I went to school to become a dietitian, and that was a way that
I could still use my culinary training in a productive way, because let's be
honest, I'm way too emotional to be in a professional kitchen. I would
cry at the drop of the hat, like I don't have the thick skin
for that. And I knew that. I was very self aware to know
that that would wreck me, and so I became a dietitian. You're listening
to the Plant Based Diet podcast where we talk about all things plant based.
I'm mister Garth and the host of this show and founder of Alternative Food Network.
Join me in my amazing array of guests who are a mix of healthcare
professionals, industry executives, and people with an interesting story to tell about their
plant based journey. Let us help you with your journey wherever you're at to
learn the what, why, and how to eat plant based. Today,
I'm joined by Mica Siva, who is a trained chef, registered dietitian,
recipe writer, food photographer, and a new cookbook author. Share is Jewish
inspired plant forward recipes, and I'm excited to chat with her about modern Jewish
cuisine through a plant forward lens. Let's see if we can bridge some cultural
divides with some food. But before we get into that, I wanted to
give you an update on my Prolon experience. In the previous episode of Plant
Based Diet, I mentioned that I did Prolon's five day restricted calorie plant based
meal program, which is designed to mimic fasting without a water only fast.
A few weeks have passed since I did it, and I'm still leaner than
I was prior to And while I didn't love restricting my food intake, the
more time that passes, the more pleased I am that I did it,
and I hope my cells are pleased to If you'd like to try it,
ProLAN is offering the Plant Based Diet listeners a fifteen percent discount using promo code
AFN fifteen. Just click the link in the episode description and type in code
AFN one five to get fifteen percent off your order. If you use the
link, we may receive a small commission from your purchase. And now to
the show. Welcome Nika. It's so nice to have you on. Thank
you so much for having me ester. I appreciate being here. You know
I follow you from my personal account on Instagram, and when I saw that
you were going to be coming out with a cookbook, I'm like, oh,
it would be so great to have you on the show. So thank
you for taking the time today to join us. I know that you do
have a baby at home and you're very busy, and kudos to you for
having the headspace even to come on the show today. My pleasure. Honestly,
anything I can do to speak to an adult instead of to a two
month old is a good thing for my mental capacity and health. I think,
all right, did you get any sleep last night? Last night wasn't
too bad. Actually, my husband a nice split shifts overnight, so I
took the second shift and it wasn't too bad. All right, We've got
you fresh, or as fresh as you'll be for these days. Oh yeah,
all right, Well, before we get into talking about the cookbook,
I wanted the listeners to get to know you a little bit and here what
sparked your love of food? Oh so, my love of food has been
lifelong, really, and my grandmother Eva definitely was a huge driver and me
fallen in love with the act of feeding just as much food. We come
from a big family of eaters everything we do was centered around food, as
many Jewish families are, and my grandmother Eva was an amazing cook and hostess,
and so I grew up learning to cook through her and just seeing her
cook and make dishes to really show how much she loved us. You could
tell what kind of mood she was in based on what was for dinner when
you came to visit, and so much of our relationship was centered around food,
and really, even from a young age, showed me that food meant
so much more than just tasting good or being something that we ate. So
if she was in a great mood, what would you what would she have
made for you? Oh, if she was in a great mood, I
know that this is I'm not a meat eater anymore. But she would make
us chicken schnitzel with cornflake crumbs, and the vegetable would be in raceberg lettuce
salad because that's of that era, and mashed potatoes and carrots together, and
then there'd be some sort of like pie or her favorite was angel food cake
for dessert. So that was like happy Grandma making that, and that was
always such a special meal for us to enjoy when we'd go visit her,
and that really sparked my love of food. And then as I got older
and I got to be more independent in the kitchen and I could make my
own food choices, and I told my family I wanted to become vegetarian when
I was about twelve. My parents were super supportive and actually hired a dietitian
to come to the house to teach us all how to eat vegetarian things together.
Wow, which was such a good idea in retrospect looking back on it.
And funny enough, my old third grade teacher had gone back to school
to become a dietitian, so she's the one who came to the house to
teach us. And that really sparked my love of getting creative in the kitchen
because at that point it was this is how we eat well when we're vegetarian,
eating a vegetarian meal together. But at the same time, we're not
going to make you a separate meal, Nika. We need to work together
on this. And that's when I started to get creative and excited about what
I could make in the kitchen to make sure that I got to eat something
yummy and we could all eat together. So you were already cooking when you
were a tween or tea that. Yeah, it was. I feel like
anytime there was an activity in the house, it was always centered around food.
So we were always cooking growing up. And then I got to be
more more independent at that point as well, and even throughout high school temp.
Ten eleven, twelfth grade, I would have my friends over for dinner
and make multi course dinners and it was just something I really loved to do
and it was how I expressed my creativity in a lot of ways and frustrations
as a tween female. And then you went on to school and you became
a chef, right, I did. Yeah. So I went to the
natural Wordmate Institute of Health and Culinary Arts, which is a long school name
and it's now a part of the Institute of Culinary Education in New York.
So I went there at nineteen and I studied culinary arts, but they really
focus on health supportive cooking and especially vegetarian food, and we would do weeks
of gluten free baking or baking for different allergies and we would make our own
tofu and Tempe and Satan and that was so exciting for me. And it
was at a time also when vegetarianism was prevalent, but it's not what it
was today. And to be able to make all these different dishes vegetarian when
there was no beyond beef. At that point there was no I think Guardian
Chicken was just starting. Like it was a very fun time to be in
a vegetarian space, and of course, as a nineteen year old living alone
in New York, it was also a fun time in general. And once
I finished, I was wrapping up my program and really thinking what do I
want to do next? At the same time as my student visa was expiring.
I'm originally Canadian, so I had this clock ticking of like what do
I do? And I went into a I didn't know that is from Okay.
I'm from Calgary originally Okay, And so I had this clock ticking,
and I knew that I had to do something and had to go back to
Canada. So I went to school to become a dietitian. And that was
a way that I could still use my culinary training in a productive way,
because let's be honest, I'm way too emotional to be in a professional kitchen.
I would cry at the drop of the hat like, I don't have
the thick skin for that, and I knew that, I was very self
aware to know that that would wreck me. And so I became a dietitian.
And I worked for a number of years as a dietitian in Toronto and
started a small food blog as a creative outlet. And in twenty eighteen,
my husband and I were moved to London, UK for a work transfer on
his part, and I just I was at this fork in the road where
the only dietitian jobs in the UK were hospital based. I'm not a hospital
person. I'm a community cooking class type of person. And I just pursued
the food media side of things, where I was working with BuzzFeed in the
UK doing their branded content and videos, still making a lot of non dietitian,
very elaborate, viral things that I would purson never want to eat on
a daily basis. And then in twenty twenty, after two years at BuzzFeed,
we were moved to the US. Happened to be March twelfth, twenty
twenty. We were moved to San Diego. Not the best time to move
to a new country by any means, but that at that point is when
I went falling on my own business of doing recipe writing and food photography for
brands and newspapers, and of course my blog which became not with Micah the
plant Forward Jewish cooking blog outlet, resource website, I don't know, and
that's kind of turned into what it is today where I have my cookbook coming
out. I wrote a kid's book about Jewish food this past year with my
husband, and I focused my writing on Jewish cuisine, and then I write
for a lot of different outlets like Lunch News, the Jewish journals, different
magazines and whatnot, because that's what actually pays rent. And now a word
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order of fifty dollars or more at truleef market dot com. And now back
to the show. So I don't know if this is going to be a
tough question for you, but clearly you're Jewish, you have an online presence,
you have a Jewish brand. So what has it been like lately?
And I asked this because we're recording this in the beginning of twenty twenty four,
when the world seems to be a little less of a friendly place towards
Jews, or at least the anti Semites are feeling quite emboldened. So how
have things been for you? You know, it's interesting because it wasn't always
a Jewish blog, and I wasn't always visibly Jewish online, and I only
it's funny now I say that first wave of anti Semitism instead of the most
recently, but in twenty twenty is when I chose to end of twenty twenty,
sorry, is when I chose to pivot into the Jewish space. And
that was a really tough decision because I had been doing mostly white label content
and content for other brands, which means that my name and face isn't necessarily
a part of it. Sometimes it is, but they can use it.
And I made this choice to be my personality as a do and I wanted
to be out, I guess out and proud about it because I am.
I am as a person really proud to be Jewish. And it took me
about four months to get the courage to do it because I was afraid.
Within that first month, I lost three long term clients. And that was
three years ago. And I still say it's the best thing I ever did
with my work, and it's made me so much more passionate about what I
do. But since October seventh, it's been a really scary place to be.
Bear in mind, also on October seventh, I was eight months pregnant,
and so there was a lot of things going on already, and I
remember waking up that morning seeing the news and reading about other young families and
couples, and I said to my husband, I was like, this could
have been us. This easily could have been asked like this couple in their
thirties with pregnant or with an infant, And it was heartbreaking. And at
first I was very vocal about it on social media, and I was very
out there and speaking from a place of pain and fear and also pride for
being Jewish. And after every two seconds my husband would have to filter my
comments and messages for death threats and saying that my baby should die and all
of these terrible messages, I said, like, I can't. I had
to take a step back and still do my Jewish thing, but not speak
up as much as I would have wanted to, because for my own mental
health and for probably the health of myself and my baby and the end of
my pregnancy, I needed to find a place inner of peace, which is
also what we all want anyways, But that's a whole other conversation, and
so I had to take a little step back, and since I've felt a
little bit like I've gotten my ground. I mean, I'm only two months
into motherhood, but I've started to share, do and do a bit more
because I'm also thinking about all these I'm seeing in a different light as a
mom now, where I'm thinking of these parents who just want their kids to
come home, and I'm thinking of my little two month old and my heart
is breaking. And to be Jewish online is really scary, but it's so
important. I've definitely culled through my list of contacts in the past few months
and recognize that not everyone loved me for me. And you know what,
they don't deserve our bagels. They don't deserve our delicious food. They don't
deserve to see what I'm making because I'm making something really cool and yummy and
amazing and fun and beautiful and peaceful, and they don't deserve that. If
they can't see the beauty in another culture, then that's their own problem.
And I've also learned that you can't fix someone who doesn't want to learn.
You know, it's been really interesting and I think it's more important than ever
to be Jewish and thinking about my book coming up and my book tour,
people have asked, am I afraid to share my book events and whatnot?
Online? And my response is, I got to make money. I have
to make money. It's my business. I still need to put myself out
there. And as a Jewish population, we also need to support each other
and buy tickets to Jewish events, support Jewish businesses, listen to podcasts by
Jews. Even if it's not a Jewish thing, it doesn't have to be
to be something that we choose to support. So it's a big question.
And at the end of the day, like, I'm not solving any problems
by making a vegan his army sandwich, And if you feel like that's problematic
for you, then maybe there's something else going on inside. I'm just trying
to celebrate it a diverse food landscape that comes from an ethnic group, and
I think that that's important in this world of learning about each other and in
a global world, it's important to explore other food cultures. And I'm exploring
my food culture and sharing it and that's at the basis of what I'm doing.
So all right, so that's interesting, very interesting time. And that
was the good segue until let's talk about your cookbook, so let's talk about
it. Let's talk about it. So I'm going to guess that it's not.
The recipes in there aren't exactly vegan or plant based versions of your grandparents
cooking. But because you have the word modern in the title, so maybe
you could tell everyone again the title of the cookbook and what's modern about it.
Yeah, so the cookbook is called Nash for Recipes celebrating Modern Jewish Cuisine.
And then you have to take a big breath because it's a mouthful.
But there's so much to share about it. So you're right, it's not
just a vegan or vegetarian version of my grandmother's recipes, but there are a
lot in there. So there's lots of classics in there, maybe using different
ingredients than they would have otherwise. But it's also a way to explore the
breadth of Jewish cuisine across the Daaspora, which means pretty much across the globe,
and think about the ingredients used and memories that they may bring up.
And look at dishes and say how can I eat this Monday through Friday and
think about I don't know, meal prep or Tuesday night meals or Wednesday lunches,
nutritious breakfasts, and rethink what it means to eat Jewish food. You
don't just have to eat it on a Friday or a Saturday or for a
holiday, but these are dishes that you could eat essentially any day of the
week. So the modern part is the ingredients that we're using the fact that
it's not meat or an animal based product, and thinking about the modern landscape
of how we're eating and bringing some little bit of Jewish influence into dishes that
can be enjoyed whenever you're eating. So that's when they see the modern part
of it. It's modern ingredients. It's based on how we're eating in the
twenty first century and still paying homage to the Jewish traditions and Jewish dishes.
So, for example, one of my favorite recipes that I personally make every
week is inspired by my zetas or my grandfather, is quick pickles. It
was the he was like when we'd go to his house, we'd get quick
pickles, we'd get fresh sqeeze orange juice, even in the dead of winter
in Canada, and I root your float and a packaged missus Els cookie.
They'd all come on a tray I don't know what kind of meal this was,
but this is what we would eat at his house and sometimes toast,
yeah, sometimes toast if he was feeling up for it. But he would
always make these quick pickles, and so my memory of that is so strong,
and I wanted to make a dish that could be served alongside any dinner
that was great to bring to a pollock, anything that you're doing that isn't
just pickles. So I made a smashed cucumber and dial salad inspired by those
pickles. So looking at different ways to prepare cucumbers using like you basically just
whack the heck out of a cucumber like you would for an Asian inspired cucumber
salad, but then taking the almost exact recipe or ingredients as my Zeta my
grandfather would have used to make it into this really fun salad that gets better
over time. And that's such a fun way to enjoy cucumbers, but also
think of them in a pickle ish way, which reminds me of my grandfather.
And so dishes like that are definitely in there, or dishes that rely
on different spices or another favorite of mine is red wine braised beets over mama
liga, which is kind of like a polenta. My grandmother comes from a
Romanian heritage and mama liga is very common there, and it's usually a whole
ton of butter made with milk, and my version uses tahini nutrition least,
and so it's kind of like a umami but super creamy and rich polenta version.
And then I make a really beautiful red wine braised beets, also inspired
by the stews that my grandmother made with like whatever leftover terrible kosher wine she
had on hand. And so it is definitely a modern take. And you
might not look at a dish without knowing those things and say, hey,
this is totally a Jewish dish, But it's looking at where where do the
stories come from and those memories and thinking about like a really warm and wintry
dish, but totally plant based. Nice And what about were able to conquer
the sponge cake that used to you know, my grandmother I think used eight
or ten eggs to get it, you know, those high sponge cakes.
I have you been able to figure that one out? You know, I
didn't even try. So the book is it's plant forward. Eighty percent of
it is vegan and then some of it has eggs and dairy because at the
end of the day, if we all, if I can appeal to people
who are even just interested in different sides and eat more vegetables, then that's
a wind. And I think that's that would That's always been my goals.
If people can try one or two vegetarian dishes, I think we're all better
for it. And so there are some eggs in some of the cakes and
honey in my honeycake, but I didn't try the sponge cake, but perhaps
that's in the next one. Also. I also felt like there were some
recipes of my grandmother that she would literally be rolling in her grave if I
ever tried to touch like I tried to veganize a passover bun like. One
of those was super heavy MutS and meal buns, and I swear I wasted
so much food trying to do this. It was hockey puck after hockey puck
after Brooke, and I said, you know what, maybe this isn't Maybe
this isn't for me. I'm going to pull out all my hair. But
I did make a really amazing vegan MutS of baal, which took me over
twenty tries. And pounds and pounds of muzzin meal, and I hate food
waste, so I ate every single failure and I don't. I don't.
I think I was consipated for weeks on that one because I ate so much
failed MutS of ball, but I got it. It's for those of you
who don't know MutS of balls or muzzi meal, it's essentially once it gets
in, it just stays there forever, and it's it's like sludge. It's
delicious. Go try a MutS of ball from your local deli if you can
find that nice and fluffy. Yeah, so I learned with a vegan one.
I actually included my recipe that uses eggs in there as well, but
uses olive oil instead of small sor chicken fat. And then I had a
vegan one side by side, so you can make whichever one you want with
a really nice spicy tumoric broth and my vegan one. Instead of being boiled,
I actually steam them in a steamer and then add them to soup,
which took me about eighteen tries until I was like eating soupy MutS of balls
and thought I should try steeping them. And that was That was the best
success. And I cried over that bowl of soup. I'm not gonna lie.
I shed many sears. Steaming them helped give them their form, exactly
so, because MutS of bowls were so heavily on the eggs to buy them
together. And so for this, for these ones, I use like aqua
faba and oh what else did I use? My mind's drawing the blank,
but either flax or chickpea flour to help bind them. But then they would
steal disintegrate no matter if I kept them in the fridge overnight, if I
froze them, no matter what I did, they would disintegrate. And then
I realized that steaming would probably help to keep their shape together much better,
and and it did. And it was a beautiful sight to see those little
muttaballs steaming in the basket. Let me tell you, yeah, it was
the most beautiful thing. It was my biggest accomplishment in my life. Besides
my baby was tied. Yeah, yeah, right. And who doesn't love
the good MutS the bat right exactly? Well, it sounds delicious. I
hope I could get my hands on a copy. Now, let me ask
you, if there's someone listening and they love food. They love to write,
and they aspire to combine the two. Do you have many words of
wisdom for them? Words of wisdom? I feel like I'm learning every day
myself. But I would say that if you love writing and love food and
want to write about food, the best thing that you can do is just
start. Know that nobody's ever going to read the first while of what you're
going to do, and really what you need is proof and a portfolio of
your capabilities. And that's how I've always seen my social media and my blog.
It's all a portfolio of what I do, and so I can then
take that and say this is why you should pay me to a brand or
a newspaper. So I've always seen my goal with social media is not to
make money as an influencer. I do very little of that because I see
it as my living resume of my capabilities. And so I would say just
start, and if you're feeling self conscious, remember that probably just you,
your mom, and your husband or partner will read it, because that's probably
in real who will read it for a long time. And just get creative
and have fun with it. It's my biggest advice is put yourself out there,
which you have done with your cookbook. So tell people where they can
get the cookbook. It's not at the time of this recording, I understand
it's not out yet, but this episode will come out in March. Okay,
great, perfect, So the cookbook comes out March fifth. You can
get it wherever books are sold. If anyone buys it who's listening, You
can also send me an Instagram message or email and I'll mail you a little
keychain. I've got these adorable vintage style motel keychains that say Club Notch on
them, which I think is hilarious. But it's just a little way to
share your love for food and Jewish joy in the world essentially, So anyone
who's listening can send me a message and I'll mail Thempty. You just have
to show me that you bought a book and send me your address and I'll
pop one in the mail. And you have gracious lines agree to let us
do a giveaway of one of your cookbooks. So for anyone listening, hop
on to our newsletters subscribe to it, because that's what we're going to be
doing the giveaway. And you can do that by going on Alternative Foodnetwork dot
com click the newsletter subscribe button and then you'll see a little giveaway that we're
going to do Micah's cookbook. So before we go, can you let us
in on what else? I mean again, you're a new mother and you
have a new book. Are you doing anything else that we should know about?
Yes, I am. I am going to be going on my book
tour with my baby and my husband because this is when he takes his paternity
leave for all of March, half of April, and half of May.
So I will be all over talking about vegetarianism and Jewish food and sharing delicious
treats from notch. So if you're in New York, Boston, Philly,
Washington, DC, Seattle, Sortland, Minneapolis, Chicago, Austin, Dallas,
Houston, LA, I think that's it. In San Francisco, oh,
and Toronto, I will be in your city, okay, Oh,
and Providence. In Providence, that's all. I'll be all over between March
April and May. March I'm doing East coast things, and then April I'm
doing West coast, and then May is Chicago, Minneapolis, so kind of
middle. So I will be in your city. So if you hear one
of those cities. You can go onto my website and I'll have a list
of all the events I'm doing. Or send me a message and ask where
I am and I can send you a link to the event. But come
come see me, come say hi. If you have a favorite vegetarian restaurant
in your city, please let me know because I will be hungry and eating
dinner at four thirty because I have a baby, So please let me know.
So that's that's next on my horizon. You also, I don't know
if a current gig, but you also took over hosting duties of a podcast,
Yes so I season two. We wrapped up recording in November. So
I am also the host of the TCSO Twin Cities Jewish food podcast called Not
Your Bubby's Nosh. So I interview different people in the Jewish food space.
I do some solo episodes. You can learn more about how one gets a
cookbook deal and what got me and inspired to make a Jewish cookbook, and
different recordings with people in the food space. So you can find that on
tc Folk podcast. But that's on Spotify, Apple, wherever you listen to
your podcasts. If you want to hear more of my voice that was all
recorded pre baby, so I don't know what kind of pregnancy brain was going
on because I can't stand this sound of my voice, so I don't listen
to them after the fact, but my husband tells me they're good. You
get used to it. Wow. Well, you're very, very busy,
that's for sure, and I really appreciate you taking the time to come on
the show today. Thank you very much. Thank you so much, Esther.
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