about

Hi.  I’m Misty Martinez.

my family:

husband of 8 years: Romeo

children: O (age 3) and E (age 1)

about lemon sprig

Plant-centric eating concentrates on legumes, whole grains, fruits and vegetables, and shies away from large quantities of meat, dairy and processed food.

At my first job, as a server at a low-end steakhouse, I served up plate after plate of sirloins and t-bones with the omnipresent foil wrapped potato.  I was trained to garnish each plate with a sprig of kale and a slice of lemon, but I was 16, and neglected the objects which seemed inadequate, both for procuring tips and adding value to the plate.  In this blog I bring fruits and vegetables back to the plate, regarding them not as an afterthought, but as the focus.

my philosophy:

I don’t like rules when it comes to food.  I want to gather everyone at the table and not think about numbers (calories, grams, temperatures, minutes, helpings, pounds), but enjoy mealtime as sacred for sharing life and nourishment.

my tendencies:
I started eating less animal products.  I don’t remember exactly when or why.  Maybe I did it because we were broke and beans were cheap (although produce not-so-much).  Maybe because of environmental issues or main-stream farm animal treatment.  Maybe because I had a crisis of faith and needed a cause to get behind.  There wasn’t a single reason or moment that I decided to eat less meat; I noticed it midway through the process.  The truth is vegetables, beans and whole grains won me over. And there was so much cerebral momentum cheering me on, that it couldn’t be helped.  But I still eat everything, and enjoy it just as much.

my history:
I had only cooked a handful of meals* before getting married (and living on my own), but was excited about life(!) and marriage(!).   Romeo and I were ridiculously young and students, so the excitement didn’t last long.  But we still had to eat.  His culinary heritage was barren of good food.  Mine was ample, but dormant.  We both had a lot to learn, and not a lot ($35 a week) to learn on.  My husband was not interested in cooking, but he did introduce me to the idea of planning ahead in the kitchen, which is the hardest lesson to learn.  These days he has a knack for picking out top-notch recipes and cooks very worthy food.

parenting, me and the kitchen:

And then I’m a mom.  And if you aren’t a parent, either skip the next paragraph or continue in non-judgement, because I don’t want to feel bad if I tell stories about baby poop or a certain toddler asking his mom if she has a small penis.  I mean really -I don’t blame you for rolling your eyes, because I’ve been there.  But now I’m here and laughing is the only way to make it.

So, sometimes it’s not much of my own fault things fail, but just that I’m juggling a kitchen experiment at the same time my toddler says “sorry mama…” and the baby teeters at the top of the stairs.  Or I work for hours on a cherry layer cake that ends up looking like this

family cake

because E was in my arms when assembling it.  I call it family cake because I’d only serve it to my family.  But it tasted like heaven.  Sometimes we need the experience of diving into our food without holding our breath, hoping it lands on the plate nicely.  And really we all have barriers to getting in the kitchen, but let’s not let perfection be one of them, because then we really miss out.

* the three meals I made before getting married:

1) A midnight three course African meal with tropical fruit crepes for dessert. I ran out of eggs and sent my friends to get one.  They came back with exactly one egg, borrowed from a new neighbor.  At midnight. The crepes were worth it.  (age 17).
2) A Spanish tapas meal upon returning from 5 months in Spain, complete with true jamon Serrano, chorizo and Spanish tortilla amongst other things.  My (midwest teenage) friends were not impressed and none of the food got eaten, but it all tasted perfect.  (age 18)
3)  An awkward dinner party with 3 Chinese dishes that my husband and I arranged when we were first dating to get our friends to meet. The results were beyond horrible.  Two of my friends got into a fight about how to cook rice and everyone sat around waiting for us to announce our engagement, which never happened.  (age 19)