The Turquoise Table Podcast with Kristin Schell

The Turquoise Table Podcast with Kristin Schell


S2E12: Tasting Grace with Melissa d'Arabian

January 08, 2020

Host Kristin Schell interviews chef and best-selling author Melissa d’Arabian. Melissa is an expert on affordable family cooking, and author of the book Tasting Grace. In this episode they discuss how Melissa’s career got started, her new book, and how her faith influences her approach to food. Melissa first realized her connection to food, growing up in a single family home where money was tight. While she often experienced hunger at school, she saw the sacrifices her mom made to welcome others into their home with hospitality.   Melissa and Kristin discuss the problems with the way that our society approaches food. While we are as disconnected from the source of our food as we’ve ever been, we are also food obsessed; We have celebrity chefs, and we constantly post images of our food on the internet. There are some serious misconceptions about food in a world where we won’t eat a tomato because of the sugar content but we’ll drink an artificially colored and sweetened sports drink. To develop a better philosophy and theology of food, Melissa looked to the Bible where she couldn’t find any of the guilt language our society has about food. Instead, all the language around food was about loving, welcoming, and celebrating. It was observing these tensions in our food culture and this journey in the Bible that led Melissa to write Tasting Grace.   Links/Resources: