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A Coversation with Chef and Dietician Laura Pensiero
Rate it! Votes (0) | Comments (0) By Cheri Sicard Posted August 6th, 2007

Laura Pensiero brings a lot to the culinary table, being both a chef and a dietician. After first becoming a registered dietician, Laura worked in hospitals, planning meals and counseling those with health problems. Since she worked with food and enjoyed cooking, she decided to enroll in New York's French Culinary Institute. There she learned ways of keeping food flavorful in addition to healthy.

Laura found her focus naturally began to shift towards preventing disease. She realized that having culinary training put her in a unique position to help people. Her focus is on teaching people ways to put more fruits, vegetables and healthy foods into their diets. Highlighting all the goods foods you can put into your diet, rather than the bad ones you shouldn't, helps to combat a deprivation mindset.

Laura's unique blend of talents led to her position as a nutrition counselor for New York's Strang Cancer Prevention Center. Because she wanted to help more people translate findings of new studies into an easy-to-use form, she proposed doing a book with her Strang colleagues. The result is the Strang Cookbook for Cancer Prevention.

This wonderful book has many Pensiero's own recipes as well as contributions from many of the country's top chefs. Food enthusiasts will recognize names like Jacques Pepin, Daniel Boulud and Jacques Torres in the book's extensive list of contributors.

Not content to just impart her wisdom to the medical community, Laura recently joined the faculty of the Culinary Institute of America, where she teaches nutrition to tomorrow's chefs.

I  talked with Laura by phone. Here's how the conversation went:

Cheri Sicard - What are your favorite ingredients?
Laura Pensiero - Winter squashes. I really like their concentrated flavors and the color they add to a plate. They're wonderful oven roasted. I like fall vegetables in general. They are particularly loaded in nutrients and phyto-chemicals, which are the natural cancer fighters found in plants.

Cheri Sicard - What are your favorite tools in the kitchen and are there any that make healthy cooking easier?
Laura Pensiero - Non stick pans, of course, although I also like cast iron pans. Once they are well seasoned you hardly need to use any oil or fat. Cast iron is also great because it can go from stove top to oven. I also love my food processor. This is a really important tool because you can puree fruits, vegetables. starches and beans, which can add a creaminess to recipes that can replace much of the fat.

Cheri Sicard - Which of your roles is more important - chef or dietician?
Laura Pensiero - It's really integrated in my life. One role isn't more important than the other. I think that I'm a lot less scary to chefs than most dietitians. Traditionally a lot of dietitians and nutritionists come from the standpoint of taking things away or from a deprivation mindset. This is changing and we're starting to see that dieticians are getting more in touch with food. Many of them are going to culinary schools. I come from the approach of wanting the chefs to use food. Use vegetables, use fruits, use the foods that are good for you. This makes me an effective liaison between the two worlds and that's an important role. Chefs influence what we eat a lot more than medical reports. They have a tremendous power over what the public eats. I want them to see that by using ingredients, rather than taking away, they can create healthful and appealing meals.

Cheri Sicard - I know that your on the faculty of the Culinary Institute of America. How much of a part does nutrition play in a chef's training there?
Laura Pensiero - Nutritional education is very important there. The students at CIA receive more nutritional education than the most medical students. There are 2 courses in nutrition, one lecture, the other more a hands on approach in their restaurant. But it's also integrated into almost every part of the curriculum. When planning meals there always has to be a balance and thought put into the nutritional aspects of the cuisine.

Cheri Sicard - Have you ever thought about opening a restaurant and if so, what would it be like?
Laura Pensiero - No, not really. But if I did, it would probably be Mediterranean cuisine because it's so easy to just leave it the way it is and still be healthy. A lot of ethnic cuisines are that way, naturally high in vegetables and naturally healthy.

Cheri Sicard - Are you a vegetarian?
Laura Pensiero - No, I pretty much follow the guidelines of the Strang Clinic. Vegetables are most important, I'll eat small portions of red meat, if it's something that's really tempting. Lots of fish and some chicken, occasionally.

Cheri Sicard - Do you have a secret chef's tip you can share with our readers?
Laura Pensiero - I like oven roasting vegetables. A lot of flavor gets lost when you boil or steam. Oven roasting intensifies the vegetables' flavors and allows the natural sugars to caramelize. It's also something that's very easy to do, even on a busy week night. You just slice up some vegetables, drizzle a little olive oil over them and sprinkle on some fresh herbs. Stick them in the oven to roast. Simple. I also like one pot meals and vegetable stews, especially for busy weeknights.

Cheri Sicard - What's your favorite fat cutting technique?
Laura Pensiero - Vegetable purees are a great fat cutting technique. They can replace a lot of the fat that would normally be in a recipe. Let's use a risotto, for example. Usually the finishing part of a risotto is a big glob of butter. You can cut this by using a vegetable puree instead. What I do is usually leave half my vegetables whole and the other half I would cook a bit more. Or I might even use some canned vegetables, and puree them. I would then add this puree instead of the usual butter when it comes time to finish the risotto. It concentrates the flavor and adds creaminess.

Cheri Sicard - What do you find is the best way to keep people motivated to maintain a healthy diet?
Laura Pensiero - It's a lifestyle, not a diet. I tell people it's never perfect and it shouldn't be. I try to get them to stagger their goals rather than trying to get them to do everything all at once. And most importantly, I try to come from the approach of adding things to their diet rather than taking away. Add more fruit and vegetable servings. We want to get away from the deprivation mindset. Also, when people add more fruits and vegetables to their diet, a lot of the other problems take care of themselves.

Cheri Sicard - I know you talk about this in the book, but the information is so important, I wanted to get it into this interview. We hear so much about pesticides and the danger of chemicals on our produce. Can you comment on how important eating organic versus non-organic is?
Laura Pensiero - Certainly organic is better agriculturally and environmentally. It's more sustainable. But variety and number of fruit and vegetable servings is most important. If buying organic is going to keep people from eating enough, it's better to forego this, or perhaps eat some organic and some not. The variety and number of servings of fruit and vegetables are more important to the prevention of cancer than the pesticides are to the development of cancer.

Cheri Sicard - What's a good way to train children to eat healthy?
Laura Pensiero - Don't make food a huge issue and be a good example. Develop their palates for healthy foods early on. Serve lots of fruits and vegetables. I also think farm visits are a good way to connect kids to food and where it comes from. Somehow it all means more when you know where it came from.

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