I love people-watching, and nowhere is it more beautiful than in Mediterranean countries.

I love the delicate wrinkles that mark a life well lived.

I love the smile lines and the crow's feet that show the joy of life.

I love how the women age so gracefully.

Let's embrace aging and eat well from our kitchen today, on Christina Cooks.

(upbeat music) ♪ (announcer) Underwriting for Christina Cooks is provided by Suzanne's Specialties, offering a full line of alternative vegan and organic sweeteners and toppings.

Suzanne's Specialties.

Sweetness the way Mother Nature intended.

Jonathan's Spoons, individually handcrafted from cherry wood.

Each designed with your hand and purpose in mind.

Additional funding is also provided by... Hi.

I'm Christina Pirello, and this is Christina Cooks, where each week, we take fresh, seasonal ingredients and whip them into amazing dishes.

Will it all be plant-based?

Yeah.

Will it all be delicious?

You bet.

You know, when you feel well, life is good.

When you don't, you wanna curl up on the couch and watch old sitcom reruns and hope for a better day.

But that hope doesn't turn anything unless there's a little action behind it.

It won't change a thing.

So you have to put a little effort behind the wellness so that you can live a beautiful life of wellness.

And the way to do that is really, really easy: it just takes fresh seasonal ingredients, and today, we're gonna make-- we're gonna start with a salad.

And you're thinking, "Oh, great, a salad," but this isn't like any salad you've probably ever had.

It combines fruit and nuts and vegetables and a pesto, so stay with me.

So we're gonna take fresh peaches.

Now, in the summer, this is the salad for you.

In other months, when maybe stone fruit like peaches is not so prevalent, then you're gonna want to use pears or apples, doesn't matter.

So you're just gonna take it, don't peel it-- that's where the vitamin C from the sun, right, hit the peach, so don't peel them, and you want the slices to hold together.

We're just gonna slice them up.

And you're gonna put them into a bowl with water with lemon juice, it's called acidulated water, it's just water with lemon juice.

And what that does is, while you prep the rest of the salad, it prevents your peaches from turning a dark color, so that it looks beautiful.

If your peaches are all brown and not nice-looking, nobody's gonna wanna eat your salad, so...okay.

So the peaches are done.

You're gonna toss them in the lemon water, we're gonna set those aside.

Now we're gonna make the pesto, and the pesto's really easy.

These are hazelnuts, and hazelnuts are a beautiful gift from the heavens.

They are my favorite nut in the entire world, and they have these little papery brown skins on them.

You can leave them, doesn't matter.

But if you wanna be a little more aesthetic with your pesto, put the hazelnuts in the oven on a sheet tray for about 15 minutes, and then you drop them while they're hot into a dish towel and you rub them like this, and in theory, the skins come off.

In reality, most of them don't.

So you take the partially skinned hazelnuts, and they're gonna go into our food processor to begin the pesto.

(rattling) You wanna toast the hazelnuts whether you peel them or not because the flavor is just so much more... so much more hazelnutty.

Really, really yummy.

If you don't toast them, not so nice.

So we're just gonna pick these off the towel.

Now, your towel becomes a little challenging to clean, but that's for you to discover in your kitchen.

So, they go in, and then, the other thing that goes in is some white miso.

Now, usually a pesto comes with Parmigiano cheese or some kind of cheese.

We use miso to give us that flavor, just about two tablespoons.

Then we're gonna add some extra virgin olive oil, about a quarter cup.

Maybe about that much.

Now usually, a pesto also has garlic, but this one doesn't, because I want it to be a little bit sweeter.

So now we're gonna take our basil, nice fresh basil, and I usually cut out the big, tough stem.

And we're just gonna give it a little bit of a coarse chop so it chops more quickly in the blender or the food processor, or you can do this by hand.

If my nonna was here, she would say, "What's with the machine?

Do it by hand," 'cause that's how we did all our pestos growing up, but this is faster, watch.

(whirring, crackling) So this is just gonna become a coarse, sort of creamy pesto, and if you think it's not creamy enough, add a little more oil.

Like that.

Should be perfect.

Yeah.

Then we're gonna scrape it down a little bit.

And then, to really kind of finish it off, we're gonna add some fresh orange juice.

You can also use the zest, but I'm just gonna go with the orange juice.

Using my favorite kitchen tools.

You can use a gadget, if you want.

I'm not much for gadgets.

(squelching) I love that sound.

One last pulse.

(whirring) Perfect.

Now, to make the salad, we have some baby arugula, which is a bitter green, which is really designed to help the liver to do its job of cleansing the blood and metabolizing macronutrients a little bit better.

Some halved cherry tomatoes.

Our lovely peaches.

Try not to bring too much of the lemon water in when you take the peaches.

You don't need to drain them, but try not to bring too much of that in there.

Then we're gonna take our pesto.

Take the blade off.

I don't know about you guys, but I really struggle with machines of any kind.

I--they are my nemesis in the kitchen.

We're gonna give this a toss.

You want the pesto to coat everything, if you can.

Just give it a nice mix.

Smells really good, you smell hazelnuts and basil and arugula and the peaches, and it's all nicely coated.

Then we're gonna take tongs.

And when you're talking about natural foods and foods that are a little better for you, you wanna make sure that you plate things beautifully so that people wanna eat it.

You know, people eat with their eyes way before they eat with their mouths.

So we'll just take our salad, pop it in a beautiful bowl.

Make sure you've got some cherry tomatoes on top.

♪ And I'm telling you, this is a salad that nobody, and I mean nobody, is gonna turn their nose up at.

♪ Okay, so now we're gonna make a soup, and this soup is designed to relax the middle organs-- spleen, pancreas, and stomach-- so you feel grounded and calm.

And if that doesn't make you look great, I don't know what will, so stay with me.

This is a really yummy, easy-- when I tell you easy--soup.

Take a little extra virgin olive oil.

Soup's gonna get really creamy really quickly.

Take some finely chopped garlic.

And this is just gonna-- actually, you may laugh at this, but it's actually gonna boost the sweetness of the rest of the soup, because it's such a strong flavor.

You don't wanna really cook the garlic.

You kinda want it to just sit in the oil for a second or two.

Then we're gonna add some finely chopped chestnuts.

These are chestnuts that I bought packaged just like this.

They're cooked and peeled.

Now, if it's chestnut season, you wanna buy them, you wanna cook them and peel them.

Or not.

Chestnuts are delicious.

They're a fruit.

They're low in fat, they have no sugar, but they taste very sweet, so they make you feel like you have something sweet.

But they're kind of, um... kind of a pain to cook and peel.

So if you can find them packaged or frozen, go for it.

So they're gonna go in, and then we have cooked chickpeas, and chickpeas are really the key here that help you to feel balanced and well.

We're gonna use about three quarters of the amount of chickpeas that we have.

Then we're gonna add water to cover.

(steaming sizzle) And then, to this mix, before we cover it, we'll be adding some finely chopped sage, which, when you use sage, if you're gonna use dried or rubbed sage, be really careful, because it can go from tasting like delicious sage to dirt in no time.

So use--err to the lighter side and you can always add more.

Then we're gonna take some rosemary, some fresh rosemary, which I love.

I don't use dried rosemary at all.

It's like having sticks in your food.

So we're just gonna strip some off the stems here so that we can chop it.

Because rosemary's kind of a big leaf and you don't really want that in your soup.

Rosemary also is very strong, so when you use it, again, err to the side of less.

When you can smell it, you'll know, like, "This is enough."

So I'm only making a small amount of soup, so about a tablespoon of chopped fresh rosemary is really enough.

And that's gonna cook in with the soup, and because it's chopped, it's gonna simmer and get a really strong flavor in there, 'cause all the essential oils are gonna release into the broth.

We're gonna cover this, and this is gonna cook for about 25 minutes.

We're gonna wait for it to cook.

And 25 minutes later, our soup is ready.

We're gonna season it with a pinch of salt.

And if you like, if you like, a tiny bit of hot spice, which is gonna make the sweet taste sweeter.

I'm a fan of hot spice, so we are gonna use a little bit.

That's gonna go in.

Then we're gonna take this soup, give it a quick stir, and we're gonna purée it until it's smooth.

You turn it off, and by ladles, right into a food processor to become creamy.

Now, you can also pick up your soup pot and dump it, but that's hardly elegant, don't you think?

A little yikes.

And after we start ladling in... ...and you get to the bottom part of the soup, where it's a little bit lower, then you can go in-- be careful-- and pour in the balance of your soup.

Now, it doesn't look any different than when you started cooking it.

I'm gonna put on the top of our food processor and purée it.

You wanna get the soup nice and creamy.

Then... ...come right over here.

You can see the lovely texture of this soup.

And we're gonna garnish it with just a sprig of rosemary and a little drizzle of olive oil and a tiny bit of fresh parsley.

And you have a starter course that'll make you feel calm and relaxed the entire day.

♪ So what is a good olive oil?

Well, let's start with what's not.

If you're buying olive oil from a big box store in a great big container for about four bucks, (whispering) that's not olive oil.

I mean, there might be some olive oil in it, but it's not olive oil.

Really good olive oil is .2 percent acidity naturally.

The olives are picked, and within 24 hours, they're pressed.

So what you wanna look for is an olive oil that's called an estate oil, and that means the olives are from the same farm.

Olives are a very tender fruit that bruise, so when they bruise and then they're pressed into oil, the acidity goes up.

So if you can find an estate oil, that means the olives are picked, pressed, oil.

That's it, that's the process.

Pick, pressed, oil.

If they have to bring in olives from all over the world or all over the country, you have a much bigger risk, let's say, of it being acidic.

So, a really good olive oil is a very beautiful golden-greenish color and should taste kind of grassy.

And olive oil's known for its polyphenols.

Polyphenols are the heart-healthy compounds that we associate with oil.

And in America, where we have younger vines, we have a certain amount of polyphenols, 50 milligrams per kilogram.

It's five times that in European oil, because they've been doing it longer.

So try to buy European oils when you can, although I'm not dissing American oil.

When you buy oil, you put it in a container, you warm it in your hand, right?

Then you pour a little in your hand.

This is how you taste it to see if it's good oil.

Then you suck it through your teeth like this.

(sucking oil) You should get a slight burning at the back of your throat.

That's good olive oil.

♪ Okay, so--Scotty, I thought Daniel Liberatoscioli was gonna be in this segment.

-Why don't you give him a call?

-Uggh, okay.

(cell phone rings) Christina!

You're supposed to be on set with me.

Could you please come over?

I'm on my way.

♪ Ah!

-Ciao, bella!

-Ciao.

Bonsoir.

Bonjour.

-Everything good?

-Superbe.

(Christina) So I wanted to make with you today--first of all, this is Danny Liberatoscioli.

Danny Liberatoscioli, say that with me.

(group) Danny... (Christina) Okay, Danny.

(laughing) The president of Walnut Hill College, and my boss here, and, um, today we're gonna make together pain d'epices.

-Pain d'epices.

-And I did some research, and tell me if I'm right, that it goes back -a very long time.

-Oh, it's an ancient recipe.

(Christina) And they used a sourdough, rye flour, and honey and let it age for months -before it became bread?

-Exactly.

And you know, Christina, there there are shops in Dijon that specialize only in pain d'epices.

This is an important snack for the Dijonnais families.

Our students, when they travel to France with us, get to see and taste the pain d'epices.

(Christina) So you know I'm breaking every tradition -of making pain d'epices.

-Not at all.

You're reinventing tradition.

(Christina) Okay, let's try that, let's go with that.

So I know it's supposed to be made with butter; I'm making it with olive oil.

I am, after all, Italian.

And we are also using whole grain flours, and my spices are tous ensembles.

(Danny) Voilà, tout a fait, tout a fait.

(Christina) Right.

And so we're also doing it as a Bundt shape, not a loaf.

So we're breaking every rule.

So the first thing to go into our mixing bowl is... uh...a quarter cup-- and it doesn't seem like a lot, but a quarter cup of olive oil.

A nice, generous quarter cup.

And then goes in a half cup of brown rice syrup, which I'm using in place of honey.

Now, if you are not vegan and you wanna use honey, you can use honey.

And the recipe actually traditionally calls for a whole cup, but my discovery was that was way too sweet.

-That's gonna be great.

-This is gonna be nice and sweet, right?

Then we're gonna add to this, uh, three tablespoons of coconut sugar, which is a low glycemic index sweetener that tastes just like brown sugar, so that's also gonna help to boost sort of the depth of the flavor of it, rather than just sugar.

And then, if you don't mind, sir, if you would grate into the bowl while I get some other things ready, gonna grate straight through, this is a frozen orange.

This is my favorite kitchen hack ever.

You grate straight through the zest, into the pith, into the juice, to get-- I'm gonna want maybe, mm, a tablespoon.

You don't need a lot, because we're also gonna orange-glaze this to make it sweeter.

-Oh, it's gonna be great.

-Yep.

So when--this didn't originate, though, in Dijon.

It originated in Reims, am I right?

-Exactly, exactly right.

-And Charles VII loved -this bread?

-And they have their version that they're very proud of as well.

(Christina) Yeah, yeah, yeah, but how did the Dijonnais sort of... take it over, if you will?

(Danny) We know that Dijon was the capital of France, and the duchy were there ruling, so my assumption is... -So that's how!

Yeah, yeah.

-...they might have taken the recipe and kinda claimed it for themselves, -perhaps.

-Okay, perhaps.

(Danny) But we'll straighten it out today.

(Christina) Yeah, we will.

-Ça va?

-Yup.

-Parfait.

-Merci.

So I'm also going to add a little bit of fresh orange juice and save the rest for our glaze.

And this along with water is gonna be our liquid, and what surprised me when I was looking at these recipes was that they didn't use milk or cream.

They used water to make the batter into batter, which I thought was pretty surprising.

So, I'm gonna have you whisk that while I get my flour, and we're gonna use a half cup of rye flour, I did keep that.

And when I made this the first time, the rye flour is really delicious in this, I've got to say.

So a half cup of rye flour.

And then we'll be using three cups of-- I'm using sprouted whole wheat flour.

(Danny) All of these ingredients are gonna give it -a real depth of flavor.

-Yeah.

And what I like about the sprouted whole wheat, if I don't lose count here, I hope, is that it, um... -C'est trois, je pense.

-Ah, (speaking French).

What I like about the sprouted whole wheat is it digests in the body like a vegetable, so it's not so much of a carbohydrate.

Now I'm going to give you a cup of water that you're gonna keep mixing while I add the leavener and the spices.

And the other thing that this has-- a little bit more than a cup-- the other thing that this has that I love, I use an egg replacer to help to give it lift, so that's gonna go in, and it's just been dissolved in a little bit of water.

It looks kinda goopy, but this is gonna lift the cake.

(Danny) C'est nouveau pour moi.

That's new for me.

-Yeah?

-Oui.

(Christina) Okay, and then, a teaspoon of baking powder and a half teaspoon of baking soda.

Now goes in the spices, and the spices are the key to this bread.

We have fresh anise, which, I used fennel seed in this once, and it was delicious, but they taste so similar.

And then, we're gonna use, mmm...

I like a whole teaspoon of the mixed spices, or do you want more?

-More is better.

-More is always better in this, don't you think?

-It's a spice bread.

-That's right.

So that goes in.

Do you want more water?

Do you feel like the batter is too thin, too thick?

-Maybe a tad.

-Okay.

(Danny) I don't know how to say tad in French.

-Un peu.

-Un peu, voilà.

-Tout à fait.

-Voilà.

Now, get your spices on the side, get everything mixed in.

And there's nothing to fold in, like nuts or seeds, so now you can just, if you don't mind, voilà, right into-- you want to make sure you oil your cake pan.

I'm again doing this as a Bundt, so I'm breaking all the rules, and while you pour, I'll turn, -this is a two-man job.

-There we go.

(Christina) And just make sure you get all your batter.

You see the texture of the batter is very smooth and silky for pouring.

(Danny) It really is.

(Christina) And then this is gonna bake...

The traditional recipe calls for an hour.

I find that it bakes in about 40 minutes.

An hour seems like oy-yi-yi, way too long, and it was dry, so I've been playing with this for a while.

-Ça va?

-Ça va, taste it.

There's no egg.

You can put your finger in the batter.

-Mm.

Oh, it's perfect.

-Yeah.

And then I take-- I like to do this when I make a cake, is I just take a little-- and to make sure it's even, number one, and you can see little, like pinholes open up, and this way, you won't have a hole in your cake.

And this is gonna bake for about 40 to 45 minutes at 350, and then we'll bring it back and we'll glaze it.

I'll be right back.

♪ So, after 40 to 45 minutes, I'm gonna give you the honors.

-Voilà.

-Wow.

-Right?

-Beautiful.

(Christina) So before we cut it, I'm gonna make a glaze to go over the top, which-- they either glaze the whole cake, or sometimes, they just glaze each slice.

But we're gonna take some brown rice syrup.

I don't really measure this, it's just-- 'cause the glaze is the glaze.

And that's gonna come to a high rolling boil, with a little bit of fresh orange juice.

And what I love about this cake is that it doesn't-- there's no vanilla, there's no--you really rely on the spices for this bread.

It's so nice.

So, what would you, as the glaze boils, what would you serve this with?

Coffee, tea, a glass of wine?

(Danny) Let's think about it, Christina.

-Dijon, Burgundy.

-Yep.

-Wine.

-Wine.

So, would you celebrate in some way?

(Danny) Absolutely.

Always in Burgundy, we sing about wine.

-We do?

-Yeah.

-Ah!

-Et voilà.

♪ Chevaliers de la table ronde ♪ ♪ Goûtons voir si le vin est bon ♪ ♪ Chevaliers de la table ronde ♪ ♪ Goûtons voir si le vin est bon ♪ -♪ Goûtons voir ♪ -♪ Oui, oui, oui ♪ -♪ Goûtons voir ♪ -♪ Non, non, non ♪ (Danny) ♪ Goûtons voir si le vin est bon ♪ -♪ Goûtons voir ♪ -♪ Oui, oui, oui ♪ -♪ Goûtons voir ♪ -♪ Non, non, non ♪ (Danny) ♪ Goûtons voir si le vin est bon ♪ (Christina) Bravissimo!

I know that was Italian, but... All right, so here's our glaze boiled.

It's perfect timing.

So now we take just a small spoon-- you really wanna use a small spoon for this, and then, you can either spoon like this to make it more delicate, which I love, or you can pour, if you wanna be more bold.

But this is such a nice-- really, the glaze is something that you can do, but in my opinion, it's totally optional, because having had this with a nice strong espresso, which I know, again, is mixing cultures, but that's okay.

They drink espresso in France, oui?

-Of course they do.

-Ah, oui.

(Danny) Oh, that smells great!

(Christina) Now you can cut it if you'd like so we can see what it looks like.

It's so beautiful.

And I love it, dense and very fulfilling.

I mean, look at this, this is really-- it turned out beautifully.

And the smell?

Smell that.

(Danny) The best.

Wow.

Really.

(Christina) Boss, thank you so much for joining me.

-It's my pleasure.

-It was a pleasure.

(Danny) Mon plaisir.

Merci beaucoup.

♪ So what are you waiting for?

Let's get back to the cutting board, and I'll see you next time on Christina Cooks the Macroterranean Way.

♪ ♪ (announcer) Underwriting for Christina Cooks is provided by Suzanne's Specialties, offering a full line of alternative vegan and organic sweeteners and toppings.

Suzanne's Specialties.

Sweetness the way Mother Nature intended.

♪ Jonathan's Spoons.

Individually handcrafted from cherry wood.

Each designed with your hand and purpose in mind.

Additional funding is also provided by... You can find today's recipes and learn more by visiting our website at christinacooks.com, and by following Christina on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest.

The companion cookbook, The Macroterranean Way, combines the Mediterranean diet with the ancient wisdom of Chinese medicine, allowing us to understand how food affects us so we can cook deliciously while creating the wellness we want.

To order your copy for $14.95 plus handling, call 800-266-5815.

Add Back to the Cutting Board and Christina's iconic Cooking the Whole Foods Way, and get all three books for $49.95 plus handling.

Call 800-266-5815.

♪ (bright music)