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5 ways to heal your kitchen from food-related stress

Jules Blaine Davis shares how to fall in love with nourishing your family.

5 ways to heal your kitchen from food-related stress

Jules Blaine Davis is a mother of two, an artist and a kitchen healer. She helps women find ways to stop being stressed in the kitchen, to not worry about feeding their picky toddler, and to find nourishment in simple goodness. Here, she shares her 5 tips for transforming your kitchen from a place of stress, to a place of healing:

1. Find the love

First stand in the middle of your kitchen and do a 360. Gather all the things that you do not feel like you. Ask yourself about each thing. I know it can get heavy and obligatory real quick! Each thing that doesn't reflect you can be replaced with something you may already have. Don't be afraid to let things go that do not tell your story—the one you are living and the one you want to live. Less is best when it all feels like you. Little by little, replace each thing with something you love.

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2. Use vessels to tell your story

Why is grandma's broken tea cup that you love in the back cabinet? You will never use it as a tea cup but you love it, so let's use it! We need her in the kitchen. You can put bullion cubes in it, butter by the toast, toothpicks. . . so many things. Let each thing express your story and your lineage.

3. Bring in the olive oil

Buy some you love, of course. (I think you are getting the hang of this!) Olive oil is happiest and healthiest in tinted glass so it's not rancid. How does it fit in your hand? How does it look? All important parts to how you will use it and how enjoyable it will be when you do. It's good for you, so it should feel good too. Start buying things you love, not only what works for others as well. Beauty and efficiency can live together and they should inspire you!

4. Collect the right spices
The spice cabinet can be overwhelming, to say the least. When we recipe shop, it can lead to unintentional hoarding, (anyone?!?!). All you need are the spices you use all the time and these basic ones: Curry, cumin, garlic salt, onion salt, garam masala, cinnamon and nutmeg.

5. Gather around a wood board

I use wood boards as a simple way to present fresh food that nourishes. Cutting up fruit, cheese, leftover roasted veggies this way can be life changing, so easy, so doable. Don't stress about feeding; cut up what you have an offer it communally. I call it Wood Board Love. It’s an offering of the simple beauty of food. Don’t ask if they are hungry. (We all are hungry.) Put out a wood board and watch it disappear. It will make your life and your marriage better, promise.

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