wait to see you guys in two weeks with a brand spanking new, healthier together episode. Have a great one, guys. Love you. Look, I'm never going to make everything that I wear organic.

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