Alice Louise Karow

Alice Louise Karow

About

Alice Louise Karow is a former personal chef and wine consultant turned food writer. She has a passion for conscious cooking, making meals healthy, convenient and delicious.

As a Let's Move chef, Alice offers her guidance to a local elementary school under Michelle Obama's program to alleviate childhood obesity.

She has also partnered with Lean and Green Kids, a nonprofit helping to promote plant based options in school lunch programs and teaching kids and their parents about healthy food.

She writes occasional reviews for SanDiegoRestaurants.com and is the San Diego Food Examiner for Examiner.com. She is also founder of OneTalkTranscription.com supporting authors including Eckhart Tolle, James Ray, Anthony Robbins and David Morehouse and a member of Publishers and Writers of San Diego.

Learning to Breathe Fire: The Rise of CrossFit and the Primal Future of Fitness

Learning to Breathe Fire: The Rise of CrossFit and the Primal Future of Fitness

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Description

<p><b>The absorbing, definitive account of CrossFit's origins, its explosive grassroots growth, and its emergence as a global phenomenon.</b><br /> <br />One of the most illuminating books ever on a sports subculture, <i>Learning to Breathe Fire </i>combines vivid sports writing with a thoughtful meditation on what it means to be human. In the book, veteran journalist J.C. Herz explains the science of maximum effort, why the modern gym fails an obese society, and the psychic rewards of ending up on the floor feeling as though you're about to die. <br /> <br />The story traces CrossFit’s rise, from a single underground gym in Santa Cruz to its adoption as the workout of choice for elite special forces, firefighters and cops, to its popularity as the go-to fitness routine for regular Joes and Janes. Especially riveting is Herz’s description of The CrossFit Games, which begin as an informal throw-down on a California ranch and evolve into a televised global proving ground for the fittest men and women on Earth, as well as hundreds of thousands of lesser mortals. <br /> <br />In her portrayal of the sport's star athletes, its passionate coaches and its “chief armorer,” Rogue Fitness, Herz powerfully evokes the uniqueness of a fitness culture that  cultivates primal fierceness in average people. And in the shared ordeal of an all-consuming workout, she unearths the ritual intensity that's been with us since humans invented sports, showing us how, on a deep level, we're all tribal hunters and first responders, waiting for the signal to go all-out. </p>

Story Behind The Book

In 2000, I started my own business as a personal chef. Within a few years, it became clear that people really needed my help on a grand scale! I was astonished by the number of adults I met who could not cook at all! How did they survive?! The idea for a cook book came from my experiences with clients and also from my investigation into what makes a fulfilling lifestyle of health and happiness. Many people who consider themselves to be spiritual, negate the physical realm and neglect their physical bodies. Your body is sacred space - and without it you don't get to experience this existence, so it is important to care for it well! Of course, what you eat is central to your health, but your physical activity, your daily habits, your thoughts and emotional patterns and your spiritual beliefs all weave together to create your total wellbeing, your daily experience of being alive. Rather than create a new fad diet, I pulled my favorite recipes in all categories so that no matter where you start - if you're eating meat, vegetarian, vegan, raw foods - you'll find easy, delicious ways to make your diet just a little bit healthier. And, yes, there’s a whole chapter of sweet, healthy desserts! What’s interesting though is that it takes more than a recipe to make a great cook. The same attitudes that create a healthy lifestyle also create a healthy cook! Cooking from your heart is all about enjoying the process, appreciating the sensual joys of creating a great meal, tuning in and being present with the act of preparing the food, knowing your ingredients and also fully embodying your role in caring for the people you’re cooking for. Tuning in with even greater attention means knowing where your ingredients come from and how the growing, packaging and marketing impact our environment, which is really just our extended physical body. You begin to see the complete circle and the interconnectedness of all life on the planet. What you put into your body becomes what you express in the world around you and vice versa, what is put into the environment becomes what you eat, drink and breathe, think, feel. This is a book that was meant to be. I had accumulated a treasure trove of recipes and stories from my years as a personal chef, cooking for clients, doing recipe demos and teaching classes. When a friend finally pinned me down and said, &quot;When would (now) be a good time to write your book?!&quot; it clicked. I consciously decided it was time to put it all together and when I went home, I jotted down a few ideas before going off to bed. However, as soon as I put my head down on the pillow to go to sleep, I got a great idea, so I flipped on the light and wrote it down and went back to bed. Not so fast! Another idea! So, I got up and wrote that one down... and it went like that all night. The moment I started to drift off to sleep, another thought, story, recipe popped up and I had to write it down before I forgot it. By morning, I was actually energized by all the great ideas and I knew this was a book that was meant to be. It would serve to enlighten so many people about how to improve their health, how to stop making mistakes they didn't realize they were making, how to bring their lives in alignment with the happiness they were meant to feel every day. I felt guided during the writing process; any time I needed more information, I found it easily. I consider the whole project to be a blessing and a gift!

Reviews

<p class="MsoNormal">&quot;This is more than just a cook book; it's a fabulous book!&quot; -Loren Slocum, author of <em>The Greatest Love </em>and <em>Life Tuneups</em>.<br /><br /> &quot;While Alice draws on hard science as the basis for her recipes, this book is easy to read and the recipes are easy to prepare, proving that transforming your health for the better can be a fun and delicious experience! ...a beautiful book, highly informative and a joy to read!&quot; -Udo Erasmus, author of <em>Fats that Heal: Fats that Kill</em><br /><br /> &quot;The recipes are presented from a point of view which reinforces the emerging paradigm that recognizes our connection to all life and our responsibility to care for ourselves, for one another and for the living planet which itself is an extension of our physical bodies, emotions and our spiritual awareness. (Alice) adds a spirit of compassion and joyfulness to the act of cooking and eating that makes the transformation complete!&quot; -David A. Morehouse, PhD, author of <em>Psychic Spy </em>and <em>Remote Viewing: The Complete User's Manual for Coordinate Remote Viewing</em>.</p><p class="MsoNormal">&quot;A beautiful coffee-table book on intuitive cooking and eating.&quot; -Bookbuzzr</p><p class="MsoNormal"></p>