Part I: JL Fields, The Vegan Air Fryer

JL Fields is the founder and culinary director of the Colorado Springs Vegan Cooking Academy. She is a Master Vegan Lifestyle Coach & Educator, Food for Life instructor, chef instructor in the culinary program at the University of New Mexico-Taos, personal chef, career coach, and a corporate consultant offering wellness training, brand representation, and strategic planning services.

JL is the author of The Vegan Air Fryer: The Healthier Way to Enjoy Deep-Fried Flavors (Vegan Heritage Press, June 2017) and Vegan Pressure Cooking: Delicious Beans, Grains, and One-Pot Meals in Minutes (Fair Winds Press, January 2015) and co-author of The Main Street Vegan Academy Cookbook: Over 100 Plant-Sourced Recipes Plus Practical Tips for the Healthiest, Most Compassionate You (Ben Bella, December 2017) and Vegan for Her: The Woman’s Guide to Being Healthy and Fit on a Plant-Based Diet (Da Capo Lifelong Books, July 2013)She is the co-creator of The Real World Vegan Meal Plan, producer and host of the radio program Easy Vegan, and writes the monthly vegan dining review for the Colorado Springs Gazette.

JL is the owner and lead consultant for JL Fields Consulting, providing governance and strategic planning services to nonprofits and culinary and online outreach services to food associations and marketing firms. She writes the blog JL goes Vegan. Follow JL on Twitter,  Facebook, Pinterest, and Instagram.

Part II: Jasmine Leyva, The Invisible Vegan

Just “Jas” to her friends — she is unapologetically an artist. Born in D.C., a city that used to be more appreciative of doctors, lawyers, and politicians, she moved to Los Angeles for college to pursue her dream while completely dismissing America’s. After three years of itching to “do” and despite uninvited judgments, she left school a year shy of her degree for a TV production job. She is debt free! From there, she went on to work as an associate producer on a NAACP winning docuseries entitled Unsung, and shortly after, was given the opportunity to write and produce on Being, a docuseries highlighting dynamic entertainers in film and music. Happy to be doing what she loved, but simultaneously unhappy about putting that passion into someone else’s vision, she decided to let go of her nine-to-five and come into her own reign of pure artistry. Just Jasmine. No limits and no boss except for her own creativity. She went on to star in commercials and print ads for major brands like Nissan, Sony, Apple, Uber, American Express, Diesel, BlackPeopleMeet, Credit Sesame, Michelle Watches, Elle magazine and more. She also starred in the Lifetime show, My Crazy Ex, and is scheduled to star in her first indie film in 2017. However, she did not lay her behind-the-camera talents to rest. Jasmine and her fiancé, Kenny Leyva, are currently producing their own feature length documentary, The Invisible Vegan, a film that chronicles Jasmine’s personal experience with plant-based eating. The film also explains how plant-based eating is directly linked to African roots and how African-American eating habits have been debased by a chain of oppression stemming from slavery, economics and modern agribusiness. Not to sound pedestrian, but the sky is the limit