Vegetarian Cookery Day.

Thursday OCTOBER 7th 2010 in Chrysalis Retreat Centre, Donard, Co. Wicklow.

This is a full day of recipes and techniques for using grains, pulses, seeds and nuts in everyday vegetarian dishes. It is suitable for both beginners and advanced cooks alike. I am honoured (again) to be asked to present this class by the team at Chrysalis. I have cooked there on and off as a relief chef over many years.

The format is a 10:30am start with the demonstration of a number of recipes and dishes which will then form a shared lunch. Timing techniques for pulling a number of dishes together at one go will be discussed. Also discussed will be grain and pulse cooking, how to balance a vegetarian diet and how to integrate vegetarian dishes into a non-vegetarian household - these days it is much easier and more frequent for people to eat vegetarian. This shift has come as a part of an overall move towards healthier eating habits.

After lunch, sauce making, flavouring with herbs and spices is discussed as well as quick fast meals for busy lifestyles. Also discussed will be ways to make the transition to a vegetarian diet and pitfalls in nutrition to avoid. Healing diets and accounting for food sensitivities is also covered. Full notes and rcipe sheets are given out and there is plenty of discussion and time for questions.

The format is quite tight as we cover a lot of topics ... follow up support is available through this website.

Biochemical Individuality is THE reason you need to tailor your diet, specifically, to your own body. Read on for why and insights into why diet can heal the way it does.The scientist who is predominantly associated with the bringing to light of biochemical individuality is Dr Roger Williams, a biochemist from Texas, USA who published a book Biochemical Individuality - the Basis for the Genetotrophic Concept.

In 2008 I came across a food pyramid from the University of Michigan Integrative Medicine [U.M.I.M.] program. The food pyramid was a refreshing and revolutionary simple in its approach with water at the base and fruit and vegetables following. It is a organic and natural foods based approach the is scientific in evaluation and meant to to be altered according to need and body type etc. It is the clearest and best example of what I know to be true about diet and nutrition, human health and healing disease with diet as a thereputic tool. There is a FREE program running on the FACEBOOK page - become a fan and join the event.

Jesse Kalu, a Native American flute player commented to me once whilst sitting in on a cookery/awareness module I was teaching in Sedona, Arizona that I possessed the trait of Awareness Aware of Itself. I had never heard the phrase before.  I suppose this is something akin to the 'Observer' mode in western mysticism/pyschospiritual terminology.