Real Food Kitchen Tour: Holistic Mom

Welcome to another edition of the Real Food Kitchen Tour. This week we’re featuring Christina Byard, Co-Leader of Holistic Moms Network.

What’s a Real Foodie?

A “real foodie” is someone who cooks “traditional” food. We cook stuff from scratch using real ingredients, like raw milk, grass-fed beef, eggs from chickens that run around outdoors, whole grains, sourdough and yogurt starters, mineral-rich sea salt, and natural sweeteners like honey and real maple syrup.

We don’t use modern foods that are either fake, super-refined, or denatured. This includes modern vegetable oils like Crisco and margarine, soy milk, meat from factory farms, pasteurized milk from cows eating corn and soybeans, refined white flour, factory-made sweeteners like HFCS or even refined white sugar, or commercial yeast.

We believe in eating wholesome, nutrient-dense foods that come from nature. So we shop at farmer’s markets or buy direct from the farmer, or we grow food in our own backyards.

This Week’s Real Food Kitchen Tour: Holistic Mom

This week I’m featuring Christina Byard, co-leader of the Holistic Moms Network in Northern California.

Name: Christina Byard, Co-Leader of Holistic Moms Network, Tri-City Area, CA Chapter
Size of Kitchen:About 10 x 14
Things You Love About Your Kitchen: I love the gas range that my handy husband installed for me, despite his nervousness about replacing our electric power source with a gas line.  A woodworker by trade, my husband also made my farm-style kitchen table/work space extra tall so that I don’t strain my back kneading dough. Even though he made the table before we were married, I feel like he custom made it for me. I like that the end of the room is a family area that my kids can play in while I cook.  The kitchen has views both of the backyard for child supervision and out the front window for natural inspiration.  My window looks out onto the gorgeous Mission Peak.  Lots of natural light.
Things You Would Change:  If money and space were no object, I would bump the kitchen out so that it would be wide enough to have an island with a sink and seating.  And I drool over recycled glass countertops.  They bring so much color and whimsy to spaces while reusing what would otherwise go into landfills.
Favorite Tools & Gadgets:  Ah, this question is like “Sophie’s Choice!”  I am such a gadget junkie for being an overall simplistic person.  Kitchen tools are just so inspirational.  I love my Vitamix, Excalibur, tortilla press, juicer, kitchenaid mixer, molcajete, pepper grinder, espresso machine, cast iron pans…  to much gadget-love to list.  My all-time favorite, though, would have to be the Retsel Mil-Rite I bought second-hand off of Craigslist.  I love grinding my own sprouted flours for baking (my obsession).  We have recently gone gluten-free and being able to sprout and grind fresh gluten-free flours feels so much more nutritious to me than all of the pre-packaged GF products.
Biggest Challenges Cooking Real Food:  Oh, gosh, it would have to be the desire to not constantly be cleaning.  I love working in the kitchen, but feel like I am cleaning more than I am cooking there when I have a lot of projects going.  Sometimes I don’t start something just because I don’t want to clean up afterwards.
Current Family Favorite Meal: The kids love when we have taco night.  They help me mix the masa and press the tortillas.  We cook sprouted pinto beans, mash them with lots of pastured lard and butter.  Paired with grilled chicken, raw cheddar cheese and veggies from the garden, this meal is a treat for everyone!
Favorite Cookbooks: Nourishing Traditions, King Arthur Flour Whole Grain Baking: Delicious Recipes Using Nutritious Whole Grains, Peter Reinhart’s Whole Grain Breads: New Techniques, Extraordinary Flavor, Food of India: A Journey for Food Lovers.

Here are some photos of Christina’s kitchen (with her comments in italics):

Love all the sun!

Not technically in the kitchen, but the front-yard garden plays a huge role in my cooking.  I am trying winter gardening for the first time this year after a bizarro California summer growing season that yielded lots of greenery but not much produce.

Oh, wow! You are dedicated! LOL!

The fermentation corner.  My crock has garlicky sauerkraut fermenting alongside the jars of habanero hot pepper sauce.  I also enjoy making my kids’ beloved almond butter and jelly sandwiches as healthy as possible by baking bread from sprouted rice, quinoa and sorghum.  Whenever I am feeling stressed out, pounding out some spices and garlic in the molcajete is a great release!

I know I should cut back in quantity, but I do so LOVE my morning espresso!  Also fermenting water kefir for my “grapefruit zippy.”

Whenever I am at a loss for what to make for dinner, I just stop in front of this wall and let my imagination run wild.

I make big batches of fresh veggie juices and freeze them for later drinking or adding cubes to smoothies.

We are getting ready to make our annual batch of applesauce.  This year, we scored some free fruit from a neighbor whose tree was overloaded with fruit.  It took me a week to build up the courage to ask if we could harvest her tree, but I am so glad I did!

I have one of these, too, and I love it!

A seriously un-beautiful but lovely site of put-up foods.

Check Out the Previous Real Food Kitchen Tour Posts

Real Food Kitchen Tour: Radically Natural Living
Real Food Kitchen Tour: Amanda Brown
Real Food Kitchen Tour: Pamela Montazeri
Real Food Kitchen Tour: Cracking an Egg with One Hand
Real Food Kitchen Tour: Yolks, Kefir & Gristle
Real Food Kitchen Tour: The Okparaeke Family
Real Food Kitchen Tour: Holistic Kid
Real Food Kitchen Tour: Artistta
Real Food Kitchen Tour: Nourished & Nurtured
Real Food Kitchen Tour: May All Seasons Be Sweet to Thee
Real Food Kitchen Tour: The Horting Family
Real Food Kitchen Tour: Hybrid Rasta Mama
Real Food Kitchen Tour: Granola Mom 4 God
Real Food Kitchen Tour: Real Food Devotee
Real Food Kitchen Tour: Real Food Forager
Real Food Kitchen Tour: The Leftover Queen
Real Food Kitchen Tour: Health Home & Happiness

Let Us Tour Your Kitchen

Are you a real foodie? Do you have a kitchen that you’d like to see featured on CHEESESLAVE?

Please email me at annmarie AT realfoodmedia dot com. Either send me a link to a Flickr set or email me your photos (minimum of 5, but more is better). Note: Please send me LARGE photos. Minimum 610 width. If they’re too small, I can’t use them.

Oh, and please send the answers to the above questions (at the very top of this post).

As much as I’d love to include all the photos I receive, I can’t guarantee that I will use your photos in the series. I’m looking for creative, good quality photos.

Some ideas for photos:

• Show us what’s in your fridge or what’s fermenting on your counter
• Take some snaps of some of your favorite kitchen gadgets, or show us how you organize your spices
• Got backyard chickens? Send some pics!
• How about a lovely herb garden?
• Kids or pets are always cute!
• Try to include at least one photo of yourself, ideally in your kitchen

And no, you don’t have to have a blog to be included in the tour.