When food travels more than 50 miles in refrigerated trucks, it tends to lose some of the nutrients that our bodies need.
At her recent culinary show at Macy’s at Herald Square, Whitelaw made tomato and corn salad for her audience. In order to pick the tomatoes, she travelled all the way from her home in Morristown, NJ, to Lancaster, PA, because heavy rain has affected the tomato crops in NJ.
“I live in New Jersey and California and you have so many farm stands that you can go to different towns everyday almost and find these fresh fruits and vegetables,” she said. “So that’s the delicious part of it.”
Path to Becoming a Chef
Chef Melody grew up in southern California, where her family picked vegetables right out of their backyard garden to make dinner.
“I really learned cooking with my father and my grandmother. They just taught me how to cook delicious food—real food,” said Whitelaw, who began making pancakes and French toasts since five years old. “When I was a little girl, they didn’t give me dolls. They gave me stoves and cash registers for Christmas.”
She eventually graduated from University of California at Los Angeles with a bachelor degree in nutrition and is currently the owner of the Main Event by Melody, and Kids’ Green Kitchen, a program designed to teach children how to cook healthy meals and snacks.
