JCCFS: Tell us a little bit about yourself. What’s your background in your medium? How did you get started?

Cornelia: I’m excited to offer this class after observing that many people don’t seem to crave dark leafy greens the way I do, despite the overwhelming evidence of their benefits. America is rapidly becoming more and more unhealthy, with insufficient fiber and dietary variety leading to issues with our microbiomes, bodies, and minds. Lifestyle changes can make a huge life-saving difference and have been shown to reverse cardiovascular disease, dementia, diabetes, autoimmune disorders, and all kinds of inflammation; but who’s going to want to change if it doesn’t taste good? Let’s come together and learn how to make green leafy vegetables intriguing and delicious.

Because of my background in pediatrics, which mainly centers on prevention, as well as several decades of self-study around wild edible plants, herbal medicine, the microbiome, mushrooms as food and medicine and various mind and body healing modalities, this class is the perfect combination of those passions along with my abiding love of tasty food.

Sam: My skill’s with ‘vegetable whispering’ has been honed through four decades of cooking for myself and others while following a vegetarian lifestyle. My shiitake mushroom gravy is somewhat legendary and is one of the dishes that helped persuade Cornelia to marry me.

JCCFS: Tell us more about your class’s specific technique or process.

Cornelia & Sam: It’s easy to make food tasty if you deep-fry it or cover it in cheese, cream or add bacon, but it’s far more challenging to make it tasty if you don’t.  If that’s what you’ve been looking for, then this is the class for you. Students will collaborate in teams to prepare a wide range of recipes—most of which happen to be gluten-free, vegetarian and keto-friendly.  They will meet a variety of greens, hailing from Asia, Meso-America, the tropics, parts of Europe and the local Appalachian foothills.  A few technique examples include saucing, pickling, fermenting, hot-oil sizzling aromatics, dehydrating to make savory “on-the-go” crave-beating snacks, and ‘taste-offs’ comparing the same recipe made with  different combinations of greens.  We will forage in the woods and “raid” the garden to guarantee the freshness of our ingredients. We aim to showcase healthy and tasty ways to prepare and serve nutrient-rich green vegetables that people will want to eat daily.

JCCFS: What can students expect to leave your class with?

Cornelia & Sam: Students will leave with happy taste buds, full tummies and lots of new ways to cook new vegetables. And the knowledge that cooking and eating healthy greens can be easy, fun and delicious. We’ll also provide some starts and cuttings and information on care of growing some of your own greens back home.

JCCFS: What is your favorite aspect or part of the Folk School? What do you most look forward to when coming back to teach on our campus? 

Cornelia & Sam: We truly enjoy the camaraderie and community that the Folk School fosters. The vibrant energy of being in such a beautiful location surrounded by people purposefully pursuing the passion to be creative is a profoundly satisfying experience.

JCCFS: Where do you draw inspiration from for your work?

Cornelia: I grew up fighting my two brothers over ‘sie-gum-chi,’ tangling chopsticks to claim the last bits of lightly cooked, emerald green spinach made savory with soy sauce, toasted sesame seed oil, garlic, slivered green onion, and crowned with slightly crushed toasted sesame seeds. Each member of our family experienced “spinach trauma”, anticipating some variation of our beloved dish, becoming horrified when confronted with an unrecognizable grayish-green mush. And we didn’t just tussle over spinach, but also meaty-tasting textural ‘cosari’ or reconstituted marinated sun-dried fiddlehead ferns. We had gathered them in the deep woods in early spring. It turns out using traditional Korean methods removes the potentially carcinogenic compounds that are both heat-labile and water-soluble. This knowledge makes me cringe everytime I see a ‘cheffy’ dish featuring barely cooked fiddlehead ferns.

Cornelia & Sam: We recently learned a delicious short cut recipe for “Five Minute Instant Pot Risotto”. No long stirring or babysitting the pot, but still perfectly cooked grains of arborio rice, slightly to the tooth and blanketed with parmesan creaminess. We’re currently adapting the recipe to make a “Very Green, Very Speedy Risotto”. We’ve also been experimenting with keto-friendly flours, such as Lupini and Bamboo Flour to make low carb breads and crackers to accompany our dishes.

JCCFS: What tips would you give a student or aspiring craftsperson? Anything you wish you had known earlier in your career? 

Cornelia: The best career advice I’ve heard came from a highly successful chemistry professor at Emory University who invented a life-saving medication taken all over the world. He tells all his students, many of whom are aspiring pre-med students: “Figure out what you love and figure out what you’re good at, and find the intersection of those two things and then go for it.” I think the Folk School is a great place to experience doing many different things and provides help on the way to figuring out what that might be.

JCCFS: Where can folks find you if they want to stay up to date on your work?

Cornelia: My web site is www.gamushroomclub.org. You can find my contact information there.