Cooking from the heart

It has taken me nearly ten years of cooking for yoga retreats here at Bromley to realize that what some of my kinder guests would say: “your food tastes so good because you cook with so much love” actually might have some truth to it.  So as I learn through my yoga practice to release and relax and trust…. to get out of my head and into my body,  I have begun to embark on this practice of cooking from my heart.  If it is true that the heart’s electromagnetic field is five thousand times stronger than the brain’s – as I am learning reading Shiva Rea’s amazing book “Tending the Heart Fire” – then maybe I should give it a whirl.   Not that this is any full proof method…  and not that there haven’t been some major mistakes….   but it sure beats rigorously following a recipe which has never been my forte.  Moreover….  trawling for vegan and vegetarian recipes online is fun but adapting them to what is available here in Jamaica adds another layer of difficulty to my existing stress trying to get three hearty meals a day  in front of hungry yogis.  Added to that, on my almost daily trips to our ONE decent local grocery store I might find spelt flour, quinoa, even Earth Balance mayonnaise,  but its as certain that the next time I go none of these things will be on offer.  So I might as well throw out all my carefully planned menus and wing it right?.  There are rules of course… mine happen to be based around color and flavor and presentation and mostly around there being ENOUGH on the table.  There is my rule of always having three vegetable sides.. or for light lunch three salads.  Soup is a godsend and I thank my friend Suzee Ackermann for telling me to serve it daily….. and its certainly a dish where I can experiment with cooking from the heart more freely.  I literally pause and listen to what I suppose is my taste buds or stomach, however silly that sounds, before I add a new seasoning.

 

 

The really wonderful news is that organic farming is on the rise in Jamaica…. Kinsgtonians (in the capital) have for a while had the opportunity to have organic greens grown up in the Blue Mountains delivered to them, but here on the North Coast we havent’ had that gift till recently when Potosi Farms and Stush in the Bush, and since November, Mt. Plenty Organics, have made available the most gorgeous plentiful greens and vegetables formerly not even grown in the island… baby kale, a range of beans, radishes, endive, & baby turnips just to name a few.   Then there is the joy of each Friday morning heading off to our Farmers Market, now two years thriving, where I  have the pleasure of browsing stalls loaded with fresh greens, fruit, and herbs, not to mention making my first stop my new friend Patrick from whom I might order 2 doz or more fresh coconuts which he will cut and put in the back of my pick up before I leave with my loaded baskets.  There is a cast of characters there of course because this is Jamaica…   “Colonel” in his Fidel Castro copycat outfit and beard…. who hands out knock you out white rum shots to his buddies… and can be relied upon to have a supply of red peppers.  The Bee man who came to the house to remove an enormous hive bees had made behind a bathroom wall.

Gungo pea & Cauliflower soup

raw plantain w/curry-lemon-scallion

raw pak choy & grated carrot salad

As I say mistakes DO happen….   distracted by a chatty guest in my kitchen, I pureed an ENTIRE scotch bonnet – fiery hot and usually removed completely – into a batch of soup I had just conjured up with fresh gungo peas (small tasty green peas) cauliflower and coconut milk.   Luckily it was a bath for 20 and absorbed the heat of the peppers without sending anybody to the hospital!   Delicious actually as these little peppers pack a heck of a lot of flavor and have become my new best cooking friend.  Cooking vegan has turned from a total fright for me into something really fun to explore.   I have learned to use nutritional yeast as a cheese replacement in pestos and on pastas and pizzas, and am building a line of desserts that satisfy even my dessert loving husband.   Again adapting an online recipe for chia coconut pudding… I added fresh coconut jelly and melted raw chocolate from the market…… and after a couple of hours in the fridge had a yummy chocolate coconut mousse which has become my husband’s favorite.  Thanks to my beloved Vitamix I have been making pumpkin seed, almond and peanut butters and raw chocolate energy balls as well as grabbing a bag of frozen mango out of the freezer, adding coconut cream and turning out a mango sorbet within minutes.

Lots of people ask me why I don’t get more help in the kitchen…   I do have the marvelous Valerie – our housekeeper and cook who has her own dishes which I never touch like a peppery green soup made with Callaloo (our own spinach/kale type veg)….  and fish fritters and light and airy banana bread.   But working with a tight budget and with whatever is available in my pantry is another matter.   My artist friend Tukula Ntama is one of the few who I can work side by side with….. I love how she can go into my tiny but growing veg garden and return with a handful of basil, bird peppers, and parsley and adding garlic, fresh lemon juice, ginger and olive oil whip up a fresh and vibrant green dressing.   Or how she expertly graters fresh coconut and makes coconut milk which she adds to quickly sauteed bak choy and garlic.  So YES I do miss being able to run to a Whole Foods… and I do miss asparagus, mushrooms, year round avocados, and especially berries… but hey I think we are doing pretty well with what we have.

Making fresh coconut milk

Ingredients for Tukula’s dressing.

Feta, marinaded tofu, & avocado salad with roasted pumpkin seeds.