About

Hi, I’m Stephanie. Welcome to my food blog. Figs are my favorite fruit. I could go on and on…the taste, the look, the symbolism.

I have an M.S. degree in Nutrition Education from Teachers College Columbia University, and I am registered dietitian nutritionist (RDN).

In college I studied Nutritional Science-Dietetics and I also worked as a pastry cook and tried to “stage” (intern) in as many restaurants as I could. After college, I moved to New York City to work full time in a restaurant kitchen as a pastry cook before going back to school. I went from working in the restaurant world to being a dietitian at a hospital, where I provided medical nutrition therapy to patients in the intensive care units and general medical-surgery units.

After a nine year stint in New York City, I am now back in the Bay Area, working as a renal dietitian at a dialysis center all the while feeding my always-hungry toddler, trying my hand at gardening, and devouring California’s incredible produce.

I can’t seem to get myself out of the kitchen, so, I use this blog to document a lot of the cooking that I do at home.

Figs in my Belly is full of hearty, healthy, whole-food meals, with a few comfort food staples and sweets to keep me sane. Every once in a while I might incorporate some nutrition tidbits into my post. Other times, I get technical with kitchen terms and glimpses into life in a restaurant kitchen or as a registered dietitian.

I suppose that the best advice I have to offer is to keep cooking and baking. Your kitchen will probably get messy. Sometimes you will drop your cake while it is still in the oven and sometimes you will over-bake your cookies and sometimes you will forget to add that extra cup of sugar and everything seems to fall to pieces.

Sometimes you will burn your hand or grate off some of your finger or nick yourself with your knife. These have all happened to me, multiple times. But alas, it just makes all of the good moments better, like when you finally find the chewiest softest oatmeal walnut raisin cookie or the silkiest ice cream recipe or that same go-to African G-nut Stew that makes you scream comfort food. Or when you just know that in a pinch, you can always turn your oven to a high heat, line a baking sheet with parchment (or a reusable baking mat!), and make a pan of roasted veggies. Freshly grated pepper and course flaky salt should become your new best friends.

So keep cooking, keep reading my blog, and please let me know if you have any requests/exclamations/questions/concerns/I-LOVE-YOU-THIS-IS-SO-GOOD moments and I will try my best to cater to your needs and desires.

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Making Brioche; March, 2012

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