A Couple Cooks | The Dinner Special podcast

082: Melissa Coleman: Tried-and-True Over Adventurous Foods

October 5, 2015 by Gabriel 4 Comments

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The Fauxmartha

Melissa admits to having a severe sweet tooth, and on her blog, The Fauxmartha, is where she shares her tried-and-true recipes that she brightens up to suit each season. She confesses to being an over-sharer, and believes that when you find something that works, and works well, it must be shared.

I am so excited to have Melissa Coleman of The Fauxmartha joining me on the show today.

(*All images below are Melissa’s.)

On Cooking:

I came out of the womb loving food. My mom said I was four years old, sitting at the breakfast table, and she said I would be asking what we were having for lunch and dinner while eating breakfast. And she always told me, “Melissa, eat to live, don’t live to eat.” And I still live to eat and I eat to live. I love food.

So it started with a love of food and as I grew up, probably even as a little girl I would go over to my neighbor’s house and make cookies. I even loved to bake as a young girl and then in high school, as soon as I could kind of clean up my own messes, my mom would tell you otherwise, but I started baking in the kitchen and experimenting with all sorts of crazy stuff. People were so nice to try my stuff. And that just kind of continued.

Once we went to Chicago and I was on my own, married, three meals a day, I needed to somehow prepare and I liked knowing how to do things. I liked knowing the science behind things, I liked knowing how things work and I think that’s kind of what fuels cooking: how does this work? How does baking soda work with liquid in the oven, at what temperature?

In college, I think I was probably the only one doing this, I was watching Martha Stewart on the weekends, that was really cool. And then that fuelled the interest, and she talked a lot about theories behind stuff, so I learned enough to be able to talk about it. And then one Christmas I asked for, I think it was King Arthur Whole Grain Baking Cookbook, it was this huge thick cookbook. I think it was a pale pink. I read that thing from cover to cover. I learned about wheat and the germ and the endosperm, and everything. I learned how wheat is bitter and how to cut the bitterness.

I liked food so much I had to watch myself, so when I baked I tried to use wheat flour and then tried to lighten things up for a long time. I still use a lot of wheat flour now. But I guess I would attribute a lot of that knowledge to the King Arthur Whole Grain Baking bible. It’s chunky, it’s thick.

I have not read through it in a really long time. I’m sure a lot of bloggers, and just home cooks in general experience this. You make a lot of other people’s stuff at first, a whole lot, until you begin to learn what the ingredients do together, and what you like. And so now I have my cake recipe, or my bread recipe, or my muffin recipe, like a base recipe, and then I tweak it from there. So they are my recipes, but it’s a long heritage of people and books that I learned from.

On Her Passion for Food and Cooking:

I always liked to create even as a kid, and I think that’s a little bit of what food is for me too, it’s creating. But my background is in design, so I’ve been a graphic designer for a long time. When we moved to Chicago I had a design job and I liked it for a while, and then I didn’t like it for a while, and I just kept thinking. I had these long drives to work and I would just think, “There has got to be a way to merge my two loves. There has to be a way to merge design and to merge food.” And at that point I was always blogging, and I didn’t really know that those two were so inter-connected. The way I think about food, the way I think about recipes and writing the recipes is the way I think about design. How do I communicate this in a really simple but beautiful and real fashion?

I talked to a couple of other people who were struggling to figure out what do I do? I don’t even know what I want to do. And I always tell them, “Just play.” And that’s what blogging was and cooking was for a really long time, and probably still is in a lot of ways. But just play, and natural things come out. And that’s what it was for me.

On Not Being Creative or Adventurous with Food:

(Who she thinks is creative.) It’s Molly, Molly Yeh. She’s just so fun in the kitchen. She has fun with her recipes. She’s playful with her recipes. She plays, she really plays in the kitchen. I like her approach and it encourages me. Also, through the years, I’ve followed Turntable Kitchen and I like the spices that they use in recipes. They turned me on to cardamom and so did A Sweet Spoonful. Her granola recipe, marge granola that she makes, she uses cardamom. So things I wasn’t used to trying, I never grew up with, looking at their recipes, and making some of their recipes encouraged me to add those things into mine and explore a little bit.

So I’ll just tell you a little bit about my embarrassing story that happens over and over again. I get to a meal. I am with other people who would call themselves foodies and food enthusiasts, and they bring out a plate of burrata cheese and I’m, like, “Oh no, not cheese.” A big pile of cheese turns me off big time. It’s a texture issue, and it’s a mental issue. I kind of have the palate of a child. But it’s embarrassing every time, and every meal.

I went to an event the other week and at multiple meals I had to talk about my distaste for cheese, or I had to tell them I like mild cheddar cheese. I like Parmesan, I like a certain Feta that I can get at my co-op. It’s super-duper embarrassing, but I’ve learned to own it. It’s like, I don’t like cheese. And that’s okay, and I like to bake, and that’s okay. So I think just figure it out, just own it.

My husband has taught me that. He tells everybody before we go over to their house, “She likes this and she likes that.” I’m like, “Don’t tell them that, that’s so embarrassing.” But it helps. It’s not awkward. It’s way less awkward. So just own it.

On Her Tried-And-True Recipes:

Most of the times, it’s the food that we make over and over again. I find myself with blogging, I try to think of recipes sometimes for my blog, and I’m like I should just post the recipes we make. And I need to figure out how to articulate this recipe. But we make a lot of bowls, like food and bowls which start with a grain and some vegetables and some kind of protein which is usually beans for us and then a sauce, and it’s the things that we make over and over and over again. I almost want to delete any recipe that I’ve only made once. Because most of the recipes, we make them. My blog is my resource, that is what I cook from. And then I add new recipes that we make.

A lot of the inspiration has come from things that we have eaten out, or some of our favorite things that we have out, how can we make them at home? And, probably, how can we make them better and cheaper ourselves? And that’s kind of where they come from. We’re just pretty basic people, like when I am thinking up meals for the week, I start with a grain and then build the recipe around that. I either start with a grain or I start with the vegetable drawer.

The Pressure Cooker:

Which food shows or cooking shows do you watch?

None. None. None. I used to. We’ve just gotten Hulu. We were no cable people for a long time. I watch Rick Bayless sometimes on PBS because we can stream it through an antenna.

What are some food blogs or food websites we have to know about?

A new one to me is Renée Kemps; her photography is beautiful. I go to her site to just bask in the photography. And then Love, Cake. She is actually who I base my scone recipe off of. Her recipes are so good. It’s a baking blog. I think she even has a culinary background. Her photos are beautiful. Go to Love, Cake.

We make a lot of bowls, and they can get kind of mundane and redundant, so I go to Pinch of Yum because Yum has all the sauces in the world. They are quick and easy and they come together in no time, so go to Pinch of Yum for your sauces.

We eat a lot of vegetarian foods. We are not vegetarian, although people think we are, so I go to Cookie and Kate and Naturally Ella and A Couple Cooks for inspiration on that front.

Who do you follow on Pinterest, Instagram, or Facebook or Snapchat that make you happy?

So, I’m a Pinterest delinquent. I’m barely on Pinterest. Facebook, I follow Cookie and Kate again. I love her recipes. She has roundups, which are so nice, because I just need a lot of ideas.

I like FoodieCrush on Facebook, she also has a ton of ideas. She is fun and playful.

Instagram is my time suck. I spend all my time there. I love Instagram. Again, I love Renée Kemps; her stuff is beautiful. Gosh, she’s the one that stands out the most to me. I love her stuff right now.

And then Snapchat, I am not going to join. I have to save my time somewhere. I spend it all on Instagram, so…

What is the most unusual or treasured item in your kitchen?

I am going to go with treasured; it’s not unusual, it’s very every day but it’s my chef’s knife. I have used it so much; I use it multiple times a day. The handle is starting to chip away, which it shouldn’t. It’s never spent a day in the dishwasher, but I use it so much that it is well loved.

Name one ingredient you used to dislike but now you love.

I would say I am working on cheese. Feta; I like certain Feta. It’s got to be pretty fresh.

What are a few cookbooks that make your life better?

Whole-Grain Mornings, it’s by Megan Gordon, I mentioned her earlier. I love that cookbook. It’s like a handbook for brunch, which is our favorite meal. And then naturally I love Erin’s new cookbook, The Easy Vegetarian Kitchen. It’s like a really resourceful vegetarian handbook, seasonal, so she’s got a base recipe and then how to make it across the seasons. I’d say those are the two dirtiest books in our house, which means they are well used and well loved.

What song or album just makes you want to cook?

I listen to Sylvan Esso. I don’t know if people know of her. We listen to her over and over again. Her song Play It Right is kind of a little too mellow, but it works for me, and my daughter walks around the house saying, “Play it right, play it right, play it right.”

On Keeping Posted with Melissa:

I am so simple. I find the one thing that works is Instagram. You can find me there always.

057: Grace Rusch: Finding a Diet That’s Right for You

July 8, 2015 by Gabriel Leave a Comment

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The Sunday Table

Grace is a self-taught cook and a holistic nutrition consultant. She feels that our diets should be personalized, with a balance between food that makes us feel good and food that is healthy. On her blog, Grace features seasonal, organic, and whole-food ingredients, and she follows a mainly gluten-free, dairy-free, plant-based diet.

I am so happy to have Grace Rusch of The Sunday Table here on the show today.

(*All images below are Grace’s.)

On Starting Her Blog:

I’d say it was just a matter of wanting to continually be inspired by new recipes or new ingredients. It helps me keep things interesting and that way I’m looking at new cookbooks, new recipes online and trying different ingredients.

I’m always inspired by seasonal ingredients, as well. So, the blog is really just a vehicle for me to constantly come up with new things for dinner and for breakfast. That way food’s not boring.

On Her Interest in Food and Cooking:

I’ve had a long-time interest in food and cooking.

I started cooking at a young age, just helping my mom in the kitchen. So, it probably stems from that good foundation that she built and instilled in me. And then, I got a lot more into it in college and high school. I really started to get into nutrition and thinking about how the food we eat affects how we feel and our bodies. So, that really is what, kind of, jump-started my interest in cooking. Through that, I’ve discovered how food actually made me feel. And through that, I found out I was gluten and dairy intolerant. So, it’s just been a journey.

When I moved to California, this “California fresh” fare was really inspiring to me. I come from the Midwest; I’m from Minnesota. And not that we didn’t eat healthy growing up, but it wasn’t quite the same cuisine. So, in college in California, I really started to use fresh produce and make that the foundation of my meal. Since that was something that was relatively new to me, it really inspired me to find new recipes.

Finding food blogs was also an inspiration to me, as a source for new recipes.

What else inspires me is just the food that makes me feel good. I try to eat food that’s healthy, but also tastes delicious. I definitely wouldn’t say I only eat for nutrition. Sure, that’s my basis, but it also has to taste good, because I also really enjoy eating.

What pushes me further is the fact that I have some dietary restrictions. And so, I have to constantly be creative and be adapting recipes to make it something that I can eat that’s not going to hurt my stomach.

On Experimenting in the Kitchen:

I’d say I’m a creative or curious cook. I just throw things together. I don’t have too many total flops, but that’s because I love adapting recipes that I know work. Or, I just throw things together that are super simple, like oatmeal or an egg bake. There’s a lot of really simple foundations that you can build on to make something healthy and delicious. I’ve definitely had major flops, though. Especially in baking. There’s trial and error, for sure.

I think if you find recipes that you like, just try swapping out an ingredient. Like, having that curiosity. If you switch vegetables in a dish, that’s a pretty safe swap. Just start experimenting. If you add additional spices, that’s a pretty easy way to explore. Baking it’s a little harder. But for cooking, it should be fun and it should be kind of an experiment.

Just having the curiosity of “What happens if I add these spices?”, or you switch up the vegetable or you switch up the meat. Don’t feel like you have to have exactly what’s in the recipe, unless that’s exactly what you want to eat.

I think I look a lot to the online community. There’s so many people doing really amazing things. So, I’m continually inspired by other food bloggers. I have a lot of cookbooks and I cook from a lot of them here and there, but I don’t have one in particular that really inspires me.

On Some Good Resources for Learning to Cook:

I am a 100 percent self-taught cook in the sense that I never really looked up the science behind cooking or baking. I think you learn that over time. So, I don’t think that I went to one resource. 101 Cookbooks, Heidi Swanson was definitely a first food blog that I found. Sara Forte from Sprouted Kitchen was another one.

On Being a Holistic Nutrition Consultant:

I had considered, in college, going to school for nutrition but decided to go to school for business, but I found this holistic nutrition school in Berkeley, California which is where I live now. And so, I kind of made it my plan: “Alright, I’m already in California. After I graduate I’m going to move to Berkeley and do this program.” It took me a few years, but eventually, I signed up to do the holistic nutrition program. It really just stemmed from curiosity of how food affects our bodies and how you heal yourself from the inside out, through food.

I think it’s pretty baffling to me that people don’t have the connection between what you eat and how your body feels. So, for me, it was really just to get that information. I’m a total food science nerd, so I love learning about how what we eat affects our body and then how that affects how you feel. It really is a holistic approach how that affects the rest of your life.

There’s definitely a balance between healthy and food that makes you happy. It’s easy to go too far one way or the other, and finding a balance is really a personal preference. It’s different for everyone. For me, I definitely feel better when I eat a lot of vegetables, but I also love sweets. So, oats with maple syrup is one thing; that, even to me, is enough.

Sometimes I really want dark chocolate and I’m not going to deny myself that. So, it’s definitely different for everyone. That’s my overall philosophy: every single person has a different diet that’s right for them, and food should make you happy. It should be something that you look forward to eating, but it also should be nutrient-rich. It should be something that’s not going to eventually, down the road, make you sick.

I think that is the first question you get asked and it’s the hardest question to answer; is “What should I eat?”. Because it is so individualized. It is fun to navigate that path with people; to help them understand foods they like and foods they don’t like.

If you really hate peas, then there’s no reason to eat them. If you really hate beets…I personally hate beets. It’s really hard for me to want to cook them and eat them. Just because it’s healthy, doesn’t mean you have to eat it. You should definitely find things that you want to be eating that are also healthy.

The Pressure Cooker:

Which food shows or cooking shows do you watch?

I don’t watch any. I have a television, I rarely use it.

What are some food blogs or food websites we have to know about?

Ones that I frequently visit and actually cook from are: Sprouted Kitchen, it’s one of my favorites.

Cookie and Kate, that’s a really good one, I’ve cooked a lot of delicious things from her site.

A Couple Cooks, they have a lot of really good recipes.

Dolly and Oatmeal, she’s also gluten and dairy free, so I always love her recipes.

Who do you follow on Pinterest, Instagram, or Facebook that make you happy?

I’d say Instagram’s probably my favorite platform, just because I love to look at photography. I actually follow a lot of photographers and travel or portrait photographers on Instagram. I follow the food blog world, too, but those are the pictures that make me happiest. It’s just seeing other parts of the world and little snippits. If you’ve had a rough day and you’re feeling uninspired, it’s so nice to see these beautiful nature landscapes.

One that comes to the top of my head is Jeff Marsh. He’s a Seattle photographer, both portrait and outdoor nature photos. Beautiful, beautiful photos. Aubrie Pick, she is a local San Francisco food photographer; just amazing stuff. Oh, I recently met a photographer from Vancouver Island, Kelly Brown; she’s a wedding photographer and lifestyle. Really beautiful stuff.

What is the most unusual or treasured item in your kitchen?

I don’t think I have anything too unusual, but I have to admit, my most treasured thing right now is my Vitamix. I use it every day.

Name one ingredient you used to dislike but now you love.

Probably, snap peas. I really like them and can eat them raw now. And bell peppers. I kind of have a love hate relationship with them. I’m learning to like green beans; still not my favorite.

What are a few cookbooks that make your life better?

Recently, I’ve been returning to Vegetable Literacy by Deborah Madison; I love that one. The new Sprouted Kitchen cookbook just came out, that’s a really great one and her previous cookbook is excellent. I’ve also been cooking a lot lately from Vibrant Food, which is Kimberly Hasselbrink’s cookbook.

What song or album just makes you want to cook?

I love music. I went to school for music business, so music is a big part of my life. I couldn’t just pick one, but I always go to Motown or old soul or funk music in the kitchen. It’s just fun, upbeat, and inspires you. Right now, I’ve been listening a lot to Brandi Carlile’s new album, The Firewatcher’s Daughter; that’s a great one. So, a big mix.

On Keeping Posted with Grace:

Instagram is my preferred platform. But I have a Facebook page, I’m on Twitter, I’m on Pinterest, and of course the blog.