veggiessima

Discovering a whole food plant base lifestyle and incorporating what I call **cooking-therapy** into my life is the focus of my 3rd week of the #coilgratitudechallenge.

Cooking has been my form of meditation, my time to unwind after a stressful day at work, my time to stimulate my creativity by experimenting with new ingredients and by assembling beautiful bowls of colorful and healthy foods.

ooking-therapy!

Until some years ago I was a very tentative cook, I could cook meals following recipes, but if I had to tweak the end results I was never sure which spices I should use and how they would affect the flavor. I relied on store bought sauces and dressings, and wouldn't even know where to start if I had to cook something from scratch on my own.

I had always been into vegetarian dishes and never too crazy about meat but knew very little about vegan food, I had always thought of it as a very restrictive way of eating where no animal products are used. But that changed on Christmas 2011 when someone from my family got me the book “Blissful Bites” by Christy Morgan.

I was instantly intrigued by the simple recipes with short lists of ingredients even though some of the ingredients were not familiar to me. I decided to try a couple recipes from that colorful book and instantly fell in love with those new-to-me flavors.

From there I started to buy other vegan books, try new recipes with more new ingredients and little by little learned how to cook some incredibly delicious vegan dishes.

I realized this type of eating offered way more variety than my traditional diet, instead of being what I thought would be a restrictive style of eating. Not only were there so many interesting new ingredients, but also interesting new ways of combining old familiar ingredients that I hadn't thought of before.

I also learned that vegan doesn't necessarily means healthy as many might think, there are tons of heavily processed vegan products on the shelves claiming to be healthy items; my husband and I call them non foods because they have no nutrition whatsoever. I learned that there is a big difference between a vegan dish and a whole food plant based dish, which can be made with really simple ingredients and yet be incredibly delicious and nutritious. Combining any type of grains with any type of beans and some veggies is one of my favorite things to do on busy days: it's easy, simple, nutritious and delicious.

On social media I had the pleasure of meeting Dreena Burton, a vegan cookbook author/recipe developer, and was introduced to the fun world of recipe testing for cookbooks under development! Since then, I have done recipe testing for 6 books and 3 ebooks, it's **a lot** of cooking! **Plus it's a lot of fun!**

Not only have I gained an amazing hands-on opportunity to become a better cook, but I now have an immense appreciation for cookbook authors. When we buy cookbooks, we don't realize how much work happens behind the scenes before the recipes are released!

These are some of the cookbooks for which I helped test recipes (I am currently recipe testing for Dreena's upcoming cookbook)

All that exposure made me become really fascinated by the power of a **whole food plant based lifestyle**. I met some wonderful people in the plant based community that are really making a difference. It's so great to see them helping others have a better life based on food choices! I have witnessed people transforming their lives for the better, having more energy, less pain and more health, which led them to more happiness. It's just wonderful.

The last few months have been so difficult for everyone, I am so grateful for how my **cooking-therapy** helped me disconnect a bit from reality and gave me a chance to recharge and feel strong to get through this difficult time. Doing something we love and putting our focus into positive things has been more important than ever!

Cintia