Aira
About the Teacher
Why study with them?
Nutritional sweets are my love letter to the world.
As young as age three or four I can remember walking to the store to buy ingredients for chocolate chip cookies and mixing the dough with my father and sister, his fresh loaves of bread, and tasting his awful dark bitter coffee that was boiled, yes boiled, for way too long. Later, inspired by these early experiences in the kitchen, as a young kid I'd make mystery sandwiches for guests, chocolates as gifts, sometimes as anonymous love letters and just because. The joyful memories I have in childhood often would revolve around the process of making food. It was the one place I felt some sort of creative freedom and resolve, connection to family, and control and an emotional break from the rest of life.
I eventually started baking and cooking in my free time as a love letter to my sister. She found out before gluten free baking took off, a time of dense rice flour cardboard tasting bread, that she was allergic to both gluten and dairy. It was difficult for a while, especially coming from Italian roots, our family didn't really understand her diet fully, often pressuring her to eat pasta, cheese, and bread dishes or forgetting entirely and leaving her to figure out her own meal. This sparked my focus on gluten free baking and then my mom and I found out about our gluten intolerancee; further pushing my new baking vision. As time moved forward so did my perspective in baking and cooking. I started to become more health conscious, doing nutritional and herbal research and highlighting this in my dishes.
Presently, the truffles are a love letter to both my daughter and myself. I have noticed a huge intolerance in my body and mind to sugar and how it affects people who eat it as well, such as inflammation, flightiness in thought which translates to uncomfortability in the body, and uncomfortability in digestion and excessive cravings for the sweets that cause these issues. As I read more about sugar it became more apparent the negative effects it has on the body and mind. Even though I am aware of these effects, there is a lot of nostalgia to sweets for me in my family dynamics, especially with chocolate chip cookies, and in traditions throughout the world. So I want to share these beautiful memories with my daughter and to challenge traditional sugar based recipes of the world. This is what birthed my intentional herbal ball chocolates and truffles. They are a way for my daughter to enjoy the decadence of chocolate without the sugar rush and with the health benefits of herbs and spices. I also hope by making these and other kitchen creations together will hold special memories and recipes for her to share as she grows older.
As young as age three or four I can remember walking to the store to buy ingredients for chocolate chip cookies and mixing the dough with my father and sister, his fresh loaves of bread, and tasting his awful dark bitter coffee that was boiled, yes boiled, for way too long. Later, inspired by these early experiences in the kitchen, as a young kid I'd make mystery sandwiches for guests, chocolates as gifts, sometimes as anonymous love letters and just because. The joyful memories I have in childhood often would revolve around the process of making food. It was the one place I felt some sort of creative freedom and resolve, connection to family, and control and an emotional break from the rest of life.
I eventually started baking and cooking in my free time as a love letter to my sister. She found out before gluten free baking took off, a time of dense rice flour cardboard tasting bread, that she was allergic to both gluten and dairy. It was difficult for a while, especially coming from Italian roots, our family didn't really understand her diet fully, often pressuring her to eat pasta, cheese, and bread dishes or forgetting entirely and leaving her to figure out her own meal. This sparked my focus on gluten free baking and then my mom and I found out about our gluten intolerancee; further pushing my new baking vision. As time moved forward so did my perspective in baking and cooking. I started to become more health conscious, doing nutritional and herbal research and highlighting this in my dishes.
Presently, the truffles are a love letter to both my daughter and myself. I have noticed a huge intolerance in my body and mind to sugar and how it affects people who eat it as well, such as inflammation, flightiness in thought which translates to uncomfortability in the body, and uncomfortability in digestion and excessive cravings for the sweets that cause these issues. As I read more about sugar it became more apparent the negative effects it has on the body and mind. Even though I am aware of these effects, there is a lot of nostalgia to sweets for me in my family dynamics, especially with chocolate chip cookies, and in traditions throughout the world. So I want to share these beautiful memories with my daughter and to challenge traditional sugar based recipes of the world. This is what birthed my intentional herbal ball chocolates and truffles. They are a way for my daughter to enjoy the decadence of chocolate without the sugar rush and with the health benefits of herbs and spices. I also hope by making these and other kitchen creations together will hold special memories and recipes for her to share as she grows older.
