Chef-Approved Health Hacks

Speaker 1: [Music]

Speaker 2: I always get asked the question hey Chef what's the best way where I can start taking control of my health and I really believe that it's starting to prepare your own food so the recipes are easy they're not elaborate I'm not a big Baker so my baking recipes are Vitamix blending and bake or it they're very easy they're full prod recipes so if you're new in the kitchen it's it's not an intimidating book that was an intention too is to start to Pepper in a little bit of some healthy fun food into your diet without it being

Speaker 3: overwhelming hi I'm Melanie bar welcome to the shiled experience with Melanie you're here because you want to experience the life and business that you crave join me as I talk to women who have successfully built it a career and business that they love we dive into the topic of how they built it and talk about everything from Having the courage to make career leaps to the details of how to lead effectively create successful teams Implement strategies for growth and Infuse Tech Innovation magic happens when we focus on the part of ourselves and our business that brings us joy so let's dive in Amber coddle is the owner of the source Cafe restaurant in Hermosa Beach and the author of her newly released book sexy nourishing food she believes our food nourishes us from the inside out that our outer beauty inner peace and physical mental and emotional health are all fueled by by what we put into our bodies thank you for joining us today Amber you believe food nourishes us from the inside out and that our outer beauty physical mental and emotional health are fueled by what we put into our bodies tell us about your

Speaker 2: journey to becoming the chef and restaurant owner that you are today I've always been obsessed with food since I was a very little girl I knew since an age of about 15 that I wanted to be a chef I found a chef in Colorado to Apprentice Center and that's where I learned the beauty of Southern Italian cuisine and that's where I got all my scars and burns and fell in love with the restaurant business and moved here 22 years ago to open up a restaurant called mediterano that used to be on the pier of Hermosa it's no longer open but I ran that for 10 years and those were 50 to 75h hour grueling Chef weeks where I was literally working 12 to 14 hour days I was drink drink too much coffee too much alcohol I had no work life balance I was loving what I was doing I was creating this beautiful Food for People fast forward 10 years my health took a crash my adrenals were blown I was exhausted I was fatigued and I wasn't really honoring food I had this deep love for food and I was creating this beautiful gorgeous Food for People every single day but I wasn't treating my body with kindness I finally decided that I wanted to heal my body with food and start to appreciate the the nourishing properties of food about 11 years ago I had a health crash SL Spiritual Awakening and I went to this uh Spa called We Care Spa in the desert where my life changed and had this Awakening of wow I've been abusing food my whole entire life because I have a story too of past disordered eating God gave me this gift of being this amazing chef and being able to create food every single day but meanwhile in the background I also was having this very unhealthy toxic relationship with food I was desperate and said okay well it's ready to heal myself with food and take back my power power when it came to food fast forward now where I am today and that's a quick background I fell in love with Southern Italian food and I got my tra traditional Chef training which brings me to where I am now 10 years ago I opened up the source CAE in Hermosa Beach because I was so passionate to heal myself and my body and heal my relationship with food but I also knew that there was a need in the community for other people that really wanted to start to heal their bodies with food everyone thought I was crazy for Le leaving metatronia to open up the source and it was definitely a huge risk I had no idea what I was doing it was my first restaurant that I owned it's so

Speaker 3: interesting because I've known you for so long and my senior year of college I lived in Hermosa Beach and I went to

Speaker 2: Mediterraneo all the time it was definitely my baby for 10 years put a lot of love into that place and the source when I opened it 10 years ago I still wanted to have a chef driven Vibe right and I wanted to take my love and passion for southern Italian cuisine and Tapas and fuse it into more health-driven food food is beautiful and it nourishes our body but I also don't want to feel deprived I want to help get rid of the stigma when it comes to the word healthy around food food is beautiful and sexy and delicious and it doesn't have to be steamed broccoli tofu and chicken when you think of healthy food and Southern Italian training into the sources new philosophy of nourishing and fueling people's bodies and gluten-free and dairy free and keto and paleo Whole 30 raw all the things no sugar basically the food at the source has been really where I am on my healing Journey so when I opened up the source at that time I was seeing functional doctors and natural paths and acupuncturist and I couldn't eat 50 things corn soy gluten potatoes all kinds of things well I don't want to feel deprived my creativity was stemmed from that for instance I have a brownie it's made out of zucchini and Rocka cow there's no flour there's no sugar it's got a little mro The Source Cafe is so

Speaker 3: loved by so many including me tell us about the moment you decided to open the restaurant what you said before about Mediterraneo so many listeners can relate to because when we love what we do we put our heart and soul into what we're doing and that might not always be the best for us at That level at that

Speaker 2: level so I had a year before I quit Med it was my baby was going through a breakup I started started to lose my joy even though I had this joy for creating this beautiful food I was losing my joy for just my work life balance I was losing my sanity I was not happy when I decided to open up the sores I literally started praying and meditating and visualizing exactly what I wanted it to be and started asking Spirit God whatever your word is show me a storefront I started to experiment with the tumer tonic which is now the most popular drink there and I was slinging it out of the back of mediterrano and I was putting people on cleanses I was okay I know that this is my path and show me a sore front God so the thing with the source is it came from my soul it was a soul calling I knew in my bones and in my soul that it was going to be successful and I had to open it and everyone around me was telling me not to do it it was too risky the restaurants fail you have a good job you make good money and I have to take this risk I'm feeling like I can make much more impact and it really was leaning into faith I'm a big meditator so it was really a time to lean into my meditation and faith and visualization and and TR and just trust and I believe that once you make a decision you have to go with it I made the decision and my mom helped me and had support from friends and once I made the decision we opened 45 days later once I opened up and I asked God to send me a storefront it all flowed so effortlessly and I knew it melany in my soul and my heart that it was the next step and it has been a huge success and

Speaker 3: I so glad you didn't listen because the people around us mean well but they can Crush our dreams and what we want to do and it's great that you didn't listen and you trusted

Speaker 2: yourself yeah exactly it's all about really that inner trust and that took it was scary but I felt it sources now 10 years later we H our 10 year anniversary a month ago and so blessed for the community and support and love and growing and healing every day and you

Speaker 3: have so much and you can tell that you've put your soul into it because your food is amazing and incredible I cannot go to Hermosa without going in and every time I go in there's always a line every friend I talk to like oh I love this Source you've created something really amazing and beautiful thank you you are also the author of The cookbook sexy nourishing food you invite us to go on a journey with you to have fun in the kitchen and create food that tastes amazing your food always does

Speaker 2: tell us about your book this book was a three and a half year project and it was published about a month ago so so my intention behind sexy nourishing food was I wanted to Showcase how sexy plants are first because we all we're also fiber deficient the average American I think 2% of Americans eat enough fiber and I'm not vegan but I wanted to show how beautiful plants are so the book is 90% plant-based and I have one little chapter at the back that's bis and eggs and seafood because that's what I eat I wanted vegans and meat eaters to both be able to buy the book and there's many recipes from The Source the avocado toast and some smoothies and smoothie bowls and I wanted to show Elixir and there's a whole chapter in there about

Speaker 3: what it means to sprout nuts and seeds and the benefits of sprouting and then there's a whole glossery of adaptogens and superfoods and the benefits and wanted to start to inspire and help people realize that what we put in our body matters right now today and I always get asked the question hey Chef what's the best way where I can start taking control of my health and I believe that it's starting to prepare your own food so the recipes are easy they're not elaborate I'm not a big Baker so my baking recipes or Vitamix blending and bake or it they're very easy they're foolproof recipes so if you're new in the kitchen it's it's not an intimidating book that was an intention too is to start to Pepper in a little bit of some healthy fun food into your diet without it being overwhelming

Speaker 2: and I've learned that from you too even as I'm making lunch for my kids in the morning if I'm making a turkey sandwich I think to myself this doesn't have to be boring and I can use things like avocado Mayo something to make it more fun than just a turkey sandwich I love that you said that it doesn't have to be boring let's Pizzazz it up let's get excited like I love my smoothie bowls they made with cauliflower and purple sweet potato and kids don't even know and it tastes like yogurt or ice cream

Speaker 3: and the title came because people always like are like oh how did you decide on the title and I believe that food is here to nourish and fuel our bodies but then my favorite work word to describe food that came from my culinary training is sexy perfect beautiful juicy Ripe Tomato I mean there's nothing better than that or the moment when you bite into a luscious sweet juicy Peach I mean it's beautiful and you don't have to over complicate your food and that's honoring our bodies too and I remember

Speaker 2: we were planning a meal for one of the events that we hosted together for she built it and I remember you told me let's do avocado toast on sweet potato and I remember thinking oh I didn't say it at the time but honestly I thought I don't know if I'm GNA like this but I fully trusted you it was so good there was nothing left when you made it for everyone I mean it was all gone I love it I remember everyone was a little bit resistant to it and then they were like oh wait a second hold on this is really good this is so good so fun when you're

Speaker 3: surprised by things like that yes it's my favorite thing to do to people

Speaker 2: too you say throughout your experience as a chef author and restaurant owner that there has been no shortage of business which is clear when you go into the source Cafe there's always a line and also life lessons what is one of the biggest lessons you have learned and how did you overcome it one of my life

Speaker 3: lessons I have definitely made some business decisions in the last 10 years where I have definitely not listened to my inner voice and myself and my higher self and I've been too persuaded and really started to self-sacrifice myself for others and maybe got into some people pleasing didn't really honor my true self that's a thing that comes up

Speaker 2: for me is the people pleasing and letting that go and like really honor if I would have people pleased and I would have listened to all the outside people when I opened up Source I might have not opened it because there was so much fear so honestly letting go of fear has been the one of the biggest life lessons and not listening to that sneaky little voice that comes up because when you make an action out of fear it's it's not love based usually I Stumble and I fall on my face and I don't want to call it a failure because all failures are a great life lessons we have to fail to succeed one of the things is when I make a decision out of fear it never works out and that's really good advice because every person in the business world has taken risks there's no one that hasn't had a failure of something but it's how do you turn it around and what do you do next so I think the life lesson is when I make a decision from fear I know I'm about to get smacked on the head from the universe and learn something learn a really hard lesson that I needed to see and always trying to tune in to my inner guidance system which we always have it it's just so easy to get persuaded either by ourself by that fearful little voice or by other people that's part of

Speaker 3: life such a good reminder to trust our

Speaker 2: instincts yeah it's trust trust always

Speaker 3: comes up you learned that food that you

Speaker 2: love to create could be medicine tell us more about that I got into food as medicine when I opened up the source when I was healing my adrenals and I had a lot of inflammation in my body and started to get into the healing properties of turmeric and ginger and chlorella and it's so easy especially as a person with a past of disordered eating and eating disorder behavior that abusing food there's no medicinal qualities when we're abusing food but there's so many medicinal qualities if we can literally just get present and be like okay what do I want to heal but right now I'm deficient in some D vitamin and I'm deficient in some iron this is what came up for me personally this last blood work so you know what I'm going to do liver sorry vegans that are listening is one of the greatest superfoods out there and I always can heal myself and my labs come back beautifully if I can eat raw liver for a couple months and that is medicine or turmeric the turmeric tonic when I'm feeling sick or having an immune challenge or I feel like I have some inflammation in my body I'll mix up a little bit of turmeric and ginger and cinnamon and sip that in the morning and it is medicine chlorella is amazing for helping rid uh heavy metals from the body there's so many different Super Foods and me I always talk about on Instagram I'm always on a journey of healing my adrenals and one of the best thing for adrenals is really incorporating adaptogens into our diet I started really getting into adaptogens about eight years ago and adaptogens help our body adapt to outside stressors and I use many from Maca to ashwan gandha to Rocka Cal to all the mushrooms like Lion made for cognitive Health brain Health Energy stamina and overall Vitality so it's really powerful when you can like tap into food and then there's greens and avocado for brain

Speaker 3: health and wild salmon I love hearing

Speaker 2: all of this and you think about reading labels today and whenever something comes up for me I think how can I heal whatever's happening with me in a healthy way and you're right recently I realized I was low in iron cuz I've cut back on eating so much meat cuz I want make sure the meat is raised healthy as I'm putting it in my body but I think I was low in iron too and it's interesting when you have those thoughts and you think okay how can I balance this out how can I balance it out and the old me 11 years ago I would just go take I would go to the doctor I would take medicine or even I'm not opposed to supplements I love supplements but like also how can I complement the supplement so maybe I do need to take A B B vitamin but I'm also going to eat some raw liver or maybe then I eat the liver and then I let go of my B vitamin but you can just kind of tweak it yeah and listening to how you feel if you're walking around depleted and tired and you have brain fog and you relying on caffeine like there's something your body never lies there's something always going on when I coach women whatever's showing up in our life is showing up in our body so maybe too if I'm feeling fatigued and brain fog and maybe I have lower back pain okay what is really going on in my body okay I'm having some money fear this week and I haven't been resting and money fear shows up and your lower back it's all really tuning into your body and maybe I need more rest or I needed more water could be simple simple things you need to go lay out and try to get sun or take a walk in ground ground Barefoot on the grass or the ocean so

Speaker 3: good I love this conversation such good

Speaker 2: reminders for the things that we need and a lot of it's at our fingertips like we always forget that a lot of it is is free a lot of it doesn't have to cost money now obviously going to buy organic food does cost a little bit more but I believe we either pay now or we pay later but some free things to help us with our health what is grounding go put your feet in Mother Earth even if you live somewhere cold 5 to 10 minutes of putting your feet in Mother Earth it's beautiful we're blessed that we live in Southern California so we we can go do it meditation rest breath work visualization gratitude there's so much gratitude for my my body we can really tune in and start to really listen it's a journey it's a daily Journey For Me still listen to our body's wisdom magic happens when we focus on the part of ourselves and our business that brings

Speaker 3: us joy what is one way that you make sure to find and live your joy each day

Speaker 2: oh my gosh the biggest thing that brings me joy is when I get a comment or an email or a text or a DM from a customer that says Chef my life has completely changed my health has changed because of your food my daughter has not eaten a chocolate chip cookie in five years and now she can finally have a chocolate chip cookie and you don't understand the joy you bring to my life with your food and that that keeps me going the restaurant business is stressful it's hard my community and my customers they keep me going I wouldn't be doing it if it wasn't for them if I can make impact in one person's life a day a week a month it mean I'm blessed I'm grateful how I can make impact through food is just it's amazing you have made such an impact and are such a light for so many and the source Cafe is just so good I know anyone listening that has been there I know they agree with me and I know we're all going to go out and our

Speaker 3: feet in the grass thank you for joining

Speaker 2: us Amber please tell us how and where we can find you so you can find me on Instagram at Chef Amber La I have a website Chef amber.com there's a link for my book there there's an upcoming event I share tips and tools on how to live a holistic life if you have YouTube you can go on YouTube and I have a cooking show I produced last year called holics all that holistic living and I have beautiful guests that are on there making Paradigm shifts so those are a couple ways you can find me and you can always reach out and DM me if you have any questions or want to say hi or connect I love meeting new people thanks so much for having me on

Speaker 3: today thank you for joining us today I'd love to hear from you reach out to me at hello Sheil it.com on our Sheed website or at Sheed on social thank you to my editor Rich draino who always makes us sound good until next time let nothing stop you from experiencing the life and business that you crave [Music]