Quirky Cooking Chats

Many of us go through a period in our lives where we begin to question the work we do and our career goals and decide we want to find work that is more fulfilling, that gives us purpose, and that brings connection with like-minded people.

Maybe you have been out of the workforce for a few years because you’ve been busy with babies and small children; or maybe you’ve had to take a break due to health issues, and now you feel a bit lost and not sure how to begin finding work that will ‘fill your bucket’ as well as your bank account!

That was the case for Jo, who put her graphic design career on hold to begin a family, then realised after 10 years of being home with kids that her career no longer fit in with who she was and what she wanted to do in life. Helen Marshall of Primal Alternative also had this predicament – she left the corporate world to have kids, went through a major change in her diet and lifestyle, and when she was ready to begin working again she knew she needed to find something that fits better with her young family.

Jo and Helen discuss how to find fulfillment in your work, and Helen shares her dream of giving women the opportunity to build their own business doing something they love, something that has a purpose, is family-friendly, promotes good health, and fosters beautiful connections.

We love what Helen is doing with her community based business, Primal Alternative – check it out here. If you’d like to know what’s involved in starting your own Primal Alternative franchise you can find out more here.

Helen also does health coaching, and has her own podcast: Primal Alternative Podcast

Primal Alternative are the producers of our Quirky Cooking Grain Free Pastry (and our Sweet Potato Pastry), and will be stocking more of our products soon!

From the Intro:

Jo has been in the Northern Territory cooking at the Hope for Health retreat for the past week. Find out more about Hope for Health and the work they are doing to improve the health of Indigenous Australians, here.

Interested in the Hope for Health “Together Retreat”, June 2019? Learn more here.

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Rhiannon Crispe is an occupational therapist and passionate autism advocate. She thinks outside the diagnostic box and sees every child as an individual with unlimited potential. On this episode, Rhiannon shares some of the ideas and interventions that can empower parents of kids on the spectrum, and explains that there is not a one-size-fits-all approach to the complexities of autism. Jo and Rhiannon discuss questions such as:

– What is autism?

– How has our understanding of autism changed over the past 50-70 years?

– If autism is a behaviourally defined condition, why do we need to be

– Can nutrition make a difference for autistic children?

– What can parents do at home to support the health and development of

Rhiannon is the host of Homebase Hope a fortnightly podcast dedicated to empowering parents of kids on the spectrum. She is hosting Australia’s largest free and online autism event in April – The Autism Summit.

Useful Links:

Rhiannon’s Website, Homebase Hope

Australia’s largest, free and online, Autism Summit – learn more here

Our Quirky 10th Birthday Giveaway! 

Hope for Health Indigenous Health Retreat, Darwin

Please feel free to contact us if you have any questions!

The post AQJ 135: Empowering Parents of Kids on the Spectrum, with Rhiannon Crispe appeared first on The Wellness Couch.

Jo and her two eldest kids (19 and 21) have just come back from travelling overseas, and in this episode Jo shares her travel tips, especially for those who are on special diets and find the idea of overseas travel a bit daunting! She talks about:

• What foods you can and can’t take on flights overseas (and in Australia)

You’ll also hear about the places they travelled and their itinerary –  so watch out, you’ll be wanting to book flights to Spain after this episode!!

Make sure you also listen to the intro of the last podcast, which was recorded in Spain with their friend and tour guide, Victor Garrido of ‘We Love Malaga’! Listen here.

Useful Links:

A Gluten Gree Guide to Spain

Top 10 Food Markets in Spain! (Always check out the markets wherever you go – they’re amazing!)

Food Tours in South Spain that we recommend – let them know if you’re gluten free and they will accomodate you!

• Malaga Walk & Taste Tour

The post AQJ 134: Travel Tips – Travel Food, Eating Out and Being Prepared! appeared first on The Wellness Couch.

In this episode, you get two discussions on health and wellness topics for the price of one! 😀 The main interview is on supporting parents of kids with developmental disorders to eat well, and the importance of play therapy in helping to change your child’s diet for the better. Plus in the intro, we discuss another topic you’ll find very interesting – how the lifestyle in Spain impacts their longevity, and what we can learn from their way of life!

Intro: Jo introduces listeners to her friend Victor Garrido (a tour guide and quirky cook in Spain), and they chat as they drive through South Spain about the Spanish way of life, and why Spanish people generally enjoy long, healthy lives despite some habits that would seem to work against health and wellness. Once again we see it demonstrated that good health is so much more than just a great diet!

Victor Garrido runs the We Love Malaga tour company in South Spain, and is a long-time follower of Quirky Cooking. He is passionate about sharing his country and its history and culture with visitors to Spain, loves to cook, and his history and food tours are well worth experiencing!

You can find Victor at @boke and @welovemalaga on Instagram, and on the We Love Malaga website. You will find reviews for his tours here on Trip Advisor. If you’re thinking of visiting Spain, we highly recommend looking him up!

Main Interview: Jo interviews her friend Crystel Poggioli (Paediatric Occupational Therapist and GAPS Practitioner) who works with special needs kids and super fussy eaters about the strategies she uses in therapy sessions to help them learn to eat well. She discusses why healing food is so vital for reducing the symptoms of ADHD/ADD/Anxiety, the importance of play therapy, and many of the strategies she uses to help support these children.

Crystel Poggioli has been a Paediatric Occupational Therapist for over 23 years with a range of experience including Royal Children’s Hospital, Brisbane; the inclusive education system in Vancouver, Canada; and working all over Far North Queensland in the education and health system.

She established The Whole Child in 2011 and has been providing holistic occupational therapy services to children and families ever since. Having a private practice allows Crystel to blend her passion for natural health, down-to-earth strategies including gut healing and play therapy.

Crystel had the privilege of training in person with Dr. Natasha Campbell-McBride to become a Certified GAPS practitioner, and she loves how occupational therapy and GAPS work together so well to bring healing and recovery.

The Whole Child provides occupational therapy and GAPS services in the clinic, in the community and via Skype or email. As well an online shop stocks products that Crystel really believes in (10% discount on books for the month of February).

At the same time Crystel is blessed with her own family life – and on a homeschooling journey with 6 children… so far they’ve been homeschooling for 10 years, with the youngest being 3 and the eldest 15. Crystel finds that above all else being a mum is the biggest self-development program you could ever embark on!

You can find out more about Crystel and on her website, The Whole Child

You can also connect with Crystel on Facebook, The Whole Child

The post AQJ 133: Play Therapy for Fussy Eaters, with Crystel Poggioli (OT) appeared first on The Wellness Couch.

Sharon Collon of The Functional Family is passionate about supporting families with special needs. She loves to share step by step, practical strategies and solutions to improve your daily life and routine, helping to reduce the stress and overwhelm that parents of special needs kids are often dealing with. Over the past ten years she has researched and tested these strategies in her own family, teaching her children the skills they need for life, and helping many other families she has come into contact with. She is big on life hacks that really work, and big on getting results to get your family to a place where you have time for adventure, laughter and joy!

Sharon’s online course, Calming the Chaos, offers life changing strategies to parents who have a child or children with ADD, ADHD or anxiety.  This course offers practical information about how to structure the home to assist the whole family. It tackles everything from organising your home, creating routines and systems, becoming your childs’ advocate, and transitioning your child from activities, to creating joy in your home. Everything that you need to survive and thrive as a parent of a child with special needs.

We are shaping future adults. Right now it might be a child who has trouble brushing their teeth and getting ready, but in the future it could be the adult who can’t get to work on time.  It’s so important to teach them the skills now, so they can grow up to be functional, happy and well-adjusted adults.

Useful Links:

The Functional Family website

Calming the Chaos course – $20 off!! (plus more info about the course here)

Facebook page

Instagram

The post AQJ 132: Calming the Chaos – Supporting Kids with ADD, ADHD & Anxiety appeared first on The Wellness Couch.

“You know how this is supposed to be the season of joy? Well, I don’t know about you, but most years I feel like I’m just running around in the kitchen like a mad woman! I actually want to have time to sit down… time to DO the joy, and to SHARE the time. It’s very much about being organised and having a game plan, but also having stacks of simple recipes that you can mix and match and use in different ways, and dress up or down. I’m really keen on mixing and matching, I love putting a whole lot of things out on the table so people can take a bit of this or a bit of that. And you know what I really like about that? I like that it brings people together. You’re not just preparing things and putting it on their plate, they’re actually involved in the meal.” (Jude Blereau)

“You know what I also like about this approach? …[The food is] put out in a way where you have to take a bowl, and when you’re pouring for yourself you have to pour for the person next to you, so it makes you of service to the people around you. So you’re sharing a meal in a really communal way… you’re actually connecting with someone as you pass the plate to them… and no matter how the year has been with them, if you put something on their plate an exchange of gratitude takes place.” (Fouad Kassab)

In our last podcast for 2018, we sit down with Jude Blereau of Wholefood Cooking for a wonderful chat about food that nourishes both body and soul, and how to make the Christmas season a beautiful time of connection and joy.

Grab a cuppa and and join us around the kitchen table, as we discuss:

• Delicious, whole food dinner party ideas

Useful Links:

• Jude’s online Christmas cooking class

The post AQJ 131: A Delicious Wholefood Christmas – with Jude Blereau appeared first on The Wellness Couch.

Christmas is a dangerous time of year for those living in the GAPS village. Taken out of their natural habitat – clean water, chemical-free living, wholesome whole foods without additives colours and preservatives – and instead plunged into the chaos of conventional diets means GAPS folk need to be extra careful. Today we interview the wise elder Elyse Comerford on her experience on how to face the world during Christmas. This episode is full of tips and ideas that will make it easier for GAPS people to enjoy delicious, healing food with their loved ones during the holidays.

We chat about:

• Whole food and GAPS menu ideas

(Elyse Comerford is an Integrative Nutritionist and Certified GAPS (Gut & Psychology/Physiology Syndrome) Practitioner, Holistic Health Coach, Exercise Scientist, Keynote Speaker, Mentor, Mum to Dylan, and a massive sustainability advocate. Elyse is also the GAPS mentor for members of our Quirky Cooking for Gut Health Program, and helps answer questions from listeners on our podcast.)

Useful Links:

For those of you working towards beginning GAPS on the school holidays, you can begin with a consultation with Elyse and you’ll be off to a great start! Elyse has a 50% off consultations special for a limited time, you can contact her here.

Join in Elyse’s 12 Days of Christmas to get some nourishing Christmas recipes!

Make Jo’s GAPS Gingerbread

Over the next few weeks leading up to Christmas, Jo and Fouad are interviewing a few of their favourite health-foodies about their best Christmas tips, with a focus on ways to reduce the holiday stress and enjoying a beautiful, healthy Christmas with friends and family. Each one will share some of their favourite Christmas traditions, and what the holidays look like for their family.

In this episode, take a sneak-peek into nutritionist Cyndi O’Meara’s family-focused Christmas! Jo and Cyndi chat about:

• Cyndi’s family traditions

Cyndi O’Meara is a nutritionist, film maker – ‘What’s With Wheat?’, best-selling author, international speaker and founder of Changing Habits. Learn more about Cyndi here.

Useful Links:

Cyndi’s ‘Changing Habits, Changing Lives’ book

Cyndi’s online ‘Marketplace’

The Changing Habits Facebook page

Our upcoming events

The post AQJ 129: A Simple, Healthy Christmas with Cyndi O’Meara appeared first on The Wellness Couch.

Our gut health and GAPS practitioner Elyse Comerford joins us on the show once more to answer your questions. Today’s discussion includes fasting and in particular broth fasting, what to do while you’re on or recovering from antibiotics, Elyse’s approach to SIBO (small intestinal bacterial overgrowth), reflux and weight management while on a healing diet. Listen In

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It seems that the culture of exercise as portrayed by media equates very low body fat, summer abs and shredding with health. Relatively few exercise practitioners are advocating holistic movement practices, and with the majority of exercise media focusing on attaining aesthetic goals, many of us feel far too daunted by exercise. In addition, if we are on the healing path and have been suffering from poor health and fatigue, improper exercise could further complicate our issues. In this podcast we interview Carl Hammington, a movement and FUNctional training expert. Carl discusses how realistic fitness goals can be tailored to the individual, how movement can contribute to healing, and how to integrate movement into your life in a way that is sustainable. Carl has been in the health and fitness industry for 16 years. He has been actively involved in corporate health, has run health retreats, is a presenter and has presented health and fitness seminars around New Zealand and internationally. He is a co-founder and Academic Director of Wellington’s fully integrated gym HealthFit Collective. Carl is behind the mic on the Wellness Couch podcast, BestMe Radio.

More about Carl here

Carl’s Health Fit Collective website – health assessments, programs, online education, corporate health, and more!

Carl’s Podcast, Best Me Radio

Our upcoming events 

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