Foodie With Purpose

Michaele Garcia

Welcome to my recipe blog with tips for healthier eating

Healthy eating does not mean giving up all our favorite foods, but making changes to our diet by incorporating healthier ingredients while still preserving our traditional, cultural, and personal preferences. We need to create better, healthier eating habits we can maintain.

Interested in trying out some healthier recipes yourself? It is surprisingly easy to create healthy dishes to improve your and your family’s health, prevent chronic diseases, have more energy while also improve mood and get better sleep.

In the words of hippocrates:

"Let Food be Thy Medicine
and Medicine Thy food"

Extra Virgin Olive oil

The most important ingredient in most of my cooking is a high quality extra virgin cold pressed olive oil (an extra virgin avocado oil for frying). Fats are essential to our diet and keep us healthy, but not all fats are created equal.

Tip: Keep some olive oil in a bottle or other container and flavor it with herbs, garlic cloves, peppercorns and chili flakes. Use it for salads, for drizzling over soups and sauces, and for dipping with toasted sprouted or sourdough bread.

How can we prepare healthier meals?

Check out my tips and Find healthy and delicious recipes

Recipes

Here you can find my recipes, what I eat and what I prepare for my family. Food has to be delicious and be good for us. Food should not be poisonous but healing.

Eating Healthier

There are foods that should be avoided like highly processed foods and sugar. How can we do that without giving up taste? How can we maintain healthy habits?

Buying Food

With all the different choices, what should we buy? How can we read product labels without a science degree? What do we eat when we are on the go or when we travel?

How it Started

Foodie with Purpose

I have always loved food! I like to eat and I like to cook and have always tried to cook somewhat healthy, but unfortunately, I failed miserably! After losing my mother to a heart attack and finding myself with the same symptoms 25 years later, weighing over 200 pounds, I knew I had to make a change. After I came home from the hospital, where the physician told me that I have to be on cholesterol medication for the rest of my life, I started my research. I earned 2 nutrition certificates, started to exercise and changed my diet. After 3 months I was off the cholesterol medication and the weight started to come off. I have lost nearly 50 pounds and have never felt better in my life. Although I lost weight in the past, it was never in a healthy way with a long-term outlook and I always gained it back. Now it has been over a year and I have incorporated many changes to my diet and lifestyle. I seem to have endless energy, my mind feels clearer, and I have neve been more excited about food! I love this way of eating, enjoy fresh and healthy ingredients, and feel no more guilt!
Michaele Garcia
Michaele Garcia

Cultural
influences

Growing up in a small town in the Black Forest, I learned how to cook from my grandmother and mother who were both amazing cooks, my grandmother in a more traditional way, my mother always trying out new exciting recipes. I do not want to miss my comfort food but now enjoy healthier versions of traditional German delicacies. 

I married into a large Cuban family where food is always at the center of gatherings and celebrations. I will always remember sitting in my mother-in-law’s kitchen and learning how to prepare the traditional dishes. Cuban food has amazing flavors that I have come to love and which have a large influence on my cooking now.

Living in Miami for over 30 years, I have been able to enjoy dishes from many cultures from all over the world. There is no other place with this vibrant cultural diversity which is mirrored in its food. I cannot help but be influenced by these amazing colorful culinary treasures. Also, the eateries in New York City and Upstate New York have left an unforgettable impression on me, especially the artisan locally sourced delicacies of the Finger Lakes region.

Although I have never been to Asia, Asian cuisine is all around us. Especially the Japanese and Thai dishes with fresh fish and light coconut curries, Indian cuisine with its use of amazing spices, and the Korean restaurants in Ithaca, New York have been among my all time favorites.

Nutrition, Heart Disease and Diabetes

How to prevent or even reverse cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes, and kidney disease with the right foods

Mental Health and nutrition

How the increasing cases of mental health issues can be treated and sometimes cured with nutrition 

All photos used on this website and in my blogs are either my own or from pixabay.com where gifted photographers make their photographs available royalty free. It is a welcomed source that often captures exactly what I want to show in a much more professional way. Thank you to all those wonderful artists.