As my husband put it, if this book was a music album, it would be my greatest hits. It is everything I cook today that has evolved so much along the way: my life experiences; people, countries and ingredients that inspired different recipes; my time working as a private chef on super yachts; and then being a mother – these have all shaped me and my cooking. Sharing what are now recipes I love and am proud o with everyone, so that they can enjoy them too, was the driving force behind now being the right time to launch a cookbook.
The focus is on delicious, healthy, realistic and achievable cooking in your busy life. It’s about food that can be cooked and enjoyed on your own, but even more so to encourage enjoying it with others; breaking bread with one another over the dishes and enjoying the slower moments of enjoyment in this ever-hectic world we live in.
Removing refined sugar from our daily diet was a huge step forward as a mother: feeling a responsibility in feeding my children properly and healthily, yet knowing that they, as do I, love eating something sweet, and working on creating options that are much healthier – this is why all my desserts became plant-based, too. I didn’t just want to avoid refined sugar – I didn’t want blocks of butter in cakes, either, but I wanted the taste. It took many years of learning, tweaking, testing my original recipes, and then having them all approved by my children – their approval meant I had the right taste! All the while, I was making these dishes far healthier and also guilt-free, because what goes into my body is just as important as those around me.
Cooking is essential to family life. Making good food to put on the table for everyone to tuck into and enjoy is massively important. Real food, good food, healthy food – it fuels everyone, keeps us all healthier, and brings us together.
I have designed The mymuybueno Cookbook to be as accessible to everyone as possible. All of the recipes have been tested with gluten-free flour too, so it can simply be swapped over. The same applies to vegan and vegetarian: I advise simple swaps in the recipes to make them easy to adapt.
We have so many hats to wear in modern life, and if we are mega organised in all that we do, it helps equip us better. I also share my mymuybueno philosophy in this book, helping people to improve the quality of their life, removing people who cause them upset, and doing things properly, or not doing them at all. It’s about helping people to boost the quality of their life in all ways – and this follows across into their food and cooking, too.
