We Ate Well, New York, NY (2026)

Our mission is to help you eat mindfully, joyfully and sustainably on a vegetarian diet.

10/16/2026

Every Navaratri growing up, there was sundal.

A bowl of chickpeas or another legume, simply seasoned with mustard seeds, curry leaves, chilies, hing and coconut. It was prasadam, something we made because that was simply what you did during Golu.

I loved it enough to include my own version in my cookbook, The Vegetarian Reset. But when I wrote the cookbook, I was thinking about sundal largely through the lens I knew then: a delicious, naturally protein- and fiber-rich vegetarian dish.
After studying Ayurvedic nutrition, I see that little bowl very differently.

We tend to look at chickpeas through a modern nutrition lens: protein, fiber, carbs.

But Ayurveda asks another question: what happened to the chickpea before you ate it?

It was soaked.
Cooked until tender.
Tempered with pungent and aromatic spices traditionally used alongside legumes.

Finished with fat and fresh coconut.

In Ayurveda, these transformations are called sanskars. Preparation can change the qualities of a food, which means the recipe itself becomes part of how we understand its nourishment.

And this was one of the most fascinating things I discovered while researching vegetarian protein traditions around the world.

Traditional cuisines didn’t simply identify nutrient-dense foods and put them on a plate. They developed techniques around them. Soaking. Grinding. Fermenting. Cooking. Spicing. Adding fat and acid.

It’s funny to look back at a recipe I put in my cookbook years ago and realize there is another layer of wisdom in it that I’m only beginning to understand now.

The chickpea may be the ingredient. But the wisdom is in the preparation.

Happy Navaratri. And if you have The Vegetarian Reset, consider this your reminder to pull out the Sundal recipe this week.

10/12/2026

Turns out, tadka was never just about flavor.

Cumin, mustard seeds, hing, ginger, garlic, chilies and curry leaves are bloomed in hot ghee or oil, then poured over the finished dal.

Of course, it tastes incredible. But many of these spices have also traditionally been used to support digestion. Cumin and hing are considered carminative, while ginger has been studied for its effects on gastric motility. Ginger, garlic and chilies also stimulate digestive enzymes. Blooming spices in fat helps extract and disperse their fat-soluble aromatic compounds.

And through an Ayurvedic lens, the fat plays another role as an anupana, or carrier.

What I love about tadka is that flavor and function were never really separate.

That’s something I kept seeing throughout my research into traditional vegetarian cuisines: some of the most delicious cooking techniques also served a practical purpose.

What do you put in your tadka?

10/09/2026

Maybe it’s not lentils. Maybe it’s how you’re preparing them.
As a lifelong vegetarian, I’ve spent years thinking about how to get enough protein from foods like lentils and beans.

But while studying Ayurvedic nutrition, I became interested in a different question: How have cultures that relied on these foods for generations traditionally prepared them?

Take dal.

It’s not simply lentils boiled in water. The lentils may be split and hulled, soaked, cooked with salt and turmeric until creamy, balanced with something sour, and finally finished with a tadka of spices bloomed in fat.

And when I expanded my research beyond India, this is where things got really interesting.

Across traditional food cultures, I kept seeing variations on the same techniques: soaking, fermenting, grinding, slow cooking, digestive herbs and spices, fat and acid.

My biggest takeaway?

Traditional cultures didn’t just figure out which foods nourished them. They figured out how to transform those foods into something the body could receive.

And I think there’s a lot we can learn from that in our very modern quest to eat more protein.

Save this for the next time lentils are on the menu. And stay tuned, because I’m going to show you how these same principles appear in traditional kitchens around the world.

10/05/2026

Invest in gold they said…so, meet Sunny, our new puppy! He’s perfect, and we are all completely obsessed. 😍

A few things we’ve learned about Sunny so far: he loves his squeaky duck, his Snuggle Puppy® and his ball. He gives a paws up to boiled carrots, Greek yogurt and peanut butter. Cheese is strictly okay, apparently, although he might make an exception for paneer.

Other hobbies include being impossibly cute, following us everywhere, and getting away with pretty much anything because... look at that face.

Safe to say, you’ll be seeing a lot more of him around here. Hope he brings a little extra sunshine to your feed, too. ☀️

10/02/2026

Fall-Spiced Einkorn Popover Muffins… à la Martha
I’ve been watching Martha Cooks on Netflix, and in one of the early episodes, Martha Stewart made popovers. They looked so simple and delicious, especially eaten fresh and warm from the oven, and immediately took me back to the popovers I tried years ago at Popover Cafe on the Upper West Side.

Prep is decidedly simple - eggs, milk, flour and spices. I also love that the recipe has no baking powder and no added sugar. The idea is to tear into them while they’re still warm and add your favorite jam or preserves. Try my Berry Chia Jam from the recipe index, or, for a decidedly fall twist, fig jam is absolutely delicious.

Of course, I had to add warm, sweet fall spices - cinnamon, nutmeg, vanilla and cloves. Fringe benefit: your entire kitchen (or, in my case, apartment) will smell like fall.

It took me a few tries to scale the recipe down and adapt it for a regular muffin pan, while still getting that deeply golden finish. Third time was the charm. And, rather fittingly, that third batch came out of the oven on the morning we went to pick up our...brand new...puppy! So we packed up a few warm popover muffins and disappeared them on the way.

I hope you enjoy them just as much, preferably warm from the oven with a generous spoonful of jam!

Comment POP to upgrade to my recipe club and get the recipe!

And swipe to the end for a picture of our puppy :)

09/28/2026

I haven’t stopped caring about protein.

I’ve just stopped believing that a meal is nourishing simply because the numbers look good.

Protein, fiber, healthy fats and blood sugar were foundational to my own journey reversing prediabetes. They shaped my first cookbook and much of the work I’ve done helping vegetarians build more balanced meals.

But studying Ayurvedic nutrition opened up a new set of questions for me.

Can I digest this comfortably? How was it prepared? Does my body need something warming or cooling, moistening or drying? What season is it outside, and perhaps more importantly, what season am I in?

Because our bodies have seasons too.

Stress. Perimenopause. Travel. Poor sleep. Aging. Recovery. Even the same person may need to eat differently at different points in her life.

So my cooking is evolving too.

I’m still layering protein. Still thinking about fiber and blood sugar. But I’m also reaching for cooked foods, digestive spices, good fats, seasonal ingredients and preparation techniques that can make food feel more nourishing.

I’m less interested in creating the nutritionally “perfect” plate these days.

I’m much more interested in helping you build one that works for the body you actually have, in the season you’re actually in.

If that’s how you want to think about food too, follow along. There’s a lot more of this coming.

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