THE FUTURE IS NOW

Cooking for Health When the World Is Sick // By Kelsey Casselbury

When the coronavirus pandemic struck, Americans collectively felt the stress and anxiety caused by closures and quarantining. In an effort to calm nerves, people turned to an old mainstay— comfort food, whether homemade (or home-baked, as noted by trending photos of sourdough starters and Dutch oven loaves on social media), or from local restaurants in the form of takeout and delivery. Data from Uber Eats during the month of March revealed which items were most-ordered during the weeks that COVID-19 prompted strict closures, and French fries took the top spot nationally. In Georgia, it was pad Thai. In Maryland, customers ordered egg, bacon and cheese sandwiches. In Oregon, fried chicken.

“Initially, when COVID-19 happened, [consumers] were eating for comfort,” says Chef Jeffrey Quasha, corporate R&D chef for Morrison Healthcare. Months in, however, and folks might be feeling the ramifications of some of those choices, whether due to weight gain or just the way they feel. Now, Quasha says, “They’re looking for healthier, elevated experiences.”

These days, consumers realize that eating a nutritious diet is one way to keep the immune system in tip-top shape to fight off potential diseases. “Food is medicine, point blank,” says Chef Andre Rush (left), a former White House executive chef, United States military chef, member of the ACF’s U.S. Military Team and owner of ChefRush LLC, and the nonprofit 2,222 Inc. He credits healthy food with saving his life after an illness left him close to death, calling himself a “sometime vegan,” who loves to cook vegetables along with whole grains and plant-based proteins, such as pea burgers.

Don’t forget that creating a menu for health could mean mental health as well, which is more important than ever during these trying times. Chef Rush recommends incorporating sources of vitamin D and omega-3 fatty acids, such as salmon, tuna and free-range chicken and turkey into diets. “They are especially helpful for depression,” he adds.

Even if a person ramps up healthy cooking at home, they need a break from time to time—so they’re still going to be calling on chefs for some of those meals, whether that means they’re stopping for lunch at a hospital cafe or ordering takeout from a local restaurant. Consumers are going to want healthier options on the menu, and it’s up to chefs to develop those options while maintaining the quality, taste and consistency of every other menu item.

Changing Times

Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, Chef Quasha said there was a gradual change in how people were eating. “We noticed that people were looking for authenticity, but on the other side of it, they were looking at sustainability and the ‘food is medicine’ approach,” he comments. “A lot of it has been pushed by Keto, Paleo and flexitarian diets.”

On top of that, there has been a significant push for plant-based diets, including incorporating additional plantbased proteins. “The centers-of-the-plate meat, which used to be 6 to 8 ounces, with a vegetable and starch doesn’t identify with our consumers anymore,” Chef Quasha says.

Offering more plant-based options tracks with potential meat shortages, due to the pandemic. “If you take a half-cup of grains with one cup of vegetables—roasted, fermented, pickled or just raw—and use protein as a garnish, that’s a healthier option,” he suggests. “If you look at the meat shortages that are happening right now because of the pandemic, a bigger push for grains and vegetables completely works with that script.”

Gaining Trust

Even if a customer logically knows they need to be opting for healthier menu items, they don’t always want to hear it. “Nobody wants to hear ‘you need to stop binging out,’” says Chef Nina Curtis (right), MBA, director and executive chef, Roseville Café & Culinary Arts, Adventist Health, in Roseville, California, nor do they necessarily trust a chef to provide them with a nutritious meal that’s still worth the money charged.

“If I can make it taste as you’re expecting it to, there’s that first level of trust you have with me,” she adds, explaining how she might take a favorite comfort food—say, spaghetti and meatballs—and turn it into a dish free from grains and meat. “I could take the pasta you’re used to, and I would ‘zoodle’ a zucchini or butternut squash. It’s a no-brainer to make marinara; that’s already plant-based vegan.” Then, if her customers didn’t have nut allergies, she would soak walnuts, dehydrate them—that makes them crisper, she says—and then pulse them in a food processor until they resemble a ground meat texture. Season them with Italian seasoning, salt and pepper, and form the walnuts like a meatball, using a little bit of olive oil. Finally, put those meatballs in a dehydrator “to remove water and dehydrate the outer shell, because you’re used to having the outer portion of a meatball crisp when they’re seared,” Chef Curtis says.

Other ways that you can make food healthier without sacrificing too much includes baking foods instead of frying them, switching from less-healthy canola oil to something like algae oil and always adding leafy greens to a plate.

Instead of approaching a dish by thinking you need to cut certain ingredients out, consider what can be added in to make it healthier. Take a taco bar, for example, says Chef Timothy Schoonmaker (below, left), CEC, CCA, director and executive chef, Centra Culinary Creations/ Food and Nutrition at Centra Health in Lynchburg, Virginia. “Tacos are extremely popular, and it can be a comfort food for some,” he notes. “So, how do you take a taco bar and make it healthier?” Rather than take away what makes a taco a taco—like the tortillas— consider adding sliced vegetables for toppings or thinned-out Greek yogurt mixed with cilantro for a drizzle that's lighter than traditional sour cream.

In some cases, gaining trust might mean educating your customers. Chef Schoonmaker says they often bring in different types of fruits and vegetables, but patrons don’t always take them

Cooking the Mindful Way

Ayurveda is a food science and philosophy dating back around 5,000 years ago in India with the same ancient origins as yoga. Although Ayurveda addresses health and wellness in general, when it comes to cooking, it is a holistic approach that focuses on balance and nature.

“The easiest way to describe it is the ‘yoga of food,’ which uses food to balance yourself and your personality,” says Chef Nalini Mehta, founder of the Happy Chef Project as well as Route to India and a longtime teacher of Ayurvedic cooking who has held roles as culinary instructor at the Natural Gourmet Institute for Food and Health and Institute of Culinary Education in New York. “The same sentiment that you would have on the mat, you also have through food.”

The word “Ayurveda” translates to “the knowledge of life”, with “ayur” meaning “life” and “veda” meaning “knowledge.” As such, the main crux of the philosophy is to be more mindful: mindful of your body, your brain, your energy and the environment around you. It’s no surprise, then, why many ayurvedic chefs also practice and/or teach meditation, including Chef Mehta, who is also a meditation and breath work instructor.

In essence, our bodies and the environment is made up of five elements: water, air, earth, spice and fire, and the idea is to find balance, not just through general wellness, but also through food. You first need to find your dosha (energy or personality). For vata types, air and space elements dominate. The fire element dominates pitta types. For kapha types, earth and water dominate.

“For example, if I have a fiery personality, or if I’m feeling burnt out or anxious and stressed like so many of us are these days, I should eat foods that are calming and cooling, such as salads and greens,” says Chef Mehta. “If you’re a very creative person, with your head often in the clouds, you should eat foods that are grounding, such as sweet potatoes and root vegetables, and even pasta and other complex carbohydrates. If you are stuck in the same routine over and over, and are maybe even a bit of a couch potato, you should eat spicy foods to perk you up and get your adrenal glands going.”

You could also have two doshas, Chef Mehta points out. Vata-pitta types tend to be both creative (air and space) and ambitious (fire), so it’s no wonder many musicians, artists, writers, and of course, chefs, fall into this group.

Ayurveda also focuses on using a wide variety of herbs as natural medicine.

Ashwagandha as of late has gotten more traction for its immunity-boosting and stress reduction properties. We’ve all heard more about how turmeric and black pepper have anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties as well. And then there’s ginger, fennel and carraway for gut/digestive health, stinging nettle for bone health, and many others. In addition to whole form, many of these herbs are available in powder or droplet form that can be added to foods and beverages as a concentrate. “I like to call it a kitchen pharmacy,” Chef Mehta says.

Ayruvedic cooking has other benefits; it’s a natural way to cook with the seasons, which helps the environment as well as our own tastes and dietary needs. “We crave grounding root vegetables in the winter because there is more air and space in the form of cold, blowing winds,” Chef Mehta she says. “We crave cooling salads in the summer when there’s more fire in the air.”

In a world as uncertain and changing as the current one, Ayurveda and Ayruvedic cooking offers just another route toward achieving balance, mindfulness and enlightenment through the wide variety of food at our fingertips. -Amelia Levin because of a lack of familiarity. He recalls bringing in Swiss chard and serving it as a side, and “People didn’t really know what it was,” he says. “I said, let’s take that unique vegetable, let’s put it out and sample it one day. The next time you put it out, it sells considerably.”

Adapting To The New Normal

Salad bars have long been a staple of healthy eating, especially in foodservice segments such as healthcare and colleges—but they might be a thing of the past, thanks to the coronavirus pandemic. That doesn’t mean that nutritious salads are off-limits entirely, though. “We can’t open salad bars, but you can build a madeto-order salad station,” Chef Quasha states. “Why can’t you have a signature item where you’re featuring a beautiful composed strawberry salad with candied pecans, onions and feta cheese, and put a wild Alaskan salmon on there?”

The salad bars were immensely popular in Chef Curtis’ cafe, too, but she’s figured out a new way to get those vegetables to her customers while they’re at home during closures. Her “Veg Out” boxes are much like a CSA box in that they are full of produce that can feed up to three people and can be picked up curbside. The cafe launched the sale of the boxes in May. “I’m selling it as you still get the salad bar in the comfort of your home,” she explains.

No matter what, good marketing and food composition still matters, but it’s even more important to encourage customers to choose healthier options. “If you have an amazing buffalo cauliflower sandwich and you have beautiful marketing,” Chef Quasha says, “people will be more inclined to have that.”

Kelsey Casselbury is a freelance writer, editor and designer who focuses on food and health. She has a degree in journalism from The Pennsylvania State University and lives near Annapolis, Maryland.