Party In Your Plants | Talia Pollock
Party In Your Plants: 100+ Plant Based Recipes and Problem-Solving Strategies to Help You Eat Healthier (Without Hating Your Life).
By Talia Pollock
Intro: Welcome to the number one cookbook podcast Cookery by the Book with Suzy Chase. She's just a home cook in New York city, sitting at her dining room table talking to cookbook authors.
Talia Pollock: I'm Talia Pollock. My new book is Party in Your Plants.
Suzy Chase: For more Cookery by the Book, you can follow me on Instagram. If you enjoy this podcast, please be sure to share it with a friend. I'm always looking for new people to enjoy Cookery by the Book. Now for my quarantine question round, where are you living?
Talia Pollock: I'm living in Pound Ridge, New York.
Suzy Chase: Oh, Pound Ridge is pretty.
Talia Pollock: It is. We've got lots of trees.
Suzy Chase: Oh my gosh. You said the woods, so I thought you were way upstate. What restaurant are you dreaming of going to after the quarantine?
Talia Pollock: Okay, well we just found out that the reason we moved to Pound Ridge, which was because of the Inn at Pound Ridge, which is a Jean-Georges restaurant, which, if you don't know, is very similar to ABC Kitchen, which is in the city, which also we love ABCV. We just found out that the Inn at Pound Ridge is open for take out starting tomorrow. We're so excited. Then once we get our fix on there, we cannot wait to get back to ABCV, our favorite restaurant in the whole world.
Suzy Chase: What dish is getting you through this?
Talia Pollock: I don't, nothing's getting me through this right now. I'll tell you, I have funfetti cupcakes, less unhealthy funfetti cupcakes with crap free vanilla frosting in my fridge right now that I made to celebrate my book launch virtual party the other night. Those are getting me through.
Suzy Chase: On with the show. I think we all want to eat healthier without hating our life. You want to take the hell out of healthy eating. Talk about how the coconut creamy smoothie you ate in college gave you a plant eating epiphany.
Talia Pollock: Ah, yes. Well, for over eight years prior to that smoothie, I struggled so much with my health. I had really bad digestive issues, which our digestive system's the epicenter of our body. They call it our second brain, our gut. When your digestive system is horrible and you're feeling sick all the time, it really affects everything. That digestive stuff led to immune issues. It led to lack of energy and then depression and lack of confidence. I was just a mess walking around and nowhere even close to my best self, not even in the ballpark. I was struggling so much. I knew there must be a better way to feel in the world. This couldn't be for me. I was very relentless in finding solutions. I tried multiple gastroenterologists and acupuncturists, naturopathic, hypnotherapist, everyone under the sun. All they could say is I had IBS.
Talia Pollock: I was an aspiring comedian at the time. I did my internship my junior year of college in LA where I was working for Adam Sandler's Happy Madison Production Company. In my off time, I was exploring all that LA had to offer in terms of wellness. I discovered spinning for the first time, colonics, whoa, juices, all of this stuff I never heard of before. I grew up on the East coast. My mom always says trends start out West, so I guess that was going on. It was 2008, so it was really early for all this stuff.
Talia Pollock: One day I'm going. I'm at this woo-woo healer who's touching parts of my body and telling me all these supplements I need to buy for all this money to heal my parasites. I don't know. I was desperate. I told that person as I was paying, I'm hungry. She said, "Oh, go across the street. That place has amazing coconut smoothie." I go across the street to this woo-woo place with incense wafting into the street. I asked for the coconut smoothie. They hand it to me. It's this white, frothy, creamy thing. I say, "Oh, I'm so sorry. I don't do dairy." Because at the time I knew at least that upset my stomach. They say, "Sweetie, this is vegan." I didn't know what vegan meant. I didn't want to cause a scene. So I took the smoothie, sat outside on a bench, drank the smoothie. For the first time in over eight years, I consumed something that didn't make me feel sick. I felt strong. I felt vibrant. I felt healthy. I felt energized. I was like, "What is this vegan thing?" I proceeded to spend the rest of my time in LA just sitting in Barnes and Noble, because this was before blogs and Instagram and everything, just learning everything I could about eating plants. It changed my whole life.
Suzy Chase: And naturally that place was called Planet Raw, aren't they all?
Talia Pollock: Yes, right? Yes. It was Planet Raw. It's no longer with us, but it was heaven.
Suzy Chase: Fast forward to the day when you realized you'd forgotten and ignored your own voice.
Talia Pollock: Yeah, so what happened was that I fell in love with the plants. They changed my health. It was amazing. Really. I became a new, I couldn't believe how good I felt, but it was very hard to be a normal member of society, "normal." I was in college, so I had my senior year to finish up. After that internship in LA, I went back to school. Now I was this person soaking almonds to turn into all almond milk in my on campus apartment while my friends are off doing keg stands. I was dehydrating kale. This was so long ago you couldn't even buy almond milk in stores. To get coconut water, I would crack open coconuts with a machete and scrape out the meat and turn it into ice cream. This was my college activities. It was very hard to be a contributing member of society when I was just this health nut hermit.
Talia Pollock: I graduated college more unhappy than ever before. I felt like I had to choose between my happiness and my social life and my health. I chose health. But then I was so sad and so alone and so depressed, and so I had to figure out how to combine the two worlds. That's what I've done. That's what I do with Party in my Plants, but it really stemmed out of this really sad place of being stuck, having to choose one or the other.
Suzy Chase: I've been a follower of Rachel Hollis for a long, long time. She says, "The quality of your habits is the quality of your life." What are a few pointers for folks who want to go full throttle like you did?
Talia Pollock: One, I love Rachel Hollis, awesome. Love her. Two, some habits, my overarching philosophy is I just want to help people eat more plants in a given day, meal, snack, week, month, year. Then they eat crap. Crap being chemical, refined, artificial and processed food. That's the principle. That's what I want to help people do. If you adopt that, then you're taking the all or nothing mentality out of the picture, which is what causes so much stress for people. It takes perfectionism out of the picture and it really, as I say, it takes the hell out of healthy eating.
Suzy Chase: Do we really need a blender?
Talia Pollock: Ha. You're referring to the intro from my book, "What you need more than a fancy blender." That's me saying what you need is this book. That'll serve you more than a fancy blender. The truth is that there's not a shortage of recipes out there, right? I mean, you know as well as anyone, better than anyone that there is no shortage of recipes on the planet for people to learn and make. What is missing for a lot of people struggling to eat healthier is the spark, is the desire, is the excitement, that, "Oh my God, if I change things I put in my body, I can show up in the world so much better than I ever thought possible." My book and my work aims to be that spark for people that gets them to want to eat the plants. Then I happen to have awesome recipes, but it's really this catalyst for igniting your desire to do it. That's what you need more than a frickin' blender.
Suzy Chase: I love your recipe on page 105 called the High Def TV Dinner. Can you describe this?
Talia Pollock: Yeah. Well, I'll flip to it. 105, no, it's awesome. I mean, all the recipes are divided by real life situations. Like I said, my story stems from having to compromise my real life to accommodate my healthy stuff. I don't want anyone to have to do that. This is like a TV dinner where you basically, it's like a sheet pan meal. You just eat off like those old fashioned TV dinners where you see people sitting on those folding tables and eating their airplane food in front of the TV. This is that, because everything you're making for dinner involves just one pan. You can do chickpeas and any roasted vegetables that you, vegetables you have to roast. Then I suggest you pair it with quinoa or cauliflower rice or sweet potato or something like that. It's like a souped up HD TV dinner.
Suzy Chase: I do love that you use humor to inspire people to eat more plants. I feel like vegetarians and vegans are so serious.
Talia Pollock: Yeah.
Suzy Chase: Why?
Talia Pollock: Yep, I don't ...
Suzy Chase: I don't get it.
Talia Pollock: It's so unnecessary. I mean, all that does is make it less appealing for people, right? I mean, this is not supposed to be a miserable thing. We eat a lot. It would be cool if the process of eating was enjoyable and not stressful and not black or white and not intimidating. I don't know why that's the route that so many people choose, but I have not chosen that I am here to make it fun, so you actually do it.
Suzy Chase: Speaking of fun, can you talk about apple cider vinegar?
Talia Pollock: Yeah.
Suzy Chase: ACV.
Talia Pollock: Nice transition.
Suzy Chase: Right? I just like smooth right on into that one. Is it the miracle food?
Talia Pollock: I mean, what's more fun than apple cider vinegar, right?
Suzy Chase: Right?
Talia Pollock: I mean, I don't know. What are you going to say about miracle food? It's wonderful, I'll tell you that much. I've been consuming two tablespoons of apple cider vinegar in my morning cocktail, if you will, which is just water, two tablespoons of apple cider vinegar. Then I do some greens powders, a powder, and that's like a green juice cocktail. It's amazing for digestion, for detoxing, for your skin, for energy. It's just, it's really, really lovely for your body. I use it in a lot of recipes. It's great in baking to help things rise.
Suzy Chase: I'm obsessed with your YouTube channel. I have to say my favorite episode is, drum roll ...
Talia Pollock: What is it?
Suzy Chase: The best Mexican restaurant tips where you ...
Talia Pollock: Oh my gosh.
Suzy Chase: ... show up in the R Kelly Fiesta video, which is hilarious.
Talia Pollock: Oh my god.
Suzy Chase: The best takeaway from this video is to always order soft tortillas in lieu of tortilla chips. Can you talk about that and tell us about your YouTube channel?
Talia Pollock: Oh my God, you're so awesome. Thank you for watching my videos. That is very funny. Yeah, that's fun. Yeah, I think that is the pro-iest pro tip of all pro tips. I mean, when you go, when we can eat at restaurants again, to Mexican restaurants, they always bring you a basket of these fried tortilla chips. You can ask, "Oh, excuse me, can I just please have some soft tortillas?" Then you can just use those as your scooper or your dipper instead of eating a plethora, the fried stuff as you're starting your dinner. You can also ask for vegetables as well.
Suzy Chase: Do they look at you funny if you ask for vegetables?
Talia Pollock: You know what? I don't care.
Suzy Chase: Yeah.
Talia Pollock: That's what this is about. This is about, owning it. What would Rachel Hollis say, right? Wash your face. Order the chips. I mean, not the chips, the tortillas. That's what this, I'm here to help people do. A lot of the barrier between not eating healthfully and eating healthily is that inner confidence. It's that boldness. It's that I'm just going to do it and not care what other people think because I'm that committed to my wellbeing. That's what you need more than a blender, going back to what we said before. It's that unwavering authenticity to just do the damn thing and not worry about what other people look like when you're doing it.
Suzy Chase: I think we're all learning that now in the quarantine. I have a mini trampoline and I'm on my roof and I'm sure hundreds of people can see me bouncing on my roof, but I don't care.
Talia Pollock: That's amazing.
Suzy Chase: It's in your day.
Talia Pollock: You brought it to your roof. That's awesome. That's so cool. Yeah, YOLO. That's what we're living in. Okay. If you're bouncing on a trampoline in your roof in public, then you can order soft corn tortillas.
Suzy Chase: I can, and I can order vegetables too.
Talia Pollock: Yeah, I think you can.
Suzy Chase: Yeah, bring it. Sea salt or pink salt?
Talia Pollock: I love pink salt. It's not just cause I'm girly. It's just I've always done pink salt, but you can do sea salt. I just like the Himalayan pink salt.
Suzy Chase: Some of the names of the recipes crack me up like Pad Thai in No Time and Cheez-Isn'ts.
Talia Pollock: Yeah, they're like Cheez-Its, but isn'ts.
Suzy Chase: Sweet Ass Sriracha Tofu. How long did it take you to put this book together?
Talia Pollock: I mean it was a lot. It was, I think a year, a full year before edits. Then there were edits, but it was a year. It was the best. I had such a blast.
Suzy Chase: Now to my segment called my favorite cookbook. What is your all time favorite cookbook and why?
Talia Pollock: Oh, okay. Clean Food by Terry Walters was the first ... Do you know that one?
Suzy Chase: No.
Talia Pollock: Oh, it's, she's the OG. She's the OG. She's clean food before clean food was ever a term. I just so happened to have grown up as her neighbor. She was making all this stuff with teff flour and rice flour and all this gluten-free, whole food stuff in my backyard. She really inspired my journey, so Clean Food by Terry Walters.
Suzy Chase: Where can we find you on the web, social media and your podcast?
Talia Pollock: My podcast is the Party in my Plant's podcast. I am Party in my Plants across all social media and internet things.
Suzy Chase: Well, thanks Talia for coming on Cookery by the Book podcast.
Talia Pollock: Thank you so much for having me.
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