This fresh summer salad was inspired by the pickling cucumbers purchased at the Downtown Phoenix Farmers Market. When I purchased the cucumbers I was planning on making some quick pickles. Instead, I ended up enjoying them as a raw snack and this fresh salad.
Enjoy the video of the salad…from farmers market to table…
Chopped Cucumber Salad
Inspired by the beauty of the cucumber…
Simple Ingredients
1 small cucumber (Crooked Sky Farm)
1 tomato (Crooked Sky Farm)
1green pepper (Crooked Sky Farm)
1 green onion
1 cup yellow beans (Steadfast Farm)
Simple Steps
Slice all veggies in unique shapes and sizes.
Basil Garlic Lime Dressing
Simple Ingredients
½ lime, juiced
2 tbsp organic extra olive oil
3-4 basil stems (Melanie’s garden)
1 garlic clove, minced (Blue Sky Organic Farm)
Pinch sea salt
Simple Steps
Place all ingredients into small blender.
Blend until desired level of smoothness.
Dress the Salad
Place all chopped ingredients into a medium bowl.
Pour dressing over the veggies.
Gently toss to coat all veggies with the dressing.
Salad Food Art
Plating Mise en Place: Mindfully gather the salad, garnish, and bowl for plating
Mindfully plate the chopped cucumber salad with extra slices of cucumber, tomatoes, and fresh basil.
Enjoy!
Another view…the beauty of the Cucumber Salad
As you may be aware I am getting ready to announce “The 5-Day Beautiful Food Art Challenge”.
If you’d like to be included in our e-mail to learn more about the Challenge, please fill in your Name and E-Mail below. Thanks!
I’m so honored to share simple, beautiful cooking classes with Humana in Mesa, Arizona, for the last few years. This week, our focus was on “High Fiber Foods” with a tasty, simple-to-prepare Asian Salad with Citrus Ginger Root Dressing.
Asian Salad with Vibrant Purple Cabbage and Tangy Citrus Ginger Root Dressing
Make your own gourmet Asian salad with a rainbow of raw organic veggies, your favorite toasted nuts, and intuitively created ginger root dressing.
A quick peek at the set at Humana, with my short Facebook Live.
Asian Salad: Ginger Salad Dressing: 3 Key Ingredients
The essential ingredients for a perfect Asian dressing every time are ginger root, a soy flavoring (wheat-free tamari soy sauce or Bragg’s amino acids), and fresh citrus.
Simple Ingredients
1” fresh ginger root, minced
1 garlic clove, minced
½ cup soy tamari or Bragg’s amino acids
½ orange, juiced
½ fresh-squeezed lemon or lime juice
1 tbsp rice vinegar
1 tsp local honey
⅓ cup organic extra virgin olive oil
Simple Steps
Finely mince ginger root and garlic.
Place in pint-size Mason jar.
Add all other ingredients (except olive oil) to jar and shake.
Taste and intuitively add ingredients to create your desired flavor.
Too much acid: add olive oil
Not sweet enough: add honey
Too oily: add lemon or lime juice
Asian Rainbow Salad
Along with a tangy ginger root dressing, a colorful rainbow of raw organic veggies creates a beautiful Asian salad.
Simple Ingredients
1 purple cabbage, shredded or sliced
2 cups Bok Choy, sliced
1 cup carrots, shredded
1 cucumber, julienned (long, thin slices)
1 cup snap peas or snow peas, cut on bias (Note: not have snap or snow peas)
6 green onions, cut on bias
1 cup red, purple, or watermelon radishes, sliced
1 cup almonds, sliced and dry toasted
Simple Steps
Dry toast (no oil) sliced almonds in small sauté pan on low heat for 5 minutes.
Toss all vegetables in a large bowl and mix thoroughly.
Drizzle the Asian salad dressing on the vegetables and gently toss.
Top with dry toasted almonds.
Enjoy!
Happy to share with you the beautiful, colorful, simple-to-prepare Asian Salad. At Humana, we all really enjoyed the freshness of the dish and the ginger-rich dressing.
And, I was so fortunate to enjoy left-overs with my sunset…
Hope you enjoy creating your version of an Awesome Asian Salad.
Please share your creations with us on our new Instagram @plantbasedfoodart and Facebook www.facebook.com/plantbasedfoodart
I’m excited to announce that Experience Nutrition is now offering exciting Beautiful Food Art Challenges…
If you’d like to hear about the next Challenge, please fill in your Name and Email.
So humbled and honored to be featured in the media over the years. And, really excited to start 2021 with two beautiful, very appreciated highlights in our Arizona publications. And, thrilled to shoot a farm-to-table cooking tv segment with the nationally syndicated tv show The List and with the City of Peoria in 2020.
Natural Awakenings, January 2021: “Create Food Art with Sprouted Spelt Arizona Winter Veggie Flatbread.”
I’ve been writing plant-based farm-to-table recipe articles for the Natural Awakenings Magazine for a few years, and am happy to share with you the January 2021 article: “Create Food Art with Sprouted Spelt Arizona Winter Veggie Flatbread.”
This article highlights the philosophy of the new Plant-Based Farm-to-Table Food Art Movement and features one of my favorite, fun-to-prepare, delicious meals: Farm-to-Table Veggie Flatbread. Thanks so much to editor Tracy Patterson for the opportunities to showcase beautiful food ideas on your publication.
It’s such an honor to create recipes for the CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) at The Farm at South Mountain. The Farm is a beautiful organic farm right in my neighborhood in Phoenix, Arizona.
Let’s take a look at the beauty of The Farm and the incredible veggies growing right now in mid-December 2020.
Winter Broccoli at The Farm at South Mountain.The simple beauty of Broccoli.
Enjoy the Kale at The Farm
For the CSA members, Winter Week 5: 12.17.20
The Farm at South Mountain: Winter CSA 12.19.2020
Scarlet Turnips: Root & Greens
Corn-on-the cob
Broccoli
Bok Choy
Meyer lemon
Lemon basil
Romaine lettuce
Meyer lemon
Peppers
Eggs
Winter Scarlet Turnip. Corn. Bok Choy Saute Recipe
This week’s recipe was inspired by the incredible scarlet turnip, corn-on-cob, and the lemon basil!
Hope you enjoy creating a simple veggie sauté to enjoy with chickpea pasta for a great gluten-free veggie dish. Add the Meyer lemon while sautéing to caramelize the veggies.
I was so excited to create this recipe, that I actually prepared it within 2 hours of bringing the veggies into my kitchen.
Steps to Prepare the Dish
Sauté the veggies
Cook pasta.
Mindfully plate your sautéed veggies with pasta, seeds, herbs, and edible flowers.
Enjoy the video for this beautiful, tasty recipe.
VEGGIE SAUTE TIPS
Use the simple veggie sauté culinary method to easily cook all kinds of veggies.
Pre-heat the saute pan before cooking.
Cook the veggies step-by-step to layer the flavors.
Start with onions for the flavor base.
At the end of cooking, add the greens (bok choy) and herbs (lemon basil) to gently cook.
WINTER VEGGIE SAUTE
Recipe Serves 2
Use this simple veggie sauté method to cook the fresh CSA from the Soil & Seed Garden at The Farm at South Mountain.
SIMPLE INGREDIENTS
Winter Veggie Saute: Beautiful Veggies from The Farm CSA
3-4 green onions (not in the CSA)
2-3 small peppers
1 corn-on-cob
½ broccoli stem
1 cup turnip, sliced
1 cup bok choy
1 stem lemon basil
3 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
½ Meyer lemon, juiced
Pinch sea salt
SIMPLE STEPS
Slice all veggies and corn off the cob.
Pre-heat sauté pan on stove top on medium.
Add olive oil to coat bottom of the pan.
Add the onions. Sauté a few minutes.
Add peppers. Sauté a few minutes.
Drizzle pinch of sea salt onto the veggies.
Add corn on cob. Sauté a few minutes.
Add broccoli. Sauté a few minutes.
Squeeze Meyer lemon and stir to de-glaze the pan.
Add turnip. Sauté a few minutes.
Add bok choy and lemon basil. Sauté a minute.
Veggie Saute: Ingredients
FOOD ART: PLATE THE DISH
Enjoy plating the veggies with layers of veggies and pasta.
Garnish with pine nuts (or other nuts), a green onion, sliced raw turnip, and lemon basil leaves, and edible calendula flowers.
Veggie Saute: Plating Mise en Place
ENJOY YOUR WINTER VEGGIE SAUTE DISH
Arizona Winter Veggie Saute
ENJOY OUR PHOTO SHOOT BEHIND-THE-SCENES
Interested in creating a Plant-Based Farm-to-Table Food Art Program (Virtual and in Person when the time is right), fill out our Form. Look forward to talking with you.
I am so honored to intuitively create recipes for The Farm at South Mountain CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) members. And, I’m happy to share this week’s Winter Arizona recipe with you, which was inspired by the beautiful beets and the incredible herbs: Thai Basil & Kaffir Lime Leaves.
Hope you enjoy roasting the beets and using them in my, now favorite hummus. Make a small batch of the pesto for contrast to the hummus.
The plant-based cooking video shows you step-by-step to prepare this incredible, tasty, healthy dish.
Steps to Prepare the Dish
Soak the garbanzo beans the night before you plan to create the beet hummus.
Cook the garbanzo beans for the hummus.
While the beans are cooking, roast the beets.
Next, toast the pine nuts.
Make the pesto.
Make the hummus.
Mindfully plate the beet hummus and pesto with the CSA Swiss chard and sweet peppers.
All Recipes Serve 2
THAI BASIL & KAFFIR LEAVES PESTO
Create a simple, delicious pesto with this week’s Thai basil and kaffir lime leaves.
SIMPLE INGREDIENTS
1 cup Thai basil leaves
1 tbsp Kaffir leaves, minced
¼ cup pine nuts, dry toasted
2 tbsp olive oil
Pinch sea salt
SIMPLE STEPS
Toast pine nuts in dry pan on stove for about 2 minutes.
Place all ingredients, except olive oil, into a small blender.
Blend for about a minute.
Add the olive oil to the blender and blend another minute.
ROASTED BEETS
Use this Quick Roasted Veggie method to easily cook roots.
SIMPLE INGREDIENTS
2 beet roots, sliced
2 tbsp fresh Kaffir lime leaves, minced
3 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
Pinch sea salt
SIMPLE STEPS
Pre-heat oven to 425 degrees F.
Cut beet roots into slices.
Mince Kaffir lime leaves, taking out the stem.
Place beets into roasting pan.
Drizzle with olive oil, Kaffir lime leaves, and sea salt.
Roast for 10 minutes.
Toss the beets.
Roast another 10-12 minutes.
ROASTED BEET HUMMUS
Create this simple, delicious, beautiful hummus with The Farm’s beets.
SIMPLE INGREDIENTS
2 beets, roasted
2 cups cooked garbanzo beans
¼ cup tahini
2 tbsp lemon juice
2 tbsp minced garlic
Pinch sea salt
2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
SIMPLE STEPS
Place beets into food processor and process for about a minute.
Add all other ingredients, except olive oil.
Process for 2-3 minutes.
Stream in olive oil and process another 1-2 minutes.
Enjoy with CSA sweet peppers.
Plant-based farm-to-table recipe intuitively created by Melanie Albert, Founder & CEO Experience Nutrition, Award-winning cookbook author, Creator of the Plant-Based Food Art Movement.
This week I was excited to purchase a great Chickpea Pasta from Sonoran Pasta at the Downtown Phoenix Market and wanted to enjoy it with a quick tomato sauce.
From start-to-finish with photos and videos this took less than 30 minutes to prepare and the sauce itself cooked in 7 minutes.
Hope you enjoy this delicious simple tomato sauce! Please tag us on Social Media: #plantbasedfoodart
7 Minute Tomato Sauce Recipe
Serves 1
1 heirloom tomato, sliced
1 elephant garlic, minced
¼ cup Kalamata olives
2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
Pinch sea salt
Garnish: Green onion, sliced
SIMPLE STEPS
Pre-heat sauté pan on medium.
Add olive oil to bottom of pan.
Add tomatoes and sauté for 4-5 minutes.
Add garlic and sauté for 1 minute.
Add olives and sauté for 4-5 minutes.
The Chickpea Pasta
Use this recipe as a guide to cook refrigerated (not boxed) chickpea pasta. Cook the pasta while the tomato sauce is cooking.
SIMPLE INGREDIENTS
3 ounces pasta
½ tsp sea salt
SIMPLE STEPS
Pour about 4 cups of water and sea salt into a medium size pot.
Bring water to boil.
Add pasta to the boiling water.
Lower to simmer.
Simmer for 3-4 minutes.
Drain the pasta.
PLATING
Toss some of the pasta with the sauce.
Plate with the tossed pasta, extra sauce, and green onion.
Based on a request for a chocolate dessert that is actually healthy, I’m happy to share this simple-to-prepare, delicious, healthy Avocado Chocolate Pudding. This dessert features a few superfoods as toppings for the pudding: Goji berries, raw cacao nibs, and hemp seeds.
Simple Recipe from “A New View of Healthy Eating” by Melanie Albert
Chocolate Avocado Pudding
Incredible, rich, and creamy vegan chocolate pudding will delight everyone. Make it for dessert or an after-work or after-school snack. Once you’ve made this avocado pudding, experiment by adding some extras, such as bananas, raspberries, blueberries, strawberries, homemade nut milk, and freshly ground spices, like cinnamon and nutmeg.
SIMPLE INGREDIENTS
2 ripe avocados
4 Medjool dates, pitted and sliced
1 tsp vanilla extract or 1 vanilla bean, scraped
1/4 cup raw cacao powder
1 cups water
Avocado Pudding Mise en Place
SIMPLE STEPS
Place all ingredients in food processor or high-speed blender.
Blend on high for about 2 minutes.
Stop and scrape down sides of food processor or blender, if needed.
Blend for another 2 minutes or until completely pureed and smooth.
Refrigerate for 1-2 hours.
Enjoy topped with goji berries, cacao nibs, hemp seeds,citrus, raw cacao powder.
Avocado Pudding: Ingredients into Food Processor
Avocado Chocolate Pudding. Superfoods.Add Edible Flowers & Raw Cacao Powder to your Plate.
Looking for a “healthy” Sweet Potato with Broccoli and a Cheesy Sauce?
Based on a request for a “healthy” sweet potato and broccoli dish, I’m happy to share with you a Roasted Veggies Sweet Potato Bowl with Hemp Seed Cream.
Local Farmers Veggies. In addition to the sweet potato, the dish was inspired and intuitively created with our local Arizona farmer, Crooked Sky Farms, green and yellow beans,heirloom tomatoes, sweet potato, and purple pepper.
Beautiful late Summer veggies from our local Arizona farmers.
Learn to Roast Veggies. When we cook healthy plant-based meals, one of the simple culinary techniques is roasted. We can use this simple method to cook whatever our local farmers are growing. The dish will be beautiful and tasty every time you make it.
Hemp Seed Cream. The hemp seed cream is a simple-to-prepare, tasty, healthy cream that works well as a plant-based sauce for sweet potatoes. And, it can even be used as a cheesy flavor on home-made flatbread.
Roasted Veggie Sweet Potato Recipe
Use this recipe as a guide to create your own Roasted Veggie Sweet Potato Bowl. Bake the sweet potato and roast veggies that your local farmers are growing.
SIMPLE INGREDIENTS
1 sweet potato
1 cup green or yellow beans
1 heirloom tomato, sliced in rounds
1 pepper, sliced
1 stalk broccoli, sliced
1 slice cabbage
1 lemon, sliced
3 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
Pinch sea salt
Garnish: Few leaves fresh basil
Veggies all set to chop.
SIMPLE STEPS
Pre-heat oven to 425 degrees F.
Slice veggies.
Place veggies on-by-one into a small bowl.
Drizzle with olive oil and sea salt.
Toss to coat all parts of the veggies.
Place veggies onto parchment-lined flat sheet.
Roast for 12 minutes.
Flip the veggies.
Roast for 12-15 minutes.
Bake the sweet potato another 10 minutes, until soft.
Chopped veggies.
Veggies, olive oil, and sea salt.
One-by-one toss veggies with olive oil & sea salt.
Veggies mindfully placed onto parchment-lined sheet pan.
Roasted Veggies!
Simple Hemp Seed Cream
As a plant-based alternative for a creamy sauce for the sweet potato and veggies, this hemp seed cream is quick and simple to prepare. The hemp seeds offer healthy fats and protein, while the nutritional yeast adds B-12 and a cheesy taste to the cream.
SIMPLE INGREDIENTS
¼ cup hemp seeds
2 tbsp nutritional yeast
2 tbsp fresh lemon juice
2 tbsp water
Pinch sea salt
Hemp Seed Cream: Mise en Place
SIMPLE STEPS
Place all ingredients into a small blender.
Blend for about a minute or two, until creamy.
Add more water, as needed.
Taste.
Add additional lemon juice or sea salt to suite your preferred taste.
Hemp Seed Cream ingredients in blender.
Blend for 1-2 minutes.
Creamy Hemp Seed Cream
FOOD ART PLATING
Place sweet potato into a bowl.
Drizzle hemp seed cream onto the sweet potato.
Layer the additional veggies into the bowl.
Garnish with fresh basil.
Plating Mise en Place
Food Art Plating: Sweet Potato Bowl
For additional plant-based recipes sign up to receive all of our Experience Nutrition Blog post.
A simple way to think about eating locally and eating with the season, is to eat what your local farmers are growing, or what’s growing in your garden.
What Grows Together Goes Together
A simple way to think about how to create a dish with your local farmers produce, is to create with the vegetables, fruit, and herbs that are growing together. Intuitively, have fun mixing and matching different colors, textures, shapes, and sizes.
Right now in Arizona, in late August, it’s still hot, with temperatures above 105 degrees. With the heat, hydrating foods, such as cucumbers, tomatoes, peppers, cantaloupe, and watermelons are still growing.
Thank You Farmers & Farmers Markets!
As always, thanks to our Arizona farmers markets and farmers for continuing to serve our community with incredible food throughout the Coronavirus Pandemic and our extra hot summer.
Special thanks to the Downtown Phoenix Farmers Market and the following farmers for the produce in the Lemon Cucumber Tomato Tower. Crooked Sky Farms (cucumbers, tomatoes), Blue Sky Organic Farm (parsley).
Arizona Summer Veggies
Lemon Cucumber Tower Salad Recipe
This quick salad, inspired by the beautiful, unique crisp lemon cucumber, is paired with an heirloom tomato, along with a fresh parsley gremolata.
Use this recipe as a guide to create your own fresh summer salad with your favorite cucumbers and tomatoes. Add flavor with a simple parsley gremolata as a dressing.
Have fun plating your own version of Food Art with this dish. Post it on Instagram and Tag #ExperienceNutrition
Optional: Dolmas: Stuffed Grape Leaves (Not use in plating)
Lemon Cucumber Tomato Tower Mise En Place
Simple Steps
Gremolata
Rough chop the basil, parsley, and almonds.
Place all ingredients (basil, parsley, almonds, lemon juice, olive oil) into a small bowl.
Toss gently.
Add more lemon, olive oil, or sea salt to suit your taste.
Gremolata Ingredients: Basil, Almonds, Parsley
Plating
Enjoy mindfully plating your salad to create your own Food Art.
Place a cucumber round on the bottom of plate.
Add a tablespoon of the gremolata and a few capers.
Place a tomato slice onto the gremolata.
Add a tablespoon of the gremolata and a few capers.
Continue with a few more layers of cucumbers and tomatoes.
Garnish with fresh basil, parsley, olives, capers, and dehydrated tomato.
Plating Mise en Place: Lemon Cucumber Tomato Tower
Watch the plating video and then have fun plating your own Cucumber Tomato Tower.
Enjoy your Cucumber Tomato Tower
My tower tipped over….but…still delicious, so wanted to share it with you.
Lemon Cucumber Heirloom Tomato
Stay in touch with us on www.facebook.com/ExperienceNutritionAZ and Instagram @experiencenutritionaz and tag us #experiencenutrition on your plant-based culinary creations.
We have now, with careful consideration of the Coronavirus Pandemic, postponed our Sedona Plant-Based Culinary and Self-Care Retreat to November 13-16, 2020.
If you’re interested in a once-in-a-lifetime memorable weekend, please reach out to me. Would love to chat and get to know you and answer any questions. Also, please let me know if you’d like to create a custom retreat for a group of friends or your business.
By Melanie Albert, Plant-Based Culinary Leader, Founder & CEO, Experience Nutrition in Phoenix, Arizona. Award-winning cookbook author, speaker, corporate wellness, team building, retreat leader, and caterer.
A few memories from our September 2019 Sedona Plant-Based Culinary & Self-Care Retreat.
by Melanie A. Albert, intuitive cooking expert, author, speaker, retreat host, Founder & CEO Experience Nutrition Group, LLC
Within my home-cooking, cooking classes, cookbook, and recipe blogs, one of my key philosophies is learning some simple culinary techniques and then using the techniques to cook all kinds of veggies. For those of you who know me from classes, Facebook, and my blog, you are aware that I love roasting veggies.
Roasting is simple and the cooking process caramelizes the veggies keeping them crisp on the outside and moist on the inside. The flavor is always delicious and roasting can be used in any season with basically any veggies our farmers grow.
Today I roasted veggies that I purchased on Saturday at this week’s Gilbert Farmers Market from a few of our amazing local organic farmers: Steadfast Farms, Blue Sky Farms, Abby Lee Farms, and Crooked Sky Farms. Plus, I still had a few turnips from The Farm at South Mountain. I was especially happy to also cook beans from Crooked Sky Farms for the first time.
And, I had fun experimenting with roasting a few roots – carrots and radishes – with the whole veggie. I roasted the roots and the greens and they were so beautiful. Definitely food art!
Simple Ingredients
Sweet potatoes (Crooked Sky Farm)
Carrots (Blue Sky Organic Farm)
Radishes (Steadfast Farm)
Tomatoes (Abby Lee Farms)
Broccoli (Blue Sky Farm)
Turnips & Breakfast Radish (The Farm at South Mountain)
Black Beans (Crooked Sky Farm)
Quinoa
Organic extra virgin olive oil
Dry seasoning (Today Penzeys Fox Point (salt, shallots, chives, garlic, onion, green peppercorns)
Simple Steps
Pre-heat oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.
Slice veggies into equal-sized pieces.
Coat veggies with olive oil and seasonings.
Place veggies flat side down on parchment-lined flat sheet pan.
by Melanie A. Albert, intuitive cooking expert, author, speaker, retreat host, Founder & CEO Experience Nutrition Group, LLCs
Today I spent the day living my passions and having fun with my like-minded food friends. Next weekend (Saturday, February 17, 2018, 10am) I’ll be leading a Taste of the Market Cooking Demo at the Downtown Phoenix Public Market, so I visited the market today to see what our local farmers are growing and to get inspired for ideas for the class.
Our Winter Arizona farmers’ bounty is so incredible, I just wanted to “be” with the food and my farmer friends. I ended up staying at the market for three hours, enjoying the food, taking food, talking cooking, and having my kind of fun. Later in the day, I stopped at The Farm at South Mountain, an urban farm about a half mile from my home.
Sharing some of the beautiful food and a video of some incredible cauliflower…hope you enjoy..
In awe of the cauliflower grown by Blue Sky Organic Farm…
Powerful Purple…
Gorgeous Green…
Fresh Yellow & Orange…
Radish Red…
Taste of the Market Cooking Demo…
Thanks, Downtown Phoenix Farmers’ Market…
And all my farmer friends…Maya’s Farm…Steadfast Farm…Abby Lee Farms…Golo Family Farms…McClendon Select…Community Exchange…Blue Sky Organic Farm…
Interested in my book, you can buy it and I’ll gift wrap and mail to you.
by Melanie A. Albert, intuitive cooking expert, author, speaker, retreat host, Founder & CEO Experience Nutrition Group, LLCs
Since I’ll be farmers’ market shopping in the morning, today I decided to do another “Clean my Refrigerator Meal.” I was fortunate to see a beautiful organic purple cabbage from one of my local Arizona farmers. Rather than eat it raw in a salad or as a wrap, I quickly sautéed the purple cabbage and enjoyed it with a few of my other left-overs: Black Beluga Lentils, Rose Brown Rice, and an avocado.
Let’s look at the natural beauty of the Purple Cabbage.
Mindfully pause and enjoy the art in food.
SIMPLE INGREDIENTS
½ purple cabbage
2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
Pinch sea salt
1 avocado
½ cup black Beluga lentils
¼ cup rose brown rice (all that was left)
1 avocado
1 tsp basil extra virgin olive oil
1/4 tsp black sesame seeds
Few basil leaves
Few edible flowers
SIMPLE STEPS
Slice cabbage into strips.
Heat olive oil in saute pan on medium.
Add cabbage and sea salt.
Stir occasionally.
Plate with brown rice, lentils, and avocados.
Drizzle with basil extra virgin olive oil.
Garnish with black sesame seeds, fresh basil leaves and edible flowers.
By Melanie A. Albert, intuitive cooking expert, author, and speaker. Founder & CEO Experience Nutrition Group, LLC
To celebrate the launch of my new book, A New View of Healthy Eating, last night I enjoyed an incredible, beautiful meal at the Quiessence Restaurant at The Farm at South Mountain, in Phoenix, with my yoga friend, Jody Loren. Since The Farm is only a mile from my home, over the last decade I have enjoyed the natural, quiet beauty of the farm; the just-harvested organic veggies, flowers, and fresh herbs at Maya’s Farm; and am honored to teach “farm to table” cooking classes in the Spring and Fall of 2016.
Even though I spend a lot of time at the farm, last night’s dinner at Quiessence totally exceeded my expectations with the mindfulness and beauty of the environment at The Farm, and the outstanding, unique beauty and simple, yet complex taste and textures of the delicious meal .
The meal at Quiessence reminded me of one of my favorite quotes:
“We eat with our eyes first.”
I invite you to enjoy this photo essay of my celebratory evening at The Farm, commit to go out and enjoy the beauty of your food.
