I used to cook for fun. For hours.
I loved hosting—putting out a spread and watching people enjoy it… when they did. Sometimes I enjoyed watching them sweat because my food was so aggressively spicy. My husband (when we were still mere acquaintances) was the first person brave enough to tell me my food burned people’s faces and that this wasn’t necessarily a virtue.
Gotta love Aussie bluntness. I did then. I still do.
It was refreshing. And honestly? A little hot.
I grew up in the kitchen. My mother is a phenomenal cook and baker—chemistry-minded, precise, and deeply intuitive. She’s a brilliant woman with more degrees than I can remember on any given day, teaches at seminary, runs a sport-horse farm, and has the greenest thumb I know. My father is also a great cook. Food was foundational in our home.
I went to Mexico on an exchange and came back with a love for spice… and also with a collection of tiny, unwanted passengers that quietly wrecked my health for years and permanently changed the way I eat.
Ironically, my mom’s cooking style is nearly the opposite of mine. She’s a dedicated meat eater—subtly sweet flavors, cheese, beef, bacon drippings in eggs. She makes the best Thanksgiving spread I’ve ever had and has since become something of a keto sensei. I bow.
I lean hard in the other direction: extra virgin olive oil, coconut oil, power greens, fermented foods, dark coffee, bittersweet desserts, red wine, neat Scotch, and tequila blanco. Not vegan—but plant-heavy. Paleo-ish. Sugar-free. Blood type A to her O, if you’re into that sort of thing.
My health, my marriage, and eventually my children slowly reined in my spice obsession and pulled me deeper into nutrition—not as a trend, but as survival. I nearly studied nutrition formally, but a conversation with my high school journalism teacher nudged me toward journalism instead. Ultimately, I shifted away from journalism—after I became seriously ill, had to move home, change schools, and take far longer than planned to finish my degree. I eventually emerged with a political science degree, a very long story, and a deep need to find God outside of the United States.
During my years with YWAM, I traveled widely and cooked everywhere—Scotland, Norway, France, Spain, and Morocco. I ate bread straight from an outdoor oven in an alley with Turkish and Syrian women in Antakya and learned to make Turkish coffee in the same city. Cambodia taught me clean, bright flavors that grew spicier the closer we came to Thailand. My husband and I drank the best coffee of our lives in Ethiopia, roasted, ground, and brewed on the spot by a woman squatting beside a pan.
Australia wins for black pepper pies (sorry England). The UK for fish and chips. And Chinese food—real Chinese food—is an entirely different, beautiful thing when made by a Chinese family in their own home.
Then children arrived.
And suddenly I was scraping lovingly prepared, exotic, expensive food off the floor.
My son went from moussaka to PB&J shortly after turning one. My girls followed suit. Simplicity became mercy.
We moved to Northern Ireland, where my already “missionary frugal” grocery habits were exposed as borderline extravagant. I learned Irish frugal. My kids started eating dinner. I gardened. I read Nourishing Traditions. I fermented everything.
Fermentation became my creative outlet—cheap, fascinating, and wildly effective. Ginger beer. Probiotic sodas. Milk kefir that erased my son’s dark circles and cracked lips, eased my anxiety, and calmed food reactions I didn’t yet have language for.
Northern Ireland didn’t work long-term for our family, but it was where my relationship with food—and God’s hand in it—was restored.
Food speaks to me. I use it to speak to others.
My cooking evolved from elaborate → simple → intensely health-focused. I love the challenge of making food that nourishes real bodies in real seasons—whether that’s nut-free, high-protein paleo muffins for school lunches or something rich enough to satisfy life on a restrictive anti-mycotoxin diet.
I’m picky. Very. And that makes cooking both maddening and deeply satisfying.
Once, while waiting in Scotland for my husband’s green card, I wrote a cookbook for friends. I planned two. Then pregnancy arrived, life exploded in the best way, and the books paused. This early version remains here not because it’s current (it isn’t), but because it’s part of the story.
I’ve changed every recipe in it more than once.
I no longer use shortening or industrial fats. These days it’s grass-fed butter, coconut oil, avocado oil, and extra virgin olive oil. My cooking is simpler now. If dinner takes more than 20–30 minutes, we’re having quesadillas and carrot sticks. Fallbacks matter.
This was never meant to be a marketplace wedge. It was therapy. Some family members printed copies. I still smile when I see them.
I’m currently finishing a fully updated version of that cookbook—rewritten, refined, and aligned with how I actually cook and eat now. It represents hundreds of hours of work and will eventually be released for purchase. I may choose to gift it to my email list when the time comes, but either way, this earlier version remains here as a snapshot of where it all began.
Enjoy.
Or laugh.
Whatever suits you best.
A note from the future (2026)
When I wrote this, I didn’t yet know I had autoimmune disease—or how poorly my genetics tolerate long-term plant-heavy eating.
In the years since, my nutrition has shifted significantly toward higher protein and more animal-based support, especially during pregnancy, postpartum, and autoimmune recovery. That evolution wasn’t ideological—it was biochemical.
This post reflects a real chapter of my life. It also reflects how much clarity comes after you stop forcing your body to fit a philosophy.
Food is still how I love people.
It just looks different now.