— Denise Tarasuk

Oh, okay. Well, you know, I had been accumulating so many recipes since we, uh, really, um, started our own plant-based journey, which was, uh, was provoked by a health crisis that my husband had actually, uh, in 2000, uh, 13. So, um, and, uh, you know, that that changing our lifestyle was just so spectacular for our own health, uh, prospects and for my child as well, my son, um, that we never looked back. But, um, after many, many years and having fun just writing up these recipes, having giordano photograph them and so forth, I realized, uh, that we had probably, you know, you know, hundreds and probably there was a book in there somewhere. And I, I was just very fortunate to be, um, introduced to a book agent, uh, in my area who was excited about the prospect and took me on as a, as a client. And, uh, and the rest sort of, you know, was history. We came up with a proposal for Love, the Foods That Love You Back, and, uh, it was picked up by Rezo, which was a great honor. Um, and this book was, um, this book was, as I said, you know, it was mostly on the, the, you know, part of my mission, I have to say, apart from the health and the environment and all of that is, is really related to home cooking, um, because, uh, so many people have hung up their aprons, uh, and are so seduced by the appeal, um, of, uh, convenience, foods, eating out, taking out, and so forth. And it's, uh, you know, it's just a, it it's not only a shame from a cultural and social point of view, but you know, from a health perspective, uh, and from an environmental perspective, it's, uh, it's very, very problematic. So part of, uh, you know, part of my mission is to, is to entice people back into their kitchens at whatever age. And this is aligned so closely with Rouxbe's mission as well, is to, is to empower the home cook to make really beautiful, uh, food that's, um, that's so helpful and, and, and in so many ways as well. So, um, so that was the, the first Cook cookbook. It differs a little bit that, let's see, I'm trying to think of the recipes in that cookbook. You'll find recipes for gnocchi, you know, lots of pop pie. My Italian, my husband's from Florence, Italy, we, you lived there for years, you know, so, um, it was, it's not just Italian recipes. There are, there are recipes from many places as well, other, other than Europe. Um, but, but there are, there's, you know, there's just a ton of recipes as well that are, that are really, really, um, fun, great home cooking, inspired by, uh, the beautiful home traditions from Japan and from Scandinavia and from West Africa and all over. Um, and the new cookbook is, um, you know, follows in that vein. But what's different about this cookbook is, uh, I think what I was inspired to do is after, after a couple of years, and, you know, it was pretty much promotion for the first book was beginning to wind down a little bit. I had just become so, uh, concerned about the state of the climate, um, and, uh, the worsening, you know, we see it in LA right now, but, you know, whether it's hurricanes or it's not just this country, of course, it's a global phenomenon. And because global cooking is so near and dear to my heart, just watching, um, the devastation to people's lives and livelihoods and the decimation of wildlife, um, uh, I just wanted to really understand the issue. And I just for my own personal edification, uh, took myself to school and really did sort of as deep a dive as I was able to do on my own reading studies and trying to really understand the science behind, uh, the warming climate. And was there anything we can do? 'cause I don't know if you have encountered this, but when I talk to people about the climate, just family, friends, people, you know, casually, the response that I typically get is, you know, people sort of glaze over and they say, Ugh, it's so overwhelming. It's so depressing. You know, I don't know what I can do. And they kind of disengage. Um, and, and in fact, um, the most impactful thing, what I, when I discovered as I would be, was doing all this, uh, research for the book was the most impactful thing that we can do as individuals, um, to mitigate climate change, to lower our individual climate footprint, starts with our forks. It's what we do in our kitchens. It's the most powerful thing of all the things we can do, you know, from, from, uh, electrifying our appliances, from solar power, from ev vehicles, from not flying internationally as much as we might want to, and all the other things that we can do to lower our use of fossil fuels. What we eat has the biggest impact by a long shot. And so it was a message I just felt was so compelling and people don't know, and even people who are concerned about the environment are not eating this way. You know, it is just, it's just, uh, was so shocking to me that I, I felt I had to put it in a book. And every recipe, uh, has climate footprint information for a key ingredient in that, in that recipe. So people can really begin to understand what's driving emissions for any commodity, any food that we're eating. And there's all sorts of, uh, other specific information about the country of origin, if it's a foreign inspired dish or, or, um, how to source different ingredients or, um, or who are the, the climate heroes in the plant-based kingdom that are more resilient and that we need to be eating more of even as plant-based people because our agriculture is, uh, is really under assault now. You know, 90% of, of, um, and I'll get off my, my platform here in a second, but 90% of, of crop fail, uh, failures is because of extreme weather. So it's, I'm just so passionate about this, it gets me very excited. But that was my, my motivation for writing this second book, because it was, people need hope and they need to know that they are empowered. This is an easy thing for us all to do, is just to shift in the right direction, lean into plants if we're not already there, and if we are already there with some fine tuning, so that we're really eating the most sustainably, uh, to really help our farmers help agriculture reduce scarcity and all the rest of it. Sorry, I'm, I'm gonna give you a big bravo for that one. And, uh, encourage everyone again to visit, uh, Kathy's Prescription Kitchen for more information. And Kath, I did wanna say that from your first cookbook, I love the, uh, banana bread with blueberries. That's a really good recipe. 'cause when you've got bananas hanging around that most people wouldn't wanna touch, you know that they're always good for a banana bread, banana muffin, uh, yanas or whatever. And, um, I think that, uh, you know, I've been, uh, plant-based for more than 15 years. And 15 years ago, there weren't any vegan, vegan, plant-based convenience foods. And so you really had to put a lot of time and energy into choosing your produce and what kind of plant milk you were going to use. And maybe back in that time, there were only one or two that were available. Fast forward to today, where many, many big corporations have monetized on, uh, the plant-based movement. These are foods that are mass produced in gigantic factories, and they're packaged in horrible packaging with plastic and all kinds of things. Rarely do you see one that is packaged in something that's biodegradable or whatever. And, uh, it's just interesting to see how the movement has gone from, I'm gonna strip some kale and I'm going to make a burger from some beans. And a couple of months ago, Fran Costigan had on one of the co-founders of, uh, burlap and Barrel of the Spice Company. And what I love about using their spices is that it will say single origin and explaining single origin to someone, uh, might seem foreign, but then you can sort of see, you know, uh, brain cells popping together, what that exactly means, not being in plastic, but being in glass. Little things like that. So, uh, Denise, I think that you need to follow Kathy and see what other wonderful advice she has to give, uh, based on, uh, her values that reflect her inner most thoughts, which I think is absolutely wonderful.