News & Stories

Can Delicious Food Make You Healthier?

September 6, 2024

Chef Jacques Pépin, pictured in our new Teaching Kitchen, says yes!

Nearly 2,500 years ago, Hippocrates— famously known as the father of medicine — proclaimed, “Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food.” Modern medicine is finally catching up with him!

Thanks to amazing donors like you, YNHH is at the leading edge of the culinary medicine  movement.

What is culinary medicine?

It’s a very simple idea, according to Nate Wood, MD, Chef and Director of Culinary Medicine at Yale New Haven Health Teaching Kitchen. “The way you cook and eat impacts your health.”

Nate explains the science behind culinary medicine in a bit more detail: “More than half the calories most Americans consume come from ultra-processed foods — foods high in fat, sugar, starch, and salt that increase the risk of conditions like diabetes, overweight and obesity, heart disease and strokes. The good news is, folks can manage — even prevent — these conditions when they learn to cook with healthy ingredients.”

The Irving and Alice Brown Teaching Kitchen, an idea long in the making, was created to teach nutrition, cooking, and wellness skills. Thanks to a gift from Carole Brown (see her story on p. 3), it opened last year — a gleaming facility with a television studio-style demonstration kitchen and rows of prep areas and cooktops for students to try their own hands as they learn.

Max Goldstein, Teaching Kitchen Chef and Registered Dietitian, teaches classes for patients who are referred by their health care providers. And Nate takes the lead in teaching classes for physicians and other health professionals who want to become more knowledgeable about nutrition and cooking so they can better advise their patients.

Students learn and practice cooking techniques, discuss nutrition and lifestyle basics, and then cook budget-friendly, nutritious — and most importantly — delicious recipes. Each class concludes with a convivial shared meal, where the students all show off their work.

The most amazing part? Thanks to generous donors like you, every class is free!

Preventing, instead of treating, disease

Physicians and other care providers are excited about the Teaching Kitchen because they see how difficult it is for many patients to afford the kind of help they may urgently need from a registered dietitian or nutrition specialist.

“The work registered dietitians usually do, long counseling sessions, is very impactful in managing and treating disease,” says Max. “But often these are not covered by insurance. At the Teaching Kitchen, we offer classes for free, accessible to anyone who eats!”

Although teaching culinary medicine may be new in the health care setting, it is an idea that many — including the world-famous chef, TV personality, and cookbook author Jacques Pépin — have long taken for granted.

Celebrity chef at the Teaching Kitchen stove

Jacques, his son-in-law, Rollie Wesen, CEO of the Jacques Pépin Foundation, and his daughter, Claudine Pépin, President of the Jacques Pépin Foundation, recently spent a day at the Teaching Kitchen filming a cooking demo of a few of Jacques’ favorite recipes. “I don’t stress healthy food,” Jacques says. “People don’t think that will taste good. Food should be good and just happen to be healthy.”

“Jacques has been teaching for decades that cooking at home with your loved ones using whole, healthy, fresh foods will improve your life,” adds Rollie.

That’s what Max and Nate believe too. “After all, we don’t eat nutrients,” says Max. “We eat food. And food is not just for your body, but for your mind, your heart, and your soul.”