The “Zen Kitchen”

For six years, I collected an executive chef’s salary cooking for a high profile couple. My job was to create tasty but healthful cuisine for them, keeping their weight and cholesterol at a healthy level.

I prepared my style of cooking called “Clean Cuisine,” a discipline that I developed over a 25 year period of study and training. My employer referred to my kitchen as the “Zen Kitchen.” I was a little perplexed by this moniker at first. I knew that I wasn’t cooking Shojin Cuisine (the highest form of vegetarian cooking). I had to see my workspace through their eyes and stomachs to truly understand what she meant by that.

I knew that I was providing sustenance on many levels:

Physically: I was able to get their cholesterol levels down within two months by choosing the right foods to offer and using certain cooking techniques in the kitchen. I carefully selected the products with which to work with and paid careful attention to treat those products with a certain reverence by not destroying their nutritional integrity. This, combined with a strong culinary background, elevated my style of health cuisine to a different level - one for which the employer was willing to pay top dollar. This couple knew about food. They were among the original “foodies” and also knew when one ingredient was missing in a 15-ingredient dish.

Mentally: Since “Clean Cuisine” is virtually free of refined sugars, flours and processed foods, one notices a change almost immediately in their digestion, resulting in a pleasant feeling of lightness after dining. You walk away from the table knowing that you have treated your body well in addition to having satisfaction on the palate. If you are dining with family, you have the added satisfaction that you are providing this level of sustenance to your loved ones.

Spiritually: To a certain degree, dining this way, transforms you spiritually. Not unlike Transcendental Meditation, when you sit down to a meal prepared by a chef that is mindful, the message is translated and consumed by the person eating that meal. One tends to slow down and focus, if you will, on the pleasant experience of dining; the aromatic element of the meal comes in first through the olfactory sense and then reaches the taste buds. This is a relaxing experience free from anxiety. Savoring the experience of healthy dining engages us in mental and physical mindfulness which boosts positive thinking and decreases our overall stress.

I have come to realize that in referring to my kitchen as “Zen Kitchen,” my client was mindful of the above.