Garden Grown Chef

17/11/2025

Since I am pausing my personal chef services, at what I know is a very busy time for families, I'd like to take the opportunity to highly recommend another local personal chef.

If you are looking for holiday catering or meal prep services, I highly recommend reaching out to Wanderlust Cuisine- Chef Amy Hessel

She is the former owner and chef at the Rail Trail Cafe, among other accomplishments, and you will be in excellent hands.

https://wanderlustcuisine.com/?fbclid=IwVERDUANLXKxleHRuA2FlbQIxMAABHolnR0nKZsypo8rYgf3y08ToYvYmCHc0vO-sbz4t3cCmCZxRDwt1eeI-IwVJ_aem_3ILZ8rvTVjyBDnatTqg8RA

Experience delicious meals tailored to your taste. Our private chef service brings gourmet meals right to your kitchen, with mulit-course dining experiences, group and one on one cooking classes, and meal prep. Book today!

11/11/2025

Something I love...cozying up with a warm mug of chai on the first truly cold day of the season.

Something I don't love...taking a series of awkward selfies to use for a big announcement...

In 2016, I found out I had a brain tumor, and in January of 2017, I had surgery when my first daughter was just 4 months old. It transformed my path and my life.

This Summer, I discovered my tumor has returned, and I will be undergoing another craniotomy in January.

As of December, I will no longer be cooking for clients. Instead, I will be focusing on nourishing my body and stocking my family's freezer, some of which I will post about here.

It may be a long time before I cook for clients again, but I have a lot of ideas about other sorts of meal assistance I can provide, in the form of hyper seasonal meal guides and recipes.

I may not post often (screen time is a big 👎🏻post surgery) and my website will likely come down for a time, but rest assured, I'm still here, doing my thing, trying to figure out how I can help people enjoy balanced, garden to table meals that meet the needs of their busy lives.

I hope my quest to use food as medicine in my preparation for surgery and recovery can be of use for others as well, but who knows where this next transformation will lead me.

09/11/2025

I make chicken parm, eggplant parm and zucchini parm, but one of our house favorites is actually sweet potato parm.

Cut the sweet potatoes into 1/2" rounds, toss with EVOO, Italian seasoning, garlic granules, s & p and roast at 375 deg for about 40 min, flipping half way through.

Top each round with marinara, mozzarella and Parmesan, and broil until golden and gooey.

Serve alongside pasta with fresh marinara and a kale Caesar for a delicious family friendly vegetarian meal.

06/11/2025

Fall comfort food, loaded with nutrients, packed with flavor, and easily customizable.

📸Vegan Pumpkin & Apple Cider 4 Bean Chili with Sweet Potatoes, Poblano Peppers and a Smoky + Warm combination of spices

📸Mexican Chopped Kale Salad with roasted Sweet Potatoes, Purple Cabbage, Pepitas, Cotija cheese and Cilantro 🍋‍🟩 Dressing

23/10/2025

I wouldn't exactly call this Thai curry traditional, but it does hit all the right notes that bring me back to my experiences with Thai street food circa 2006.

The veggies I use vary with the season, but the combination of garlic, ginger, scallions, Thai hot peppers, cilantro, Thai basil, coconut milk, fish sauce and lime juice create that pungent, savory, umami aroma that is as familiar as it is exotic.

This curry is great with tofu, shrimp or chicken and is best served over steaming rice.

Some of my favorite Autumn veggies to use, in any combination, are mushrooms, peppers, winter squash, green beans, cauliflower, kale and spinach.

Curry is great for freezing, so make a big batch!

Enjoy 😋

17/10/2025

It's no secret that my first step in creating seasonal menus is simply thinking about the foods that I've been craving. What I make for my clients is often what I end up making for myself, so I love it when our tastes are aligned.

This week's combo of classic homemade chicken noodle soup and Orchard Harvest Salad have been the definition of comfort food, hitting just right as the temps have begun to dip and the leaves to turn.

📸Chicken Noodle soup
with 🍋 & fresh herbs
(chicken from RED STAR FARM )
📸Orchard Harvest Salad
with baby spinach, apples & pears
from Shaw Orchards, pecans, goat cheese, red onion, apple cider vinaigrette

15/10/2025

Homemade chicken stock is liquid gold this time of year. It will become the base of so many soups, sauces, and sometimes even just sipped from a mug with a hunk of sourdough for dipping.

Soup bones from RED STAR FARM seasoned and roasted in the oven for
~ an hour at 450 deg
(or a leftover carcass from whole roasted chicken)

Place bones and juices in a large stock pot with a few stalks of roughly chopped celery, carrots, quartered onions and halved garlic bulbs. Add a couple bay leaves, bunch of fresh thyme and pinch of peppercorns.

Cover with cold water, bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer for 4-8 hrs. Stop when reduced by ~ half, or add more cool water, return to a simmer, and reduce to 3/4 for additional collagen extraction for bone broth.

Strain through a colander (and then a fine mesh strainer if youd like). Cool to room temp before refrigerating or freezing in quart containers. Fat will solidify at the top once cold and can be removed before reheating, or included for a richer dish.

For a sipping broth, add sea salt, cracked pepper and a squeeze of 🍋 to suit your tastes.

Enjoy!

08/10/2025

It finally feels like Autumn, so it might as well start tasting like it!

I love everything about Fall salads and all of the possible color, flavor and texture combinations.

One of my go-to dressings is a Tahini + Maple + Dijon vinaigrette. Easy to make and extremely versatile.

2 TBS tahini
1 TBS Dijon mustard
1 tsp Hot Honey
from Burning Hell Hot Sauce
2 tsp maple syrup
2 tsp Apple cider vinegar
(or 1/2 lemon)
1 clove garlic, minced
(or 1/2 tsp garlic granules)
cracked pepper & sea salt to taste
Water to thin to desired consistency

Whisk or blend together, adjust to your tastes, makes enough to serve 4

📸Autumn Harvest Salad with arugula, celery, dried cranberries, roasted butternut squash, toasted walnuts, red onion, Gorgonzola cheese, Tahini + Maple + Dijon vinaigrette

Easy Substitutions:

arugula ---> baby spinach
celery ---> fennel
cranberries ---> apples
butternut squash ---> sweet potatoes
walnuts ---> almonds
red onion ---> radish
Gorgonzola ---> goat cheese

23/09/2025

New season, new client, new set of dietary needs.

This is my first time working with a client struggling with a Mast Cell disorder who requires a low-histamine diet. While it is interesting for me to research a new area of nutrition science, and how food can be used as medicine, and even fun for me to come up with custom weekly menu options for her, I know living with this kind of restrictive dietary need can be debilitating for people.

It's the sort of meal plan that our current food system just can't accommodate. The only way for this client to meet her nutritional needs is through a very specific, and freshly prepared, whole foods, plant based diet where even many "good for you" foods are off limits.

What I've discovered so far is that even restrictive diets can be satisfying and delicious.

Nature provides, we just have to focus on enjoying the ingredients that work with our bodies rather than concerning ourselves with the ones that don't.

📸 GF Grass-Fed Beef Meatballs from Iron Hill Farm of Maryland with Roasted Veggies & Sweet Potatoes
📸GF Buckwheat & Applesauce Pancakes with Blueberry Chia Compote
📸GF Buckwheat Muffins with Zucchini, Carrots, Apples and local honey

18/09/2025

It wasn't necessarily the weather, the calendar or even the harvest that told me it was time to switch up my juice, it was my body.

As a family, we fully leaned into Summer this year, and it's made the first month back to school extra difficult.

Schedules, time constraints, sports, work...we're struggling to fit it all in and still carve out any time for each other, let alone ourselves. It's all been very taxing, both physically and mentally, in what is usually my favorite month, and I'm feeling a bit depleted.

Enter this season's red juice. It won't fix all my problems, or yours, but it feels like just what I need right now, and maybe you do too.

2 beets, skinned and chopped
2-3 apples, chopped
2" ginger
2 lemons, peeled
1 cucumber, chopped
1 TBS local, raw honey
1 tsp pink sea salt
40 oz filtered water

Blend, strain through cheese cloth or fine mesh strainer, enjoy over ice. I like mine topped off with a spritz of bubbly water.

Don't forget to take care of yourself in times of transition. Enjoy 😊

18/09/2025

Simple pleasures always make rainy days a little brighter.

Harissa Olive Oil from Gettysburg Olive Oil Co. helps too.

15/09/2025

Teaching balanced, garden to table eating (and cooking) starts at home.

My 9 yr old made dinner last night 95% by herself, and I don't know who's more proud, me or her.

Meatloaf with Red Barn Farm Market at Harry C. Dehoff Farms ground beef and Stoney Lonesome Farm ground pork, topped with a Burning Hell Hot Sauce Crabby Hot Honey & ketchup glaze with sides of sweet potato coins, My Mother's Garden green beans and Flourish & Ferment Co. sourdough bread with a ☀️ punch of freshly squeezed orange juice, lemonade and bubbly water and followed up with Shaw Orchards apple strudel and homemade ice cream with Apple Valley Creamery dairy.

Taking a night off cooking has never tasted so good. 😊