A Week of Dinners: Alexa Arnold

Alexa Arnold is the Deputy Director of Strategy and Partnerships at FoodCorps, a nonprofit that connects kids to healthy food at school. Her work focuses on improving the health and sustainability of school meal programs across the country, advocating for policy change, and helping kids learn about and build great relationships with food. She lives in a plant-filled apartment in Brooklyn with her husband and enjoys pottery in her free time.

Alexa is one of the most talented home cooks I know, so I thrilled when she agreed to share her weeknight dinners with us! Here, she shares her favorite green sauce, go-to pizza crust recipe, how intuitive eating has had a profound impact on her relationship with food, and more…

What have you been cooking lately? Are you making anything on repeat right now?

I’ve been making a bunch of pizzas during the quarantine because they’re an easy fridge-cleanout kind of meal, and during this time of isolation, I’ve been looking for simple meals that don’t ask for a lot of my mental energy. Assembling ingredients onto a pizza after a long day on Zoom feels almost meditative, like an opportunity to stop thinking altogether and just operate on autopilot. It’s about all I can handle after having been extremely focused on work and spending whatever energy I have left on trying not to think too much about the horrific events unfolding all over my city.

Making pizzas during the pandemic has been a source of comfort and familiarity, though the entire process really has me longing for the normalcy of last spring – when the Grand Army Plaza Greenmarket was bustling with mask-free people and filled to the brim with produce. After picking up what I needed, I’d spend the day drinking wine in Prospect Park with friends, who’d all stumble back to my apartment to enjoy a few homemade pizzas – as was our tradition, though we hadn’t ever called it that. It might be a while until we get to have a day like that again, so until then, quarantine pies will have to do.

We’ve also been making lots of pizzas these days. I’m excited to give Alexandra’s crust recipe a try! Any other go-to’s you’ve been loving lately?

I’ve been having a love affair with NYT’s olive-oil granola for a while now, a recipe that’s been passed around my office for years. Once you get the base down, it’s the perfect palate for experimenting — the recipe calls for apricots and pistachios, but I’ve had a lot of fun with whatever dried fruit and nuts I have on hand. Right now, pecans and hazelnuts are in my heavy rotation!

And in terms of go-to recipes, I like to make a lot of herby sauces and nutty, crunchy salads. Lately, I’ve been having a real go with Bon Appetit’s green sauce no. 4, which I’ve been piling on “loaded” sweet potatoes with black beans, pickled red onions, and feta.

How have the fundamentals of intuitive eating affected your relationship with food?

Years ago, when I was early in my recovery from an eating disorder and still focused on eating “perfectly healthy,” I tried to get on the meal prep train. I’d cook big batches of stews or salads or other meals, only to find myself feeling sick of — yet obligated to eat — one particular meal for multiple days in a row. 

Cooking this way made it tough to tune into my body’s hunger cues and a more intuitive way of eating — an approach to food and health that I’ve been living by for the last few years since recovering. Intuitive eating has nothing to do with diets, meal plans, or rigid rules, and has everything to do with trusting your hunger and healing your relationship with food.

Relearning to eat outside of diet mentality has been a pretty revolutionary experience for me. I’m much more aware of what and how much I like to eat on any given day (which, it turns out, is different every day – hence why eating the same thing every day wasn’t working for me), and I feel much less guilt and much more creativity in the kitchen. 

One of the things I’ve realized works great for me is to keep around ingredients with lots of flavor, texture, and customization options so that I have whatever I need to whip up a bunch of different types of meals. I always try to have a few of the following around – herbs (parsley and cilantro), nuts and their butters (pecans, pepitas, hazelnuts, cashews, tahini), acids (lemons, limes, different kinds of vinegar), cheeses (always feta, usually something interesting from the farmers market), and greens and crunchy vegetables, which I switch up depending on what’s in season — kale, arugula, carrots, celery, snap peas, squash. 

I also always have a cabinet full of oils, dried beans and spices, different types of grains, and canned tomatoes. I guess that sounds like a fairly stocked pantry! But having all of these options on hand makes it so much easier for me to decide on the spot what I’m hungry for and what sounds good, without thinking too much about planning and prepping. Pasta with yogurt, feta, and peas? Check. Shakshuka with crusty bread? Got all I need. A big grainy salad with toasted nuts and a bunch of herbs? Easy.

Okay, and for a really important question: What’s your favorite thing to snack on right now?

While grocery stores are crowded and shelves are empty (especially the flour aisle), I’ve been making weekly trips to the Sunday farmers market in my neighborhood to stock up on this perfect, seedy, dense loaf from my favorite bakery (which also operates the restaurant Runner & Stone in Gowanus – once it reopens, the eggplant crostini is a MUST TRY). I haven’t had it in me to venture into sourdough land, so I’ve been living on this bread during the quarantine. A slice, toasted, with a schmear of high-quality butter and sea-salt feels like a really nice gift to myself.

Thanks so much, Alexa! Everything looks beyond delicious!

P.S. What’s the best meal you’ve ever had?

(Photos courtesy of Alexa Arnold.)