Plants

OMG ya’ll, I learned so much on the vegan cruise. It was fantastic. I loved it so much! And every single one of my friends who went with me have already signed up for next year’s cruise. Everyone thought it was amazing! The only tension was that at nearly every moment you had to decide… Do I go to the pool or go to a lecture? Even when we were at port and could get off the ship at someplace like the Bahamas, it was: Do I go to the beach or go to a lecture? The lectures were that [...]

One of the things I love about leading Radical Health Accelerator is observing the types of questions I get and seeing what the trends are. I know that what the women in the program are curious about at any given time is a window into what other health-minded women over 50 in the US (and in other countries, we have 5 countries represented in this year’s RHA) are exploring in their own lives. Since we cover exercise, diet and energy in the program, the questions run the gamut but this year there’s a strong interest in eliminating dairy. It makes [...]

Have I ever told you about that time I entered a chili cooking contest? It was 2012 and I’d been vegan for about 3 years. A friend was holding a chili cook-off as a fundraiser for their local fire department and the judges were the firefighters themselves. Even though I didn’t cook with meat and this was a “normal” standard-American-diet chili party, I decided I’d enter a veggies-only chili. I went a little crazy preparing for it by creating and testing several chili recipes of my own design and deciding which one I thought was the most tasty.  Over the [...]

I hope you're sitting down because I’m about to share with you one of my favorite brain-boggling plant-based protein facts. Whenever I teach this in a class, people’s minds are blown. It’s just so counter to what popular diet culture says that there’s a juicy little moment of silence after I talk where people are trying to process what I just told them. You know how white potatoes get a bad rap? Supposedly, they’re full of starch and “bad” carbs and are nutritionally void? It’s not true. White potatoes are full of essential nutrients and vitamins and are an excellent [...]

This is tofu. 😊 A couple of weeks ago, an incredible cohort of women finished my signature 90-day program, Radical Health Accelerator. Taking women over 50 through this program is often as enlightening for me as it is for them. No two groups are ever the same. Each has its own personality, similarities and differences which makes every program experience unique, fun and full of happy, high-five “a-ha” moments. In this most recent group, many women were intimidated by tofu - and overcame it! In case you’re not exactly sure what to do with the white jiggly stuff, I’m dedicating [...]

“I really don’t want to look like I’m incompetent,” I fretted to myself nervously… I was sitting in a sterile, clinical, hospital office in New York City, getting ready to see a new client, and my palms were sweaty. My feet were sweating too. This wasn’t my full-time, high profile corporate job where I would have been comfortable meeting someone new. This was a weekend “personal growth for me” nutrition client and I was very new at helping people in this way. I was seeing him for free but that didn’t make me feel any better. His name was Jeff, but I [...]

How would you describe your relationship with food? Do you eat for health, comfort, or distraction? Are you someone who stress eats? Is there guilt or shame around food for you? For the longest time, I didn’t understand food. I didn’t learn about eating like I learned about math, which was described to me as a necessary life skill. As I grew up, all I received was a little bit of guidance around the appropriate amount of food to eat. My mom was quick to tell me what was “too much” but that was really it. I was left to my own devices [...]

Many of you know how changing my diet radically changed my health and is a big part of my journey that led me to where I am today: writing you this email. In my personal transformation, there’s a key switch that was flipped, but it happened over time. Not so much like suddenly turning a light switch on, but more like a sunrise - slow, steady and beautiful. What happened was that my relationship with food changed from eating whatever I was in the mood for at the time to connecting what I ate with how I felt: my mood, emotions, self confidence, [...]

When I was a pre-teen, I’d go to aerobics with my mother. It was the time of adult women wearing leotards and leg warmers and headbands, you know, that whole scene. I’d be the only kid in the room full of ladies. As soon as I arrived, I’d position myself as far away from my mother as possible, somewhere near the back row, do all the moves and I loved it!I adored the teachers and decided I’d become one (which I did when I finally arrived at 18 years old). Every week, I couldn’t wait to get to class. I craved how [...]

Are you tired of recipes that will feed an army when you’re only cooking for one or two? Are you bored with eating the same thing several days in a row, or feeling guilty when throwing away uneaten leftovers? Well, my healthy eating friend, you’re not alone. Earlier this week, I sent an email with these thoughts and the #1 comment I received which was along the lines of “I can’t believe how much my family was on board.” Here’s the #2 most frequent comment I got: “I’m having a hard time with variety because I cook for two and we [...]

Have you ever been totally convinced you didn’t like a certain food and then someone cooks it in a certain way, or you accidentally eat it, and suddenly you love it? I did that with beets. I grew up with canned beets and decided I didn’t like them and stubbornly held onto that for a loooooooooong time. Then one day, back when I was vegetarian, I was hungry and rushing through the San Francisco airport to catch a flight. As I ran, I rapidly scanned both sides of the terminal for the take-out restaurant with the shortest line, picked a [...]

OMG, the grocery bill.I was mostly raised by a single mother who worked in non-profit and courageously and uncomplainingly raised two kids.Honestly, I was pretty sheltered from her money concerns, but I know they were there. I realized early on that I’d never have a lot of the things that my friends at school flaunted and I wanted to have too.Once a week, the three of us would go to the grocery store and buy the food for the week. When it was check out time and the clerk would ring up the items, my brother and I played a [...]