An Interview with Rebecca Katz: Part Two

Last week, we published the first part of our interview with Rebecca Katz, chef, nutritionist, cookbook author, culinary translator and expert at cooking for people with cancer. Here, the conclusion of the interview.

Liz: On your website, you have a Culinary Rx section that provides a comprehensive list of ingredients with great health benefits. Which foods do you most highly recommend for people undergoing cancer treatment?

Rebecca and Bella

Rebecca: Mint and ginger for sure. Mint has some very powerful phytochemicals that can quell inflammation. You can drink mint tea, chop some mint in your salad; you don’t need very much. Ginger inhibits NFKB and quells nausea, helping to stimulate appetites that aren’t there. Drink ginger tea or put ginger in things. The cruciferous vegetables: broccoli, kale, cauliflower, collards, arugula. They are very high in sulforaphane, a well-studied phytochemical that is helpful in dealing with cells gone amok. Garlic and onions are superfoods. And as far as fruits go, I would say the dark berries are really wonderful.

Liz: What results can cancer patients expect to see from the foods and recipes you recommend?

Rebecca: They’ll be able to eat, when they thought they might not be able to. Basically, the recipes are designed to be what I call nutrient-dense, which means that every food, every ingredient in the recipe plays a role—no empty calories. I use a lot of herbs and spices, which tickle the taste buds, even as people are going through treatment and experiencing transient taste changes.

Recipes are designed to include the right amount of good, healthy fats, the right amount of acids, the right amount of sea salt, the right amount of sweet. They are designed to use nutrient-dense foods and be balanced, and when they hit the taste buds, to really come alive and become interesting. The best recipe in the book for anyone with any kind of illness is the Magic Mineral Broth: when you feel like just can’t eat anything, but you need to be nourished or hydrated, it has everything. It’s like taking your body to an internal spa. And if you can’t make it yourself, you can recruit someone to make it for you. Remember that when people are sick, others really want to help but don’t know how, so if you give them a concrete path—can you make this broth for me and put it in small containers?—that’s very empowering.

Liz: Finally, what words of advice can you leave our SevenPonds readers with, who may be dealing with cancer, caregiving, and end-of-life?

Rebecca: I think one of the hardest things is when you’re watching someone who is sick; our inclination is to want to force people to eat. Food is an emotional issue with a lot of charge behind it. But someone may not always be able to eat a whole plate of food. We think, if you don’t eat you’re not going to get well; if you lose weight you’re going to die. There’s a lot of projection that a caregiver might place on someone who is going through treatment. So I just caution and say, have things available, give things in small portions. People will come to food in their own way.

That’s the magic of nourishment. When people are not feeling their best, sometimes it’s a broth that will get people connected back to food in some way… it could even be a potato chip! It’s hard to say. As caregivers we should just try hard to be flexible. Caregivers also need a culinary support team of people they can call upon to take on some cooking roles. Caregivers need to be nourished too. The more direction you can give them in handing off the recipe, the better.

I have seen people passing on: one woman, all she wanted was French toast, and her family told her she could not have it—it was too high in sugar, carbohydrates, not good for her. I said, wait a minute! This is what she wants! She is passing, she should have the best French toast she could have! Whether it’s life-affirming, using food to heal and move on, a last bite: the role of food is to be nourishing.

To learn more about Rebecca, visit her website at http://www.rebeccakatz.com/.