I grew up in Richland, Pennsylvania, a small town in the heart of Pennsylvania Dutch country. Coming from a small town had its benefits. As a child, I spent lots of time playing outdoors and had the opportunity to spend a lot of time with my grandparents and family. Almost everyone in my family cooked well. My parents prepared fresh food almost daily and our requirement was to be on time for meals, use good manners, and help clean up afterward. They recognized the importance of a family meal and saw it as an opportunity to spend time together. Of course, at times it was an infringement on playtime, but overall I felt appreciative for the meals and values my parents provided. I was quite fortunate for the stability this brought me, and those experiences continue to help me today.
I began to cook when I was young. The first cooking class I gave was in second grade when we were required to give some type of demonstration.
Being a bit of a procrastinator I was not prepared.
At breakfast I got the great idea to teach the class how to make oatmeal, so I got my father to teach me. I headed off to school armed with my ingredients, a pot, hot plate, and wooden utensils. My class was a success and the oatmeal I made was both delicious and vegan!
When I was in my teens, my grandparents and relatives began to develop degenerative health problems. Diabetes, high cholesterol, high blood pressure, and breast cancer were touching the lives of my family.
I became concerned that the same health problems could become part of my future, since science at that time indicated that many of these health problems were hereditary. Throughout my high school years I led quite an active life. I could pretty much eat whatever I wanted and not gain a pound. While I was not a huge fan of meat, I did love cheese, ice cream, pretzels, and pizza. During my freshman year of college, my unhealthy lifestyle of bad food and bad beer caught up with me and I started to gain weight. I wasn’t happy with my body so I decided to make some changes like taking regular walks and eating more vegetables. I also eliminated refined sugar from my diet.
Over the next couple years, I continued to watch the health of my family members decline. I saw how they struggled with their effort to diet and make changes later in life. I decided I would rather make changes to my lifestyle while I was young.
At the age of twenty-two I became more and more interested in health. I began exploring vegetarian cooking both for better health and ethical reasons; I like animals. A number of years later I discovered macrobiotics when my friend, Ralph, invited me to attend a lecture on macrobiotics given by Patrick Riley, a macrobiotic teacher and shiatsu practitioner. That lecture changed my life. The philosophy made perfect sense to me and I liked the idea that we are in control of our destinies. Transitioning to a macrobiotic diet was pretty easy for me as I was already a vegetarian eating grains, veggies, and beans. This was the beginning of my lifelong study of macrobiotics and my passion, food.