From My Heart to Your Belly

What defines me as a food blogger?

If there’s good food present, I’ll be there with a fork in one hand and a camera in the other!

As an avowed foodie who incessantly eats, talks and daydreams about food, I founded a supper club for the sole purpose of sharing incredible food, fine wine and scintillating conversation with fellow foodies. Luckily for me I live in savory Seattle, a city offering culinary adventures long on innovation, artistry and superior ingredients among a selection of diverse cuisines and top-notch establishments.

What started out as a quest to dine my way around the tastiest restaurants the city has to offer has segued into a passion for innovation and experimentation in my own kitchen. Although I continue to marvel over good food and the effort put into ensuring top quality cuisine and presentation, I have come to truly appreciate that food cooked from scratch will always rival a spectacularly extraordinary dining experience.

Preferring to invent dishes on the fly rather than re-purposing another’s recipes, I embrace fearlessness in the kitchen. Happily, the palette of my imagination resists all bounds. Trusting my intuition and ingenuity, I am not afraid to pair cinnamon with salmon, caramelized fig with pizza or chocolate with lamb chops.

Cooking by availability and intuition—shopping the market, choosing produce that looks fresh and appealing, and then combining it with ingredients on hand, according to taste and personal preference – is perhaps the oldest and most authentic way to prepare food—an exploration of taste, flavor and ingredient combinations. Browsing the open-air markets and eclectic groceries not only fuels my inspiration, it provides a wonderfully diverse selection of foraged, seasonal ingredients as well as exotic, ethnic treasures. It’s not until I am standing in my kitchen though, holding some wondrous fruit or vegetable in my hand, that I know how I am going to prepare it.

My food blog is one of many in a global community of like-minded epicureans, sharing what comes out of our kitchens and our hearts. More than just a collection of recipes, instructions, and information about the preparation and serving of foods, a food blog is a chronicle and treasury of the fine art of cooking, an art whose masterpieces—created only to be consumed—would otherwise be lost.

Food brings people together; it is the shared flavors of friendship and community. Ever since I was a teen, one of my greatest pleasures has been preparing meals for others and being witness to the look of pure bliss that crosses their face with that first bite; a soul-satisfying achievement encouraging me to continue what I love best, cooking from my heart to your belly.

A 13th-century Buddhist leader-philosopher, Nichiren, while in exile, wrote in a letter thanking a follower for sending him food, “Rice is not simply rice, it is life itself.”

If you make this recipe, snap a pic of your dish and hashtag it #kellylenihancooks. I'd love to see your creations on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter!

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