I am a professional natural foods chef and a passionate home cook. My commitment to using the purest local, seasonal ingredients grown without pesticides means I cook as much as possible with produce that is grown in the gardens of small farmers who live nearby. Dairy products, when I use them, come from cows that are raised on local pasture, and eggs are gathered from hens that run free, eating grass and grubs. My first love is crafting food artisanally, so the whole grain breads I bake rise with the power of wild yeast alone. Butter, yogurt and cheese are made in my kitchen or on nearby farms. While I favor artfully crafting food, I am adept at bringing cooking down to basics and keeping it simple when teaching others. In this way, I hope to provide an example of how we can feed ourselves in ways that are delicious, respectful of all living creatures and the environment, grounded in culinary tradition and supportive of lasting good health. I am a graduate of the Natural Gourmet Institute for Health and the Culinary Arts, the nation's only accredited, professional chef's training program with a focus on health and natural foods. I also completed the Natural Gourmet's Food Therapy program, a one-year course taught by Annemarie Colbin, designed to train health professionals in using food as a tool for healing. I completed internship training at the Lukas Klinik, a cancer hospital in Arlesheim, Switzerland, and at the Smith Farm Center for Healing and the Arts cancer retreat program, based in Washington, DC. I have studied food and healing for more than twenty years, with two decades of experience cooking for those with special dietary needs due to health conditions. I have also especially loved cooking for my family, including my three children, whose ages range from teenager to toddler.