What an experience! Three days at the conference was like a week in Paris. So much to learn, see, do, and eat! All of it was awesome! Even better, all 1500 people were like old friends. No matter where I was, it was easy to talk with everyone I met. At meals I could pick any table and the conversation was guaranteed to be fascinating. I thought I knew some stuff, and I do compared to the standard American, but at the conference I was seriously humbled by the attendees and the speakers.
Before I describe the lectures that I attended, which will occur over several days, I have to mention a bit more about the food. It was amazing! Chef Amanda Love oversaw feeding all 1500 of us. How she created WAP food for all of us and have it turn out so amazingly I will never know. I have never had better food and there is no describing it. It highlighted to me that I need to step it up in my own kitchen. As much as possible the food was local and donated organic, pastured, grass fed, wild caught, you name it. There were barrels of kombucha (60 gallons), fermented kefir cheeses (which were part of 605 pounds total), lacto-fermented vegetables and fruits (95 gallons), raw milk (300 gallons) and special teas (575 gallons of ice tea and 2,200 tea bags) to drink. The amount of raw milk consumed at every meal was mindboggling. I didn’t overeat (much), and the food was so nutrient dense that I was never hungry, which was amazing given how hard I was thinking the whole time – from 9:00 a.m. – 9:00 p.m. and later!
You can learn about the food and recipes here: FOOD! A couple of other interesting statistics about food amounts that are not on the website: butter (785 pounds), oil (343 pounds), yogurt (50 gallons), eggs (600 dozen), fermented salsa (19 cases) and salmon (450 pounds).
At the awards banquet the guest chef was recognized and she in turn recognized the hotel chefs and staff that she commandeered for four days. It was really wonderful, as I don’t think that the hotel chefs and staff get much recognition, and they were all brought on stage for some serious appreciation. The head chef said a couple of neat things, such as they learned a lot about food and they were grateful to actually cook with real butter and lard. He hoped that the guest chef would come back soon. Someone should have filmed these four days and made a documentary similar to the one that Jamie Oliver made.
Finally, I want to thank my friend, Noelia, for getting me to the conference. If it wasn’t for Noelia urging me to go for the scholarship (over and over), then driving me there and sharing her room with me, I would not have attended. You are an amazing friend and I wish I could better tell you how much I appreciate you giving me all of that effort to get me there. It was the most amazing conference and I am so glad I shared it with you!
Tomorrow I will give notes from my first day, which was a day spent with the amazing cancer M.D., Dr. Nicholas Gonzalez.
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