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Health & Fitness

"Plant-based Diet": Kaiser Permanente offers cooking class in Redwood City

Classes at KP Redwood City start June 3

An East Bay chef and a psychiatrist at Kaiser Permanente Redwood City have teamed up to bring an unusual cooking class to KP members, patients, and now the community. The program talks about the health benefits of a whole food, plant-based diet, and the chef demonstrates delicious dishes made with veggies, whole grains, or fruit.

                “I used to be obese, prediabetic, and had a myriad of medical problems,” says Chef Lisa Books-Williams, and who spends two of the four class sessions demonstrating recipes and techniques that she says saved her life. “On the plant based diet, I lost 100 pounds and restored my health.”

                Dr. William Wong, Psychiatry, KP Redwood City, has been interested in healthy nutrition for nearly his entire life.

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                “I used to be, well, chubby. My family ate a lot of processed, fast food and so did I,” says the slim, fit-looking Dr. Wong. By the age of 12, he came to follow a diet of fresh fruit, vegetables, whole grains, and legumes.

As a medical student, Dr Wong  urged his father and his uncle, both heart-attack victims to follow the plant-based diet. His uncle was rigorous about it, and is still alive; his father, not so rigorous, died 6 years later.

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Chef Lisa and Dr. Wong met at one of her plant-based diet cooking demonstrations. They went to Scott Brown, Health Education Director at KP Redwood City and proposed a $75, 4-session class for the KP members and patients. He agreed. (The class is now open to the community.)

“Lisa’s food is really delicious,” says Brown.

Chef Lisa’s “students” get an ample serving of reality in class.  “I tell people they need ease into a plant based diet,” says Lisa. “You can’t go from all steaks to all salads overnight.”

“People always ask me about getting enough protein on a plant-based diet,” says Dr. Wong. “There’s plenty of protein in whole grains, such as brown or purple rice, quinoa, and in legumes, also broccoli.”

Lisa suggests that people start simple, like her famous green smoothie, which won over the hearts and tastebuds of some unruly high school students at friend’s school: “Bananas, kale, and more got major ‘eeewwws’ from the kids, but at the end, they all asked for second helpings,” smiles Lisa.

Scott Brown helped Chef Lisa stage a brief demonstration of her cooking techniques before a large gathering of KP NCAL health educators in Oakland. And she’s been invited to do lunch-hour presentations for KP doctors, nurses, and staff at several hospitals and medical offices.

“I ask them if they’d be willing to talk about a plant-based diet to their patients,” says Lisa. “They all say yes because they love the food and its health-giving benefits.”

Dr. Wong says  three Southern California KP physicians and a dietitian recently published a peer-reviewed article in The Permanente Journal (http://www.thepermanentejournal.org/issues/2013/spring/5117-nutrition.html) that posits a low-sodium plant based diet with exercise is associated with weight loss and may reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease and mortality.

“Dr. Eleanor Levin of KP Santa Clara also talks about the plant based diet with her cardiology patients,” says Dr. Wong.

Other KP Northern California medical centers have healthy eating programs and classes for members and staff, including some variations of the plant-based diet, but none have Chef Lisa, who was named  “Vegan Iron Chef” in San Francisco, 2013, and a similar honor in NYC in 2010.

At KP Redwood City, Lisa  “vegucates” and “cooks” with a food processor, knives, and a special blender. Often, she brings pre- cooked dishes from home, like a baked casserole of colorful zucchini, yellow squash, fresh tomato, garlic, shallots, basil and Italian seasoning, and pepper.

“Just a tiny pinch of salt,” says Lisa. “The Heart Association cautions against too much salt. I want to eat health promoting foods.”

 

Members (or community) can call Health Education to register for the Plant Based Diet class at (650) 299-2433. Class schedule is available online at kp.org/classes



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