"I did an internship at Millennium, which is an amazing fine-dining vegan restaurant in San Francisco," said the Germantown Friends and University of Pennsylvania graduate. "I saw that not only did they work with local farms and use organic foods and wine, they composted all their kitchen food waste. I'd never seen the connection to nature so integrated into a restaurant's philosophy before."
Back in New York, she worked at Aquavit, where she saw a similar philosophy at work. Observing chefs who avoided wastefulness and respected the environment influenced how she wanted to run her own catering business.
Even at the swankiest of catered affairs, Shafia's goal is low waste or no waste. It's not a new idea to her.
"I grew up in a house where we nearly always ate healthy food and were eco-friendly long before it was fashionable," she said. Her father is of Persian descent and grew up in Iran during World War II. "It wasn't that my parents were especially ahead of their time - they just didn't quite realize that the Depression had ended!"
Her mother gardened, and the family never wasted food or anything else.
"I think it's time to reclaim some of those old-school, conservation-minded food traditions," said Shafia.
In her book, which is divided by the four seasons, she includes more than 80 toothsome recipes, laced with relevant and practical tips on cooking and sourcing with a "lucid food" approach. You'll learn that 25 million trees are cut down for chopsticks every year (bring your own reusable ones to that favorite Chinese restaurant!) and that the average American household throws away 14 percent of its purchased food (save scraps for stock and compost!).
