Words from the source

With great power comes great responsibility and so I stand here holding a great power of ancestral wisdom I have acquired and with the responsibility to share it

To fully understand and know ancestral foods and food in general, we have to forget everything we think we know about food -modern day food systems are based on profit, it is a business not healing, not even nutrition.

If you are someone who is not on ancestral food path, i hope this is your awakening

My name is Liva Vino and I created Ancestral Food Alchemy after my own awakenings and realizations about food

Who here gets their food from this community? Even if its a very small portion -farmers market? Co-op, friends 

Something happens to our nervous system once we start looking for actual food within our environment, within our reach. If we really think about it, all today's so-called food that is available at the grocery stores is a new invention, and truly foreign to our bodies. All the chronic health issues start in the gut - gut is the second brain. Nourishment from REAL FOOD is everything

 I was born and raised in North East Europe, Latvia, a nation with a population of 2 million people and like every country bordering Russia, we were also occupied by the Soviet Union. 

 I grew up on ancestral diet, at the time I of course didn’t know that’s what it is, I was just planting and harvesting the potatoes together with my family, I was just foraging berries and mushrooms with my grandparents and we were just playing in the gardens of cucumbers and tomatoes, life and food were equals, life happened around food. 

With the fall of the Soviet Iron curtain we were free and so was the market. I remember coca cola showing up in our small community store that was the size of a kiosk and MacDonalds claiming a historical building next to the Monument of freedom in Riga where it still stands,  I too then though, that is the taste of freedom

 We regained our freedom without an army or a war, and kept  our culture that is rooted in traditions before we started counting the time by the Georgian calendar. And since I myself actively walk the Ancestral food path I know - because my whole bloodline and ancestors before me have been practicing ancestral food ways my body benefited from that immensely. My nation's geographical and political circumstances protected us from processed food exposure. 

The first time I experienced what impact food can do is when I moved away at 23, 15 years ago, to North America, Vancouver BC and after tasting the meat there became vegetarian for 5 years and learned about the insanities of animal farming and how dairy farm cows never see the daylight and calves are separated from their mamas the moment they are born. I never knew that type of food- food that’s tortured and grown in fields sprayed with poison. 

Fast forward 4 years away from my ancestral foods and Thyroid problems arose and still at that time trusting medical system I believed only a medicated petroleum filled pill can help me (yes- every single pharmaceutical pill has petroleum in it

2 years after  that I live in Northern California deep in the mountains and return back to growing food- rooting my fingers again in soil and remembering my ancestors who always had been putting seeds in the ground with the arrival of the spring. 

Because of my location which is 2 hours away from grocery stores I start making everything from scratch and once my thyroid imbalances come up again I ask my previous doctor- what foods can support me and hearing her answer - None- I never speak to her again and start questioning the medical system for anything. I fully change my diet and take out processed and gmo modified food and my body starts thriving again.

5 years ago I moved to Taos and lucky coincidences or God who’s born from the womb of Goddess puts me into sous chef position even tho I have no professional training. I am forever grateful for these experiences but I start understanding and experiencing a very unforgiving side of food again- canola oil even in high end restaurants and extreme food waste. I start collecting buckets of food scraps to feed animals, I also build compost in my yard.  

Two years of being a chef I organize a ticketed dinner event at the Stakeout venue where my intention is all local, all cooked in real fat on real metals with real salt and nothing is wasted, how to call this dinner Ancestral Food Alchemy lightbulbs into mind but the marketing director changes it to Earth Centered Gastronomy that hits the nail on the head because it is. Ancestral Food Alchemy tho has sprouted and I can’t back away from these principles, everything changes for me as local and seasonal cooked in animal fats is the base for everything I do. I quit being a chef and became Ancestral Food Alchemy.

3 years ago my daughter announced her arrival and I upgraded my diet again, I take out cane sugar completely and eat protein and fat based diet, no prenatal supplements - don't have time for supplement or baby food propaganda right now, but know everything we have been told about food including animal food, about supplements about baby formula and baby food, and the medical system itself is based in profit marketing its a business, not healing, not even nutrition 

I have so much to say about all this, that is why I have a radio show on KNCE 93,5fm every other Thursday at 9am called Ancestral Food Alchemy Radio Hour. An ancestral diet is all about healing from the foods we consume grown in the environment we live in - we are what we eat. If we only eat processed food and foods that have traveled from 18. other countries, are we even eating real food? Are we shaking the hand that feeds us? I have made a quest for myself to break up with the governed food systems and as impossible as it may sound it is possible and once done - the true power shows her self

During intermission you will taste Ice Cream I have made from 3 ingredients I have sourced within reach - you will taste real food that is grown in this environment, under the high desert sun and nourishing us - humans who live here by animals who live here beside us.

If none of what I've said is encouraging you to seek real food and abolish processed feed, I hope this will

  They burnt women and called them witches, they burned women and got away with it by calling them witches and now the pedophiles run free and are profiting from us when we consume processed foods. 

PechaKucha Youtube video my talk starts on min 17

Love For Food 

3-week program for caretakers and their little ones to learn and share the love of coming together and preparing food in an intentional and ancestral way. 

As humans, we have shared the meal with our tribe and village since the beginning of time, and only in recent history, with the industrialization, we have been pushed into individual micro family units. Where we only on special occasions get to experience the beauty and healing of what it means to prepare, and share the meal together. 

This three-week-long program will bring us together to remember this ancient wisdom so we can nourish our nervous system by experiencing the village. 

Being together is our birthright, food is meant to be shared and eaten with hands, passed to one another with a smile and kindness. Remembering this birthright and showing it to our little ones inspires them to seek that out throughout their lives. 

Each week, we will prepare food inspired by our ancestors and will share stories of our grandmothers and women who came together around the fire and brewed together not just food but culture. 

3 Fridays, February 20, 27 & March 6, 10-1 pm Talpa

Week 1: Broth, meat stock, and ghee - foundation for every meal

Week 2: dehydration nuts, seeds, making crackers, and dipping sauces: salsa, hummus - finger foods 

Week 3: chocolate and desserts, caramel, gummies, ice cream - sweetened with honey