**PLEASE NOTE THIS IS A VIRTUAL PROGRAM THAT WILL TAKE PLACE VIA ZOOM. Registrants will receive a link to access the Zoom Webinar via email.**

Spring is the perfect time to refresh your cooking habits. In this lively and practical online cooking class, culinary medicine educator and chef Christine Van Bloem will demonstrate how to create light, Mediterranean-inspired meals that feel satisfying, seasonal, and completely doable for one or two people.

You’ll learn how to:

• Build a balanced plate using simple Mediterranean principles
• Cook smaller portions without waste or boredom
• Add flavor with herbs, citrus, and healthy fats instead of excess salt
• Feel confident creating fresh dinners that support heart health and overall wellness
• Come cook, learn, and leave inspired to make dinner feel easy again.

Menu:

• Herby Farro & Chickpea Spring Salad
• White Bean, Spinach & Garlic Skillet

About Christine Van Bloem: Christine has been teaching cooking for a long, long time, and she is still excited to cook, teach, and share with you. After surviving a heart attack in 2020 and the loss of her brick & mortar cooking school business, Christine found new purpose cooking for her own empty nest.

Post heart attack, Christine is reforming her butter-loving, heavy cream worshipping ways by making changes to how she cooks--taking things in a healthier direction, without doing a complete 180 and still keeping things flavorful and delightful. The key here is healthier. Christine is not afraid of butter, but she's using a touch instead of stick. A tablespoon or two of cream or half-and-half, not a cup, and so on and so forth. And now that the kids are grown and living lives on their own, Christine is re-learning how to cook for two and sharing that process along the way.

Christine is currently training in culinary nutrition with The American College of Culinary Medicine and has researched The Mediterranean Diet & Menopause for her capstone project.

Made possible by the Friends of Gleason Public Library in cooperation with the Groton Public Library Endowment Trust and other area libraries.

Sign up directly via Zoom HERE!