Mindful Cooking: Bringing Zen Into the Kitchen

[00:00:02] Speaker A: HeyMud podcast presents. Welcome to Mindful Mud. Thanks for listening, everybody. Who's tuning in? I am Fluina Nicoli, your host. I'm a Zen teacher and a mindfulness instructor. Today I'm very grateful. I have no Ko Moller as my guest. She's a local, some of you know her. And we will talk about mindful eating, mindful cooking, mindfulness around food. So if that doesn't sound yummy, I really hope you will stick around and listen to this. So I'm going to start with a few words about Naoko Muller. She is a food activist, Japanese cooking connoisseur, and in English as a second language educator. She was born in a Zen Buddhist temple in Niigata in Japan, raised in Hawaii and in Japan at Zen Buddhist temples. She learned how to cook from an early age, assisting her mother and later as a minister's wife, cooking for large groups at Zen Buddhist temples. She conducts Zen Buddhist vegetarian cooking workshops and educational workshops for parents and teachers in England, America and in Japan and I think in other countries too. She also operated an English school in Japan for over 20 years and also worked as a teacher trainer while managing the temple. Hello, Naoko. Welcome to the show. [00:01:43] Speaker B: Hi, Florina. Thanks for having me. [00:01:46] Speaker A: Yeah, it's wonderful. You, you are back. We did a. Three years ago, we had another show. It's actually. You can find that one also on. On Mindful Mud as a podcast and prepping for the show, I was listening to it again and it was really fantastic. We talked about so many different things. Your upbringing and then also the sacredness of rice and just so many wonderful things. Do you remember that? Yeah, the rice bowls, old tradition. [00:02:20] Speaker B: Yeah, don't really remember that. I was, when we recorded that session, I think I was in Honolulu. That correct. [00:02:29] Speaker A: You were. And so we talked a lot about the different rice bowls and the meaning of them. It was just fascinating world to dive in. So, listener, if you're curious, you can find that episode on podcast, any platform out there. And just look for Mindful Mud. Scroll down a little bit. It's number five. So it's kind of like in the past. It was a couple years ago, but you will find it easily. All right, so I'm gonna. We're gonna talk a little different. Different topics this time. So switching it up, even though it was a long time ago, but yeah, so I'm kind of curious. No. You call yourself a food activist. Tell me more. What does that mean? [00:03:14] Speaker B: Okay, so food activist. Yeah, actually I kind of went beyond that now. Food activist is a person that's introducing food in. I mean, looking at. Looking at life itself through food. But now I am. I'm still a food activist, but now I'm rather. What do you call, researcher. And I now belong to this college in Japan called Japan Food Studies College. So food studies actually began in the States and now it's happening all over the world. So you look through your. Your, like glasses will be food looking through the eyes of the food. And within that, my specialty is the immigrant plantation food of Hawaii because that's where I spend half of my life. And I also specialize in Shojin Ryori, the Zen vegetarian cuisine. And fermentation, Japanese fermentation. And so doing all that is still considered food activist. And it was interesting that you had asked me to come on this show because I just finished a paper titling my upbringing in Zen temple and Shojin Yori itself. And I am going to where the food studies college is actually hosting with the Osaka University this October in our International Food Conferen, where I will be doing some presentations and some workshops. [00:05:16] Speaker A: Beautiful. Where is that again? [00:05:18] Speaker B: In Japan? In Osaka. [00:05:20] Speaker A: In Osaka. What are the dates? If people from Japan are listening to this podcast, perhaps they can join you guys. [00:05:27] Speaker B: Yeah. 10-10-1112. [00:05:30] Speaker A: Okay. Of 2026. [00:05:33] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:05:34] Speaker A: And so you will speak about that article you wrote. [00:05:38] Speaker B: I. Yeah, the article that I wrote will be in a booklet with my teacher. But this year the conference theme is water. So I'm going to my. I think I'm going to be talking about how Shojin Ryori, which is the. How Japanese cuisine is connected to water. You know, Japan is a country of water. So like, I think I've said this before, but Japanese food, we say we cook with water, whereas the Western food, you cook with oil. [00:06:15] Speaker A: I see. Yeah, yeah, yeah. There's not that much fried stuff. Right. It's more. [00:06:21] Speaker B: Yeah, of course, now it is. But traditionally, and so we have a lot of terminology, things to do with water, how to use the water. [00:06:32] Speaker A: Water is so important. I mean, we can go on and on just talking about water for an hour here. That's. That's fascinating. And with what kind of water we cook and all of that is. Yeah. What are we drinking too? Like. [00:06:45] Speaker B: Right. [00:06:45] Speaker A: Quality of water. And it's these days a real resource that's lacking too real good drinking water. [00:06:53] Speaker B: And you know, in Japan, because Japan is in the monsoon region and almost 70% of the whole country is mountainous, so we do have good water. And so fermentation, you need water to ferment. And Then Japanese fermentation, it's from rice. And it's unlike the other Asian countries. Japanese rice is once a year crop. And we plant rice in wetland. So you need water. So that's different in other Asian countries. Yeah. [00:07:32] Speaker A: What would be in other Asian countries? I thought that's also in water. But, but they harvest multiple times. [00:07:39] Speaker B: Yes, multiple times. And you don't really need that. The, the way that the Japanese plant is, you kind of at, at the beginning when they actually do the planting of the rice plant, it's like a swamp. I mean it's like, you know, and then, and throughout summer it has to be dried and then harvest. Whereas the other Asian countries, their whole land is, might be wet, but it's not as, what do you call. It's. The water is not there. And so the water. In Japan we, there's the irrigation system kind of connect, makes the community because we have to share water. So that's how the Japanese, all these communities began around water, around rice. [00:08:26] Speaker A: And then it's a community effort to grow the rice. Yeah, just the sharing of the water in the land. [00:08:32] Speaker B: And then, you know, it's once a year crop. So more. So you need help the others from the others. [00:08:38] Speaker A: Yeah, fascinating. Yeah. So you're more coming now from a, like you're, you're connected with other people who look more through a science lens at food. [00:08:51] Speaker B: Well, this food study. So we have someone like me, the ordinary, you know, like housewife. Right. And so we. Well, as in academia, you. There were no ordinary people. It's more like the scholars. But in food studies you need scholars and you need, you need chefs, professional, you know, chefs. And then we need ordinary people because all the food that we eat, all the cooking begins with home cooking, especially Japanese food. It just begins with home cooking. So we need those, it's, you know, those three different people. And so when I say I'm gonna, we're gonna be doing international conference, it's a bit, it's a bit different from ordinary acade conference because we have more ordinary people coming in. And of course we, we have to have the academic background too. But you cannot, this cannot happen just on paper because you know, some scholars, they know how to do research, but there's no the field work and they have not cooked. Yeah, exactly. So we take care of that part. [00:10:14] Speaker A: So. And then you share experiences and knowledge and, and exchange and do think tanks, I'm assuming, and. [00:10:20] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah. So the conference is like ordinary conference. We do like 20 minute presentation, you know, oral presentation, poster and Everything like that. But also there's some workshops which I'm going to be doing is the miso making workshop. [00:10:36] Speaker A: Oh, sweet. [00:10:37] Speaker B: Yeah. And I'm going to connect that to Californian cuisine because Japanese fermentation, especially in California, with California cuisine, started in the Bay Area in the restaurant called Japanese. So that restaurant kind of began using the, the word farm and table. A farm to table. [00:11:01] Speaker A: I see. [00:11:02] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. So I want to connect. And here in California, our California cuisine is mixture of Asian, Mediterranean, Mediterranean, you know, all these different types of ethnic food kind of put together as California cuisine. And I, throughout my miso making class, I noticed that the way people use miso is so different, very different from the Japanese, which I learned a lot in my miso. In Japan, of course, our beans are usually soybean, but I make, when I teach, especially I make my miso with chickpeas. So what's available locally? Yeah, yeah. In Japan, we don't. We never eat chickpeas. Now this, you can buy it. But so I'm going to introduce that and I'm going to be making that and then turn that into some sort of, you know, Californian Asian fusion. Fusion, yeah. [00:12:11] Speaker A: You're very special. No comiso. [00:12:14] Speaker B: Right, right. [00:12:15] Speaker A: Fascinating. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So coming back to, to the awareness cultivation through food and, and, and prepping and eating food and all of that. Last time I remember when we were talking, you mentioned that when you're cooking, there's something happening where you can start really coming into the present moment and your mind starts to slow down and there's the shift happening no matter how busy it is around you. Right. There's a certain things that's coming in. Can you like, talk more about that? [00:12:53] Speaker B: Yeah, I think everyone has that sort of experience, you know, and so I belong to, as you know, Soto's insect and, and the founder is Dogen. And Soto Zen sect is the, the sect in. There's three Zen sects. But among the Soto Zen sect, we cherish, we do a lot of just silent meditation, which is, which you call zazen sitting, nothing but sitting. And so according to Dogen, he said that cooking and sitting in zazen is the same thing. So, you know, because in this kind of, is a fundamental philosophy that kind of goes under the whole Japanese, that you don't have to be Buddhist to be Japanese. This is the underlying philosophy that we all have that food. We don't just. It's not just we cook food for just, just to eat, but it's, it's something there that we want to share. We. We think about someone else. Who are you, who you're feeding the food to or. And you know, and so in. Especially in Japanese cooking, I notice because I've lived here, I lived in Hawaii and I lived in Japan. Japan. I know the Japanese people are more. More conscious about preparing. And so. And then I even. They don't really realize. But I'm sure there's a moment that when you, you know, doing cooking especially, I think we. Because we chop a lot. You know those chopping on a cutting board and so those sound of chopping vegetables or the smell. And then if you have to chop in a certain length of time, you kind of. Your hands kind of starts to kind of move before you notice it. And no, in fact, no matter how busy you are. And actually for me, when. When things are like a chaos around me, that's when I feel more, you know, focusing myself. I don't really like to do zazen the city meditation because kind of my hand kind of wanders off. But cooking, your hands moving and your. Your hands moving. And of course you have to be conscious about what you're doing because otherwise you're going to chop your hand. Right? Yeah. And so it. It just brings to me the same kind of. What do you call? Consciousness? And then I feel myself. I don't really. Of course you. You're doing the movement, but. But then I feel myself really calm inside and I'm doing it like as if I'm kind of dancing, you know, and that makes me feel really good. And it's not a long time. It's just a moment and moments, but I think that's about. And then of course, when you're kind of wake up, then you have to think of, oh, who am I going to make this for? So Japanese cooking, you. We don't normally traditionally authentic cooking. We do not have recipes. [00:16:28] Speaker A: Right, yeah, you mentioned that last time too. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's more like you. You think of who you cook for and then you adjust the way you cook it. [00:16:38] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah. [00:16:39] Speaker A: Makes so much sense. [00:16:41] Speaker B: Yeah. And then, plus it has to be more seasonal. For example, if you buy right now tomato, they're sweet, right. So you don't really need to add things. So you don't really have to. I mean, you probably don't do the same thing. We all do this. We don't add much salt or much spice. Then when you buy tomatoes in winter, so things seasonal that we eat, especially when you think about the vegetarian food, it just makes so much difference. So you can't really say. Okay, one teaspoon of that, one tablespoon of that. [00:17:22] Speaker A: Yeah. Doesn't make sense. Yeah. You have to adjust it to what's going on. So when you say it's part of the way you meditate. [00:17:32] Speaker B: Right. [00:17:32] Speaker A: And coming to the present moment, cooking. And I can so relate. Like there are these certain activities, many of them, but cooking is definitely one of them that really gets me right back into. There is nothing I need to worry about. It's just being right there. I don't have the future trip. I don't to think about yesterday. I can just be with my cooking and the creativity, the chopping, the vegetable, the smelling. Right. All these senses are activated. And it's just such a, for me, such a calming and, and beautiful thing to do. So. Yeah. So when you can you like, give a little idea, let's just say somebody's like, well, how would I do that? Like, how do I start coming into the present when I'm cooking? I'm just totally stressed out that the dinner is not going to be ready or whatever the thoughts are. [00:18:28] Speaker B: Well, I guess first of all, I guess you just need to kind of rewind yourself or slow down because you do need some time to do all this. But you know, another thing is that when you look at the Internet, Japanese people are not cooking like that anymore. They have all these things in a. In a tube or things in a box or two in things in a package. Right. And so it's not like that. But. But if you have, for example, a lot of things, I mean, like if you go to the garden and you harvest whole container bag of tomatoes, then you have to deal with that. But at one point they need to be washed, they need to be taken care of. And so those are the moments I'm sure that everyone will. You don't. It's not a commercial thing that you're doing. So you have, you put them in the water and you wash them. And you have to kind of absorb. Look at it one by one and take the part that. That's not good. And so doing that, just focusing on what you're doing, I think we all can feel that moment. [00:19:50] Speaker A: So act. Yes, activating. Making a decision, I think too right. Of like, okay, I'm gonna be present with washing those tomatoes. Orbit. [00:20:01] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah, right. [00:20:02] Speaker A: It's like. Or with perhaps even smelling them. I'm just here with the food that I'm prepping and just coming back to that because as you said, it is almost easier for a lot of People to kind of find some of that presence, something we're doing, because the mind has more something to hang on to then if we just practice meditation in a silent sitting. [00:20:27] Speaker B: Right, right, right. [00:20:28] Speaker A: Yeah. And you. For me, it's like using those moments in that precious way instead of, like, keep worrying about what I'm going to do tomorrow or not having enough time tonight to do whatever I want to do. It's just like, no, right now I'm cooking, or right now I'm putting groceries away or. [00:20:46] Speaker B: Yeah, yes, yes, yes. You have to focus on what you're doing at that moment. Yeah. And that it doesn't really have to be cooking, but, you know, cooking is the thing that we have to do and it has a good outcome that you get to feed everyone. So. Yeah. [00:21:06] Speaker A: Would you say that there is a difference in taste of a meal that's prepped with attention and care, or if the same meal is prepped with somebody who is very irritated, perhaps angry and very not present? Do you think there's a difference in. [00:21:24] Speaker B: Oh, yeah. [00:21:25] Speaker A: Okay. [00:21:26] Speaker B: Don't you think so? [00:21:27] Speaker A: Oh, absolutely. I. Sometimes it's interesting. [00:21:31] Speaker B: I. [00:21:31] Speaker A: Even if I, like, if I eat somewhere else, let's say, I feel like I can taste almost sometimes what mood the person who prepped it was in, especially if it's really like, you can taste if it's prepared with care or not. Not even like in the plating, not even in the presentation, but really in the taste. It's really a miraculous thing. [00:21:57] Speaker B: Yeah. I think that's really. You can say that for. Especially for Japanese cooking, because we do cherish, you know, how. How it looks. I mean, not in presentation, but how it's been like, if you overcook something, then it gets too soft or if. If it's under. If it's. It's too kind of hard and it might be cooked, but it's not that the flavor is not thoroughly, you know, out, you know, so those are really. You can really. What do you call, experience a difference in Japanese food? Because our Japanese food is a lot to do with the texture and we do use a lot of different vegetables just, you know, a lot of vegetables that we. We use. Yeah. For example, like, if you get the dry shiitake mushroom and if it's not soaked thoroughly, you know, it. It. And then you just put it in your pot. If it's not so thoroughly, it's never going to be tender to. To the core, you know. [00:23:07] Speaker A: Right. [00:23:08] Speaker B: Flavor is not there. Yeah, yeah. [00:23:10] Speaker A: It's. It's like a little chewy part of something instead of real. Yeah. [00:23:16] Speaker B: And so there is, like, in. In the process of cooking, there is an order to put things in. To the pot, you know, into the food. And, you know, that's very important. And because we cherish how the texture is, we want the green vegetables to be green but cooked. And we have words for that, you know, a special vocabulary for that. [00:23:42] Speaker A: Oh, that we're lacking here in English. [00:23:44] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. [00:23:45] Speaker A: That's so interesting because it's so important [00:23:50] Speaker B: because, like, we don't have. In Japanese, we don't have the word roast because we don't use oven or bake. [00:23:57] Speaker A: It's so. Yeah. It's so cultural. Right. If something is really important, you create a whole bunch of words. It's just like with snow in Alaska or somewhere, they have, I don't know, 50 different terms of snow. [00:24:09] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah. [00:24:10] Speaker A: It makes sense, right? [00:24:11] Speaker B: Yeah, we have. We have, like, yeah, 10 over 10, maybe 15, 20 words to describe rain. [00:24:19] Speaker A: Rain. [00:24:20] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. [00:24:21] Speaker A: Beautiful. Beautiful. So languages are so fascinating. Yeah. [00:24:27] Speaker B: So when I explained that in English, for example, say, okay, let's cook spinach. And then people will say, oh, so how many minutes? And I said, no, you can't. You. You can't really say how many minutes. You just have to know it, you know, I mean, so you just have to do it. But it's not. [00:24:45] Speaker A: That's hard to do a cooking class and. And tell your students, there's no recipe. [00:24:51] Speaker B: I know. So that's why I quit doing cooking on Zoom, because at one point, my student in Japan, she was Japanese, but she still said, oh, how many tablespoons of miso do it. Do you put in? So I said, well, your miso, and my miso is different, you know? And I go, oh, no, that's. This is. This is. This can't happen. But in a way that when I did classes for the American people, because they don't really. They don't have clue. Right. So I did kind of go. Went in and explained in details that. That really kind of. It was a mind opener for me. I said, okay, I have to really verbalize this. For example, cooking spinach. In Japanese, we use the word yuderu, and everyone knows what it is, you know, to get the right consistency. But in. In terms of ingress, you cannot just say boil. It's little more than blanche, less than boil, you know, so that kind of. And so. And then. [00:25:52] Speaker A: Yes, yeah, yes. You have to kind of describe. Start describing something that you actually, in Japan, Japanese have a word for it. Yeah, yeah. [00:26:00] Speaker B: Yeah, yes. Yeah, yeah. So that was kind of on, on the other hand, I, when I taught a couple years ago, I did a class on cooking the full Thanksgiving meal, you know, making gravies and things like that. And then I had to say, so. And then they, the question was, okay, this is roast. And they said, and then one student goes, not bake. So I said, no, roast and bake is different. And then I go, okay, wait a minute, what's the difference? [00:26:32] Speaker A: I'm running over even. Yeah, I run into this even after 20 years living here. I, I say things that don't make any sense to Americans. [00:26:42] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. You know the difference between roast and bake. [00:26:47] Speaker A: So when I hear a lot of folks are like, yeah, I don't have time to cook. Right. Or like, mindfulness is often associated perhaps even with slowness. Yes, we have to in a way slow down, but it doesn't mean, right, to mindfully cook, to slowly chop a vegetable. We can be really fast. We can even probably add way more mindfulness in a shorter meal, let's say 20 minute prep for a meal. What are your thoughts there? [00:27:17] Speaker B: Yeah, yes, yes. Slow down. Yeah, slow down. But we do need to slow down, I guess at one point. But I know there are, people are not really. I mean, we're, we're way too busy these days. But we do need to slow down. We don't have time to do what? You know, like for me right now I have time, but still, even within my timeframe, sometimes I don't have time because I want to do some, something else. [00:27:49] Speaker A: I think it's a priority setting. Right. I think we do have time. It's question, what are the priorities? [00:27:55] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. So if you like to cook something, I think you don't really have to. I mean, it's not for you. You don't really have to force yourself to do it every single day. Maybe just once a day for breakfast, maybe because I'm a morning person. So then, you know, you can think of a little bit more ahead and do something that you really want to do for breakfast. Or you can even start off with once a week, you know, I'm going to make this day. I'm going to do something that I can't really do during weekdays or something. And, and once you, you, you need to, for example, if you have food before you know, you know how to cook it, you have to taste it. Right. And you have to taste it first. So you have to, you, you can't really set yourself for one whole week or one month. Schedule. But I think we all can do it like once a week, you know, just kind of shift your mind saying that, okay, this day I'm going to try to do something that, yeah, that everyone please. That will please myself too. And you don't really. I think another point is that you don't really want to stuff. Okay, this cooking is going to be mindful. This cooking is going to taste good. And this cooking, I'm going to make five course. You know, you don't have to do that. Just one thing is good enough. For example, okay, today I'm going to harvest all the tomatoes and I'll, you know, take care of them. Those things. Once you start experiencing those things, I. I think you can start to work on it because we have to eat every day and minus will like, you know, cooking and you don't. You don't need to spend your driving time going to all these temples and places just to meditate or, you know, our house, we have my husband Jay's meditation room, which kind of turned into pantry. I stuffed my. It's not a meditation room anymore. But. And that was one of the first questions somebody asked me when, when I came here about 14 years ago. Jay's friend asked me, you know, Jay's going, oh, yeah, this is my new wife, you know, and she's. She's born and raised in Zen temple. And the local guy said his question was, oh, so do you practice Zen every day? And I'm going, what? No one asked me that kind of [00:30:36] Speaker A: question in Japan while you were living in a monastery. Yeah, yeah. [00:30:42] Speaker B: So I said, well, you know, it's especially Zen is not just meditating. It's from the time you wake up to the time you go to bed. You know, this, this whole process is meditation. And. And then, of course, if you. For me, because I really like cooking, my part of meditation really is, I think, pretty long and intense. Meditating with food, right? Yeah. You can start off like, you know, once a week or, you know, something. I think it makes people feel good and it makes yourself feel good too. [00:31:23] Speaker A: Is there one practical thing? Let's just say tonight somebody is like, it's a Sunday. They might have time to cook tonight or not. What will be one little shift somebody could do, Cook, preparing their next meal. That could really make a difference. [00:31:40] Speaker B: Well, I used to, you know, when I used to teach English to little kids, I already had food education in it. So we did a lot of cooking and talked to the parents about it. And I said, you can buy food, you can go and get a, you know, good food from the deli. You can get a hamburger. But the thing is, I said, but you should plate that. Don't eat from. What do you call the package or the styrofoam container. Serve it on a plate. And another thing is that I think it makes difference if we could eat. Everyone could have the same food, you know, not just you eating hamburger. Oh, yeah. The other person eating chicken. It's the sharing, [00:32:39] Speaker A: having a family meal. [00:32:40] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. [00:32:42] Speaker A: It's interesting that you're seeing that. You know, it's. It's something I do. It's. I'm starting to realize something I've been doing all the time. Let's just say there's snacks, like something out of the bag. Even, God forbid, potato chips or popcorn or whatever. I've always had this thing of like, I never eat out of a bag. That's just not what I do. Even if I go for some junk food, I would still put it in a nice little bowl. You know, it's because it. It's just different. Like, why would I want to eat out of a gross bag? No way. First of all, there's no portion. You know, I just eat the whole bag. [00:33:20] Speaker B: Yeah, exactly, exactly. [00:33:23] Speaker A: Just so it's interesting you're saying that. So if you do get to go food, plate it nicely. [00:33:28] Speaker B: Yes. [00:33:29] Speaker A: Make your table nice. Sit down together half the meal. Absolutely. Even then that already makes a difference. And if you cook at home and do even a simple meal, we can still like even just. [00:33:42] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. [00:33:43] Speaker A: Adding a little more and preciousness to the food. [00:33:47] Speaker B: Yeah, yes. It's interesting. But in. In Zen temple then philosophy, we do eating is what you call food. I mean, cooking is practice. Yeah. And so we don't. And then of course, eating is. It's not just to feel yourself. So when we eat in Zen temples or like when I grew up, my father was ahead and we had like 10, 15 people, the disciples and nuns and, you know, and the helpers. And we all sat together and then we all said itadakimasu, which means thank you for this food in Japanese. And then we started eating. So we began eating together and we kind of look around and try to finish the food all around the same time. And then we finished the meal together. But no, no chitty chatting while eating. [00:34:49] Speaker A: That's different. [00:34:50] Speaker B: Yeah, so yeah, that is so different. And of course, a lot of Japanese don't do that anymore, but that's how it was. And then after that, we went to like a communal area and that's where we had tea and that's where you can chat, but the food. So that's the. The Zen idea is you eat when you're eating. You know, there you go. Yeah. So you have to focus on what you're eating. And I mean, we couldn't do. Yeah, focus. [00:35:19] Speaker A: Yeah. So we're talking, you know, from. From really being more mindful around cooking. Then how do we be mindful around eating and really tasting. Right. And really connecting with the food and. And where it comes from, for sure. And it's so interesting, you know, for you. You grew up in Japan and Hawaii. I grew up in Switzerland. So for both of us, it's, in a way, what we see here in the US not obviously that's a generalization, but a little bit of that is true. There's way less care when it comes to food. Everything comes in huge containers. People throw way more stuff away than I've ever, ever thought is possible. Like that carelessness around food is shocking. Shocking, right, For. For. For people like us not growing up here. It's shocking in a way. And then also the. The culture, if you want, around food, how often are families not even eating together or the TV is running or. [00:36:23] Speaker B: Right. [00:36:23] Speaker A: You eating and. And watching something, you're not even connecting with each other. All of these things have become so normal. And I would say it probably wasn't always like that, obviously, in this country either. And it just really makes me sad how on undervalued this has been. Come. Yeah. So how can we kind of. And it's not making anybody happy. That's the thing. Right, Right. It's not. It's not. [00:36:53] Speaker B: You don't even remember, you know, what you ate. Right. Yeah. [00:36:59] Speaker A: I could just imagine right now, somebody listening to us thinking, oh, my God, they're making such a big deal out of. I feel like it is a big deal because it is what we put into our body. It is part of the. Our life. [00:37:14] Speaker B: Exactly. And yeah, for me, after, you know, I. I go to bed, before I fall asleep, I think, oh, yeah, what should I eat tomorrow? What should I make tomorrow? And if I. If that's not set, I just can't go to sleep. [00:37:30] Speaker A: You make meal plans before you go to sleep? [00:37:32] Speaker B: Yeah, because, you know, there's always leftovers, which I don't really like to eat. [00:37:37] Speaker A: I. [00:37:37] Speaker B: You have to make use of that. So the morning when. The first thing in the morning, I start. This is another trick that you. I don't make everything from scratch. Every meal. Right, Right. [00:37:51] Speaker A: Yes. Yeah. [00:37:52] Speaker B: So what you can do is you can. When you, when you cook something in the morning, I keep some aside and use. That doesn't have to be the whole thing, maybe just part of it and make that, that turning into something else in the next meal. And I usually try to. The routine is like three days, one cycle. So day one, you make something. Let's say if you're a meat eater, you go beef. Second day you make pork. Third day, the leftover of two. Two days, you know, because if you're not. If you don't have a big family, I know you always have leftovers. So I don't really. [00:38:36] Speaker A: I cook the same way like that because I love, I do love to cook, but I don't always have time. [00:38:41] Speaker B: Right. [00:38:41] Speaker A: Or take the time to cook for an hour and a half. Sometimes I work late, I come home and I calculate this really in my, in my, in my weekly calendar, which nights do I come home late, what leftovers gonna have. And that doesn't mean I'm going to eat exactly the same thing than two or three days ago. However, I have the very basic there and it takes me perhaps 10, 15 minutes to create a new meal out of it. But it's a good meal. [00:39:08] Speaker B: Yes, yes. Yeah. Sometimes. [00:39:10] Speaker A: And it's not time consuming. Yeah. [00:39:13] Speaker B: Yes. Yeah. So you just, you do have to kind of, you know, make that kind of scheduling. And it's just so hard to cook three meals a day. And of course, I do have some frozen stuff that. Well, I don't really have something that I buy, but I freeze part of it and you know, in, in the freezer for. Yeah. The time. [00:39:33] Speaker A: That's another trick, right? I mean, for small families like ours. Absolutely. I sometimes on purpose, if I have a ton of stuff and I make a huge curry, for instance, I freeze two or three portions. [00:39:45] Speaker B: Yes. [00:39:45] Speaker A: And then on a day I don't have time to cook. That's what I'm taking out. All I have to do is some rice or some whatever. [00:39:53] Speaker B: So, you know, you don't. I think that we shouldn't feel bad about not cooking even that too. It's. If you be creative, you know, it just turns into a good meal. And one of the ways, another way is that think of the, the color that when you actually, when you imagine your food on the plate, make it colorful, you know, so if you think of the colors, you can add the colors to the food. It just makes it look good. So that's what's in the, the Zen teaching too. There's actually in Zen cooking, there's six colors. We say, well, the Chinese, from the yin and yang. The idea we have five. Usually five is odd. Numbers are good. Right. And so we have five colors, different colors. But in Zen cooking, we have number six. The six color makes the Zen cooking special, which is the subtle taste. It's subtle. And five colors, five ways to prepare. And then. So make it colorful. The subtleness means it's not less salt. It's just I try to enjoy the flavor of the vegetables itself. [00:41:15] Speaker A: Especially right now. I mean, I'm blown away just even grazing in my garden. The flavor of a, of, of, of a fresh tomato. Right. Or the flavor of a freshly pulled carrot or, or, you know, a pea or something. Or a cucumber. Right now. [00:41:32] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah. [00:41:33] Speaker A: It's just explodes in your mouth. You don't eat anything. And I love salt. Like, I love good seasoning. And at this, at the same time, it's just so wonderful. And then also I love to work a lot with herbs. That makes me feel so happy. I can add lots of different herbs and all. For me, it's like the herbs and the veggies, they have different relationships, right? [00:41:59] Speaker B: Yes. Yeah. So that's really interesting because Japan is so the lot of herbs and a lot of spices come from very warm places. In Japanese, we don't really have that much spices that we use traditionally. But of course these days we do grow herbs and we have a very distinctive Japanese herbs that we grow in Japan. Yeah. They add really good flavor, you know, and sometimes good texture and you just have to have little bit on your porch. And I think that makes it so different. [00:42:36] Speaker A: And it's not just the flavor. Right. It also helps with the digestion. [00:42:40] Speaker B: Yes, yeah, yeah. [00:42:41] Speaker A: That's another thing we're not on, like we haven't even mentioned yet. I do think when we, when we cook with more intention and seasonally, it's just better for our digestion. [00:42:52] Speaker B: Yes, yes. [00:42:53] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. And so I'd like to talk a little bit about. For me, I mean, in many traditions and cultures, food has a lot to do with connection and often and that how we're really so deeply connected with everything. And I find eating and preparing food is a great way of realizing that sometimes that we're so interconnected, like mindfulness often is this like kind of ego trip for a lot of people. I'm saying it a little provocative over here. [00:43:33] Speaker B: Right. [00:43:34] Speaker A: But it's like, it's just like I need to self improve. Even that whole like self improvement gig that sometimes comes with meditation and mindfulness practices. However, it's really for me way more about how much can I open up to what is actually happening and how much can I tune in to what is truly unfolding right now. And the more I do that, especially with food, There is no other way than noticing how interdependent we are, how deeply connected we are with the farmers, with the soil, with the environment, with the season, with everything. And I do feel that helps. Incredible for our mind, but also the body, everything else. What's your thought around this? Like that, that cultivation of feeling connected through food? [00:44:35] Speaker B: Well, for me, because I come from the rural area, you know, in Japan we had a. The temple, had big farms, so I didn't really have to. To grow myself, but there's always something's growing there. [00:44:51] Speaker A: And [00:44:54] Speaker B: that, that part, not the cooking part, the going to the garden and picking, the picking up. I mean, I mean, harvesting and things are not. Sometimes it won't work. Last year was a good harvest. This year is not good. And you can really, you know, plan that. But those are the things that's really, you know, it's just have in my memories that how do you. How to cook all the things that you grow with everybody? Because harvesting is just one part, but growing is another. And you don't really notice, you know how. But, but when you, if you have to buy food, you can't really see that part of the, the whole whole process. So like when I was teaching little kids in Tokyo, the kids never actually held one big head cabbage because, you know, Japanese houses are small. The cabbage are already either cut up or just sells in half a portion. And so you don't. They don't. They didn't know how heavy one head of cabbage was. And so that's when I began. So this is. These kids are not growing, right. So from that summer, yeah, I took the kids from Tokyo to Niigata, where I'm from, and then for like back to nature kind of camp. And that's where kids had access to potato, you know, digging potatoes, picking corn, the cucumbers. And they will actually kind of throw all the cucumbers that's crooked. And I said, why do you do that? Because it's crooked. Because they've never seen a crooked cucumber. Because in Japan, you. Everything is just so nice when you go to the market. Everything is just so perfect, straight, you know, no yellow part, no rotten part. And so. But I think that's the beginning, that as a human you have to connect yourself with food before you connect. [00:47:04] Speaker A: Now it's Growing. [00:47:06] Speaker B: Yes. Yeah. [00:47:07] Speaker A: So important. Let's talk a moment before we have to wrap it up already about the whole family and getting children involved. I hear a lot of, like, sometimes families are. Are like, challenged or around picky eaters, you know, or. And often I hear, you know, the kids are eating separately from the parents and the different meal. Let's just say kids just have their, I don't know, Mac and cheeses before. And then they go to bed and the parents eat. And I'm thinking, that breaks my heart. Where's the family getting together and digesting together. And so what would you say, like, how can somebody, like, include perhaps a kid in cooking or in, like, knowing how things are grown, like, what are. And not everybody's so lucky like us, right. Who have big gardens and can go harvest. But what would you suggest? [00:48:04] Speaker B: I suggest that, like, we've already talked about eating together, you know. And then another thing is, is that I have grandkids, and they all grow really differently. Like, one son has a Japanese wife, so she serves her child, like the staples, you know, fruits, vegetables, meat, and like one plate. And even the kid doesn't eat it. It's always there. On the other hand, my American daughter, you know, she's a nice lady, but then she puts the food directly onto that, like, the high chair. Now that's like a, like, tray. It has like, like a cold plastic cover that you can use as a tray, I guess, and they keep on putting it on. And I, I did tell my son, that's not going to work, you know, and then. So you just need to. To be able for the kids to eat. They. They need to see it first. So even they don't eat, you have to serve them and eat the same thing. Not different food, but eat same thing. And so if you cannot have the family time, it's okay. But I think someone needs to sit together and eat the same thing. And there are times kids start off with picky eaters. I remember that. But. Yeah, if they don't even know about it. Like, the kids in Tokyo I used to teach, they've never seen pictures. Some vegetables. And I said, why? And he, the boy said, he was a kindergarten. He said, because my mother doesn't serve things that I don't like because it's gonna be wasteful. I mean, you know, so. [00:49:50] Speaker A: Yeah, and how do you know? Because kids, ballots change so fast, right? Yeah. You keep having try something. You don't have to torture a kid, but you let them try something. Every time you cook it, they don't have to eat it, but just have a try. Hey, you might like it today. Who knows. [00:50:06] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:50:06] Speaker A: And then also. Yeah, I do agree and I think just, just getting more connected with how do, how do things grow and where do they come from? I remember. Yeah. Vividly about my childhood. I was deeply connected with that and, and I think, you know, I'm so thankful. Now we're almost coming to the end of the show. No, I'm here with no KO Muller. You are listening to Mindful Mud and we're just gonna wrap it about up. I am just curious, like, do you have any cooking classes around planned? Like, what are your next endeavors? You talked about the, the. How are we going to call it? The, the conference in, in. In Japan. [00:50:56] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:50:56] Speaker A: Do you have anything local that you might offer or could offer or. [00:51:01] Speaker B: Yes, actually I don't have anything really planned, but I do things on. On demand because as you know, I live far, like 30 minutes from town and. But if you want to come and do some Japanese cooking or Japanese fermentation, I'm always open to that. And it. You don't have to come with a big group. Just let me know and you know, we can work something. [00:51:31] Speaker A: Oh, that's fantastic. Like you will come even to somebody's house perhaps if they have like five people together and you would teach like a misto making workshop or something. [00:51:40] Speaker B: Oh, yeah. Oh yeah, I can do that too. [00:51:42] Speaker A: I'm very fantastic. I really hope people are going to take you up on that offer. How cool is that? [00:51:47] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:51:47] Speaker A: Or fermentation. Right. In general. Yeah. Yeah. [00:51:53] Speaker B: Usually I usually. Not just, not just make, but what I usually do is I do like 45 minutes lecture and then we make something and then usually serve, you know, full meal after that. [00:52:10] Speaker A: Wonderful, wonderful. That sounds amazing. [00:52:12] Speaker B: You get perhaps just. [00:52:15] Speaker A: Yeah, that's, that's wonderful. And how can people get in touch with you, Naoko? [00:52:20] Speaker B: I'm on Facebook, I'm on Instagram. Or you can email me. [00:52:28] Speaker A: What's your email? [00:52:29] Speaker B: Yeah, my name. Naoko Mahler. Gmail. [00:52:34] Speaker A: Can you spell that? [00:52:35] Speaker B: Yes. Naoko N A O K o dot Mahler M O L L E R at Gmail. [00:52:45] Speaker A: Fantastic. [00:52:46] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:52:46] Speaker A: Good. Yeah. And people can also go through me and I will add that email into the podcast link as well. So people, do you have a website? [00:52:56] Speaker B: I do. It's called One Plate Zen. [00:53:00] Speaker A: As you, as you, as you spell it. One Plate Zen. [00:53:03] Speaker B: Yes. [00:53:04] Speaker A: Then with Z E N. Yes. [00:53:06] Speaker B: Zen. Yes. Z e n. Yep.com.com. when I came here, my husband only had a big plate so I had to serve everything on one plate. [00:53:18] Speaker A: I remember. If you're curious to hear that story, please go back to the previous episode I did with Naoko. That was episode number five on my podcast Mindful Mud. And you are talking about this wonderful story about how this came to be from the all the balls to the one plate. [00:53:38] Speaker B: Right. [00:53:38] Speaker A: Thank you so much for being here with us no code today and sharing your wisdom and your your insight around food. I really appreciate it. [00:53:50] Speaker B: Yeah. Thank you very much for having me. [00:53:52] Speaker A: Again, thanks for listening and have some fun with prepping, plating and buying food or harvesting food. Have a good time. Thank you all. [00:54:04] Speaker B: Thank you. Bye bye. This has been a K Mud podcast. [00:54:13] Speaker A: To listen to other shows and more [00:54:14] Speaker B: episodes of this show. Find us on all the platforms where you get your podcast and also on our website kmud.org.