ABOUT MI
HELLO, NICE TO MEET YOU!It has taken me a while to arrive at food, but I know exactly when things started. Growing up during the Soviet era of scarcity, I found myself helping my grandparents with running their self-sustained farm. It was hard work, but unbeknown to me it was profoundly informative. I have witnessed first hand the way rennet works on milk, how salt cures pork, and how fermentation transforms vegetables. Most importantly, I experienced the origins of food and gained an immense appreciation of what is involved in putting it on the table.
Fast forward to my student years, I am living in UK where the variety, beauty and eccentricity of dishes and ingredients flares my curiosity in food even with greater vigour. Here, I launch into tasting and cooking everything with an insatiable enthusiasm so much so that my friends suggest that I should take part in a popular programme at the time called ‘Come, Dine with Me’. I wish I did, but other things kept me busy like writing a PhD thesis in the field of learning and development resulting in a 15 year long career.
One day, seeking change and challenge, I have decided to fulfil my inquisitiveness and enrolled in a chef’s training program in France. This was a game changer. The training was as much about building flavour as it was about understanding why we engage in cooking. The program shone a spotlight onto the sensory experiences, and taught me how to be intuitive and creative in the kitchen. At the same time, it was the stage for contemplating the greater significance of food and cooking, that left me equally mesmerised.
This interest in flavour and philosophy I now carry into my daily work. I am a believer that food is a conduit to the physical, psychological and social well-being at the individual level, and simultaneously it is a powerful instrument of economic, environment and political comfort of the humanity at large. The key is in knowledge and in understanding how we can harness these powers. With my work, that among other things includes writing, speaking, and training, I aspire to bring about this knowledge in a structured, informative and fun way.
LEARNING
PRODUCTS-
a menu of food-themed leadership workshops
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interactive and intellectual learning spaces on food for general public
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series of practicums for high school students where food meets science and big ideas.
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a space for bespoke content and personal epicurean notes
Ready to debate, discuss and learn about food.
Explore the learning products or talk to me.
“The only thing
I like better
than talking about food
is eating.”
Spoken by John Walters and shared by MI