Gia's Italian Kitchen's Podcast
Remember how you used to have Sunday dinners with family? Let's talk about Italian food and everything around it. From interviews with experts to my cooking episodes to little recipes to travel tips...my podcast starts to bring us back to those Sunday dinner memories.
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Gia's Italian Kitchen's Podcast
Episode 3.18 - What is the ACS Hope Lodge?
I am so honored and blessed to collaborate with the American Cancer Society in Iowa City, IA. The Hope Lodge invited me to provide cooking classes and nutritional information to the patients and their families, in their beautiful dining and kitchen space. I started with some protein packed boneless, skinless chicken breasts and made 3 dinners for them. Check out the flyer handout and my full class packet on my website, link below.
The American Cancer Society Hope Lodge program provides a free home away from home for cancer patients and their caregivers. More than just a roof over their heads, it’s a nurturing community that helps patients access the care they need. Each Hope Lodge community offers a supportive, homelike environment where guests can share a meal, join in the evening’s activities, or unwind in their own private room. Patients staying at a Hope Lodge must be in active cancer treatment.
Learn more about the Hope Lodge - https://www.cancer.org/support-programs-and-services/patient-lodging/hope-lodge/iowa-city.html
Class packet on my website: https://giasitaliankitchen.biz/events
Visit our YouTube channel to see dozens of our cooking episodes.
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Hey, this is Kelly with Gia's Italian Kitchen. Thoughts of the day are about the Hope Lodge in Iowa City. So if you've heard about the Ronald McDonald House, that is down at the University of Iowa and most cities have these is down at the University of Iowa and most cities have these. I actually stayed at one many, many years ago near the Children's Memorial Hospital in downtown Chicago. So if one of your kids, one of the children, has cancer or probably some other disease as well I'm not sure if it's just cancer and you live so far away from your house and you're coming in for treatment, you and your family can stay at the Ronald McDonald House. So the Hope Lodge in Iowa City is right next door to the Ronald McDonald House and that is for adult patients and their families to stay if they're getting treatment at the University of Iowa hospitals and clinics. So a friend of a friend connected me to the Hope Lodge, which is funded in part by the American Cancer Society. So I'm super, super excited to be collaborating with the Hope Lodge and the American Cancer Society. I will be doing some cooking classes down at the Hope Lodge for the patients and their families and some prep cooking and some nutritional information about eating healthier. Of course, I am not a doctor and I am not, you know, specialized in any sort of cancer specific nutrition, but I can speak to nutrition and, um, you know, healthy substitutes that are going to be better for your body uh, than, uh, a lot of the crap that we eat and processed foods, et cetera. So I'm super, super excited to bring what knowledge I do have and some some easy prep cooking and meal samplings for for these patients and their families. So I hope to be starting that in the next month or two.
Speaker 1:Um had a tour and it's just, it's an amazing facility, huge kitchen, so I think it'll be a perfect, a perfect combo. So why is it a perfect combo? So when I was a kid, I had childhood cancer and I'm obviously fine now. I get my checkups every one or two years with my oncologist, but I had a, you know, horrible experience, obviously when I was younger and had two years of chemo. So that sucked Very vivid memories of that childhood experience and went down to Children's Memorial in Chicago.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so it's very near and dear to my heart that this collaboration is happening because it's bringing together my passion for cooking and Italian cooking and education, nutrition and my other I wouldn't say passion, but certainly focus in my life is and softness in my heart for cancer patients, especially childhood cancer patients. So I'm just really honored that I'm going to be able to to do this at the Hope Lodge. So just wanted to chat a little bit about that and get my thoughts out there, because I've been thinking about this and now I'm trying to figure out how to develop some meal plans and recipes and some nutritional information that I can share with the patients and you know, like making some note cards or some easy cheat sheets that I can leave with them as as reference guide. So More to come on that. I guess what else is happening.
Speaker 1:So I'm also writing a cookbook that is going to be a cookbook memoir and now even more so that. But the cookbook memoir part is my childhood cancer journey and how my relationship with my grandmother and, of course, my family, but my grandmother in particular. I was just really close with her and I think the cancer you know she really took me into her heart and our relationship developed even more so as I grew up. You know, just a typical Italian family you're in the kitchen anyway, but I spent a lot of just one-on-one time with her as well, to learn her recipes and just spend time with my grandma. I loved her so much, nonoini.
Speaker 1:So this book is the cookbook memoir of the cancer journey, my relationship with my grandma, how this passion morphed into Gia's Italian Kitchen, with recipes weaved into these chapters from cooking with Gia's Italian Kitchen and recipes from my grandmother. So I'm so excited for this book and of course it's going to have beautiful pictures because I insist on a good cookbook must have amazing pictures. I, when I'm in the store and I pick up a cookbook and there's no or few pictures, I don't even, I don't even care what's in it, I just put it down. I don't even want it. So it will have beautiful color photos in it as well. So hopefully going to get a publisher in the next year.
Speaker 1:I need an agent, publisher, editor, all that good stuff. So if you know of anyone, send me a message. I would love to get connected. That seems to be how the world goes around, right? It's connections, not necessarily what you know, but who you know. So definitely would appreciate any connections you have on that front so I can get this cookbook memoir published in the next year or two. So again, thanks for listening and or reading wherever. If you're on my blog or podcast, super excited. Shout out to Jenna and Shelly at the Hope Lodge and the American Cancer Society. Thank you so much for this opportunity. I'm really, really excited to get started. So let's get cooking. Talk to you soon, bye, bye.