Attention: Health Professionals, Home Cooks, and Spirit Seekers
Special Report
"7 Secrets for Boosting Creativity & Confidence in the Kitchen: Save Time & Money While Improving Your Health!"
with Julie S. Ong, author of The EverythingÂŽ Guide to Macrobiotics http://www.juliesong.wordpress.com
Julie: Hello everyone, and welcome! I’m Julie S. Ong, macrobiotic counselor and natural chef. I’m so excited to be calling in today from beautiful San Francisco, California to discuss a topic I’m extremely passionate about. As my close friends and team members can tell you, I’ve been enthusiastically working toward this point for six years now, and I can’t wait to share with you all of the insights and inspirations I’ve learned and embraced. Today’s call is entitled: “7 Secrets for Boosting Creativity & Confidence in the Kitchen: Save Time & Money While Improving Your Health." You see, there is actually a spiritual process behind cooking. It's not as simple as just watching cooking shows on TV or following a recipe from a book. Those who derive true delight and fulfillment from the act of cooking have made a conscious and passionate commitment to exploring their creativity – to embracing their uniquely brilliant ideas instead of just blindly following the advice of authority figures. By entering into this process of self-discovery, you’ll build your confidence not only in the kitchen, but in all realms of day-to-day life. Today, we’ll explore how to transcend the expectations of society, and to turn obstacles into opportunities so you can tap into unlimited creativity. I’ll share with you the secret techniques I use to boost creativity and confidence in the kitchens of clients all around the world, helping them generate more time, money, and freedom. I can promise you this will be a valuable, info-packed call that will give you invaluable resources you can start using right away. First, a brief background about me and why I'm doing this work. About 15 years ago, I had a miraculous wake-up call when I decided to learn how to cook. I was already pretty healthy, so my decision was fueled by a true desire to become more skilled in the kitchen, rather than just losing weight or becoming more physically fit. So I asked one of my friends if he’d teach me how to cook. To my surprise, our first session had little to do with cooking. He rambled on and on about yin and yang, and talked about his philosophies on food. I kept saying, “But I want to know how to cook,” and he just smiled as he went on about the integration of food as a way to balance life. As I listened, I became more interested. By the end of the night, I had learned more than I had ever expected. Instead of a “cooking lesson,” I had completed a lesson in awareness and food consciousness, and it had inspired me to balance my body with food. Fueled by a desire to learn more, I began gathering morsels of information, amazed by how much I didn’t know. I quickly realized that I wasn’t nearly as healthy as I had imagined. A new pathway had been opened, and I knew I had no choice but to pursue life in a different way. Yin and yang were infused into every aspect of my life, not just cooking.
Ever since I could remember, I had suffered from severe acne, excruciating migraine headaches, sinusitis, and low self esteem. But as I pursued the yin and yang of life with increased consciousness, my health and confidence dramatically improved. My knowledge grew as I studied at the Kushi Institute, completing all four levels of macrobiotic training. After that, I became a natural chef at Bauman College of Holistic Nutrition and Culinary Arts, preparing meals for those healing from cancer. In addition to cooking for these patients, I also guided them toward new beliefs and life patterns for greater health and vitality. I was served as head chef at Manzanita Restaurant in Oakland, CA, which specializes in organic vegan macrobiotic cuisine. I believe that preparing food with a deep connection to the Earth helps to open the body and soul to a higher level of happiness and awareness. When you bring this truth and balance into the kitchen, which is the heart of the home, it ripples throughout all you do, feel, and think. This is truly my passion, teaching others to free themselves from the inside out by fueling their body, mind, and soul by infusing their core beliefs and truths into every dish. Now, let’s walk you through my 7 amazing secrets to boosting creativity and confidence in the kitchen. Once you learn and implement them, you’ll generate more time, money, and freedom, for a simpler, lower-stress life. Secret #1 Here is the #1 Universal Secret: You don't need recipes to cook. You were born with an inner guidance system for preparing life-enriching foods. The world’s best chefs already know this. When I was working at the restaurant, I didn’t have time to check out recipes. Time was of the essence—we could barely get everything prepared and on the table. So instead of poring over lists of ingredients and instructions, I just cooked the food and served it. No thinking about it, just getting it done. At first it was rather scary, and there was plenty I still had to learn. But along the way, something amazing happened. I found that my timing and intuition got better with every dish. I stopped using measurements, and I just intuitively added the right amount of spices and herbs and seasonings. And you know what? It came out right each and every time. I trusted my inner guidance system, and everything just fell into place. So you don’t need a big book of recipes. In fact, recipes actually become sort of a crutch, keeping you from trusting your intuition. When you use them, you’re not using all of your assets. As you become more comfortable in the kitchen and trust that everything will turn out okay, you develop an all-encompassing confidence that you can take with you out into the real world—your job, your relationships, and anything else that requires truth and intuition. I can’t emphasize enough that cooking is about so much than just following recipes. In fact, the traditional method of food preparation involved only intuition, not written instruction. It’s a process of growth that just takes practice. The more you do it, the better you’ll get, and eventually it will become second nature. So when I hear my clients limiting themselves by saying they don't know how to cook, I let them know that they’re missing an opportunity to
grow, to expand their potential, and to live life to the fullest. Some clients ask if it’s okay to follow their grandparents’ recipes to make traditional dishes. Sure, it’s fine to try out time-honored recipes to get in touch with your cultural roots. But you don’t want to get locked into just following those recipes over and over. As your creativity expands, you can create new dishes centered around your family’s culinary heritage. Sure, you’ll make some mistakes along the way, but that’s how you learn to balance ingredients in a meal and how to make substitutions. This is an empowering process, and it allows you to make more informed decisions instead of just following someone else’s advice or instructions. Just because someone wrote a recipe doesn’t mean you’ll like the dish prepared the same way. You might prefer it to be more spicy, less spicy, or seasoned differently. When you cook without a recipe, you can adjust the seasonings and ingredients to make it your own. Following recipes is not cooking—it’s assembling, throwing things together in a bowl, putting them in the oven or on the stove, and then serving them. You can infuse a meal with your unique flair by trusting your energy and intuition. Secret #2 Food is not just about nutrition and calories—it’s also comprised of life force energy, related to the energy of the seasons and the time day and your moods. In the Far East, they call this energy “chi” in China, “ki” in Japan, and “prana” in India. When you balance this energy with external forces, you’ll become centered and live in harmony with nature. The key to achieving this balance is cooking according to the seasons. For example, in wintertime you don’t want to eat cooling foods, like salads and frozen desserts. Instead, you want warming, strengthening dishes like hearty stews and soups and thick porridges. In the heat of summer, you want cool and refreshing foods like raw salads, fresh fruit, and light sautéed dishes. Seasonal cooking will help your body stay attuned to the order of the universe, becoming stronger and more resistant to illness. Part of cooking is about balancing life force energy within a dish, using your intuition as a guide. It takes practice, but living in harmony with the outside environment makes it all worthwhile. This is especially important because we live in an indoor-focused society. We’re never truly in touch with nature, so eating foods that are cooked according to the seasons helps us stay attuned to the great outdoors. Secret #3 My clients often ask me how I make food taste so good. The truth is, organic food is delicious all on its own. You know, just steaming some carrots can really bring out their flavor. My secret to jazzing up a dish is using additional ingredients— like sauces, herbs, spices, and condiments—to enhance the food’s natural flavors. Condiments really help to balance a dish, enhancing flavors and boosting the energy. When I’m entertaining or just in the mood for
something different, I flex my creative muscles to change a dish up. Sometimes even I get tired of the same old thing, and it’s nice to mix it up with some variety. So I’d suggest that you experiment and, again, really trust your intuition. Secret #4 If you’re having trouble getting started with a new meal plan, try tackling your largest meal first. From there, you can create smaller meals for the rest of the day. For example, if your biggest meal of the day is dinner, begin by listing all of the foods and ingredients you’ll need for that meal. Then your meals for breakfast and lunch will seem much smaller and easier, and won’t take as much time. This helps make the whole process less overwhelming. So instead of getting intimidated by facing three meals a day, just focus on the largest meal and then build the rest around that. Then designing the other two meals, such as porridge for breakfast and maybe a hearty soup for lunch, will be a much easier and more manageable task. Secret #5 Many of my extremely busy clients often ask me, “How can I incorporate cooking into my already jam-packed life?” I understand how tough it is to find time during your hectic day to cook one healthy meal, much less three of them. It’s all too easy to give into the temptation to toss a frozen dinner into the microwave. But the reality is, it’s easy to incorporate healthy cooking into your routine. The secret to preparing nutritious, delicious meals lies in the preparation. Before you even get out the cutting board and the knife, you need to think about what steps are required to prepare your meal. You see, you can’t start cooking until the prep work has been done. But once the foods have been soaked or cut, the cooking part takes only about a half hour to fifty minutes. If you retrain your thinking to focus on the prep instead of the cooking, the process goes much faster. Then you can just go into the kitchen and whip up a quick meal, because all the ingredients and components are ready to go. Secret #6 If you find meal planning overwhelming, you are not alone. Many of my clients want to know how to take the stress and anxiety out of planning daily meals for their families. The #1 biggest mistake busy chefs make when planning a meal is not knowing how to use leftovers— repurposing food that has already been cooked in a different, creative way. You can even take it a step further and set aside time on the weekend to precook food to use in your meals during the week. Then when you’re crunched for time, you can whip up a quick meal on the go (and save money at the same time). Secret #7
You already know about the advantages of eating healthy—a stronger immune system, reduced risk of many diseases, physical fitness, and so many more. To start enjoying these benefits, try to incorporate one new vegetable or whole grain into your meal plans each week. One of the easiest ways to incorporate healthy cooking into your life is to develop an intimate relationship with food. Really make it a love affair—get truly passionate about healthy food. It’s sort of like getting to know someone you’ve just met. At first, it’s a little scary, because you don’t know how to behave around each other. And then after you spend some more time with them and you get to know each other, you start to build a mutual trust and feel safe around them. Eventually, you can’t imagine life without them. The same concept can be applied to your relationship with food. In the beginning, it will be a little scary, but after a while, you’ll wonder how you ever got by without your vegetables and whole grains. So there you have it—my 7 secrets for boosting creativity and confidence in the kitchen. I hope it's been enlightening for you. So, until next time, get out there, start experimenting, broaden your taste horizons, and start generating more time, money, freedom, and health. RIGHT NOW! Thank you so much, and I'll talk with you soon. Here’s to inspired, healthy living! Author Bio Julie S. Ong is the author of The Everything® Guide to Macrobiotics (Adams Media, 2010), which helps men and women of all ages discover the healing and wellness powers of macrobiotics. To find out how to take your health to the next level, visit her site at https://www.juliesong.wordpress.com/