About Chef Kirsten!

Chef Kirsten Helle Personal Chef Nutrition Constulant Lifestyle and weight management specialist1 About Chef Kirsten!

First of all, thank you for checking out my site!

Here is some information about me, about my 100 pound weight loss, my business and my beautiful kids, family, friends and blessed life.

My healthy living philosophy: Eat real food that nourishes and enjoy every bite. Eat proper portions for MY body, not what a program tells me to. No foods are off limits, just limit the amounts to special occasions when there is much life AROUND the table. Make every choice in perfect alignment with my goal of living today for a healthy tomorrow. Bring life TO the family table as often as possible. Enjoy food…it is a gift. Educate myself. Enjoy the process of nourishing. Move my body more and find the fun in it. Honor my body…it is the only place I have to live. Create a healthy new family legacy!

I love food…everything about food. Planning menu’s, shopping for food and kitchen wares, reading about food, developing recipes, cooking and eating! I believe food is a gift, we should enjoy it! Making other people happy with the food I cook makes me happy. I grew up in a family that loves food also. My dad makes homemade pepperoni, sausage and jerky and did catering when I was younger. He was always making his pepperoni on the weekends or canning the vegetables he grew in his great little garden. The weekends he wasn’t cooking we were usually travelling around to ethnic stores in the Seattle area and trying new foods.

We usually picked up at least one new and unusual food to try. My dad cooked dinner from time to time also, his food was always a product of throwing this or that into the pan and seeing what came out…it was always delicious, sometimes we didn’t have any idea what it was, but it was good! My mom was a good cook too, she did the majority of the cooking in the house, some of my favorites from her are her fried chicken, homemade pasta with Alfredo sauce and spaghetti with meat sauce. I thank my parents for always having a healthy dinner on the table and exposing us to new food cultures. We spent many weekends on the coast catching our own crabs and digging for clams. For so many people, these kinds of foods are a luxury…for the price of a license we caught our limits and feasted until we couldn’t eat another bite! It was glorious, these are some of the fondest memories of my childhood. We were taught to eat what was put in front of you, if you didn’t you weren’t going to eat. I appreciate that and I try to do the same for my children, I don’t allow them to be picky eaters, they have to try everything. We were not health conscious though, my dad grew up on a farm and dieting was not something that anyone ever did, you just eat! My mom was naturally very thin and didn’t have to worry about portion sizes. We had processed foods around a lot, things like chips and cookies, bagels. I was not blessed with my mother’s high metabolism though, and I stayed chubby through school.

I was married and had a daughter when I was 22. I started experimenting in the kitchen more, not just following recipes when I was cooking dinner. Cooking became a hobby, and I was good at it. We ate a lot of food. I baked cinnamon rolls and bread and made two different kinds of lasagna in one night, experimented with new cookie recipes, would go on a mission to learn everything I could about a specific ethnic cuisine and proceed to cook practically every recipe from that culture until I knew it like the back of my hand.

My daughter was about 3 when I hit my all time high weight. I was overweight most of my life, even obese starting in high school, but now I was over 100 pounds overweight. I was having trouble fitting into my pants. I was very unhappy about how I looked, although I carried my weight evenly distributed and didn’t look like I weighed as much as I did, I knew the number. Everyone always told me I was pretty, but I didn’t feel that way. I wasn’t able to wear the nice clothes I wanted to wear, didn’t feel comfortable in a crowd and started becoming more and more inactive. I didn’t have a lot of energy, I could barely get off of the couch to play with my daughter. I saw my family members around me struggling with weight related health issues and I was following right along with that family tradition. I had high blood pressure, high cholesterol, was pre-diabetic and the picture of UN-health.

I was tired of dreaming about doing things my weight was holding me back from doing. I didn’t want to die younger than I should because of a lack of self control. Most importantly I didn’t want my daughter to struggle with her weight, live a life less than she deserved, or for me to be personally responsible for her not living as long as she should. I knew I had to create a new healthy family legacy, starting that very day. No more diets. No more waiting until I hit a certain weight to be considered healthy. Every single day I was going to live a healthy life, that was it!

I started my personal chef business, Chef On The Run Personal Chef Service, about this time. I had been studying and planning starting my own business for several years and started the business part time. I had more people requesting healthy meals so I decided to study nutrition so I could have the knowledge necessary to create their meals. What a wakeup call! I learned about proper portion sizes, vitamins, nutrients and that the processed foods many American’s rely on do nothing for our bodies! I took some fitness classes as well and started to simply move my body more. I began shedding some weight and lost about 50 pounds, then found out I was pregnant with my beautiful son. I kept exercising during the pregnancy and didn’t eat for two, now that I knew I didn’t need to, and the day after I had him I weighed what I did at the beginning of the pregnancy. I lost the remaining 50 pounds (100 pounds total)! and I have kept it off for 6 years now. I now love exercise, it is a part of my routine and my body craves it 5 days a week, at least. I continue to strive to learn more everyday about nutrition and keeping our diets about 90% “clean”.

After I had my son I ran my business part time and eventually started doing a lot of catering. My business was growing, becoming very successful. Right about that time I made the decision to get divorced. My 10 year marriage had been abusive but it was becoming more so and started affecting my children. I had to get us out. I made the jump with a prayer and hope and faith that it would be okay.

The next couple of years are like a blur. I was raising two kids on my own, and during that time also started raising my 16 year old niece who was in foster care, she had her own infant daughter. I had to make the decision to put my dream on hold, running Chef On The Run. I had to take a job I couldn’t refuse that offered secure pay and benefits. There were days in the very beginning where I went without a meal so my kids could eat, had 2 hours of sleep while I worked two jobs, had nights staying awake to figure out a way to get winter coats for my kids because the weather was cooling off and I only had prayers and faith to keep me confident that things would get better. They quickly did, I have an amazing family and network of friends to thank for helping us through those hard times…I have a lot of pride and didn’t want to ask for help but when I truly needed it they were there for me. I believe I was put through these times to show me what it is like to be without.

Now I have the utmost compassion for hunger related issues and I strive to do whatever I can to help. You never know what it is like until you’ve been there. Above all I am so grateful for everything we do have. Things were starting to be good, I received great promotions and we were doing really well. Everyone was fed well, doing well in school, had clothes on their backs and I felt really proud of my little family, we were doing it on our own!

Something was missing though. I dreamed about starting my business back up someday, maybe when I was ready to retire. About this time I met an amazing man who turned my world upside down and encouraged me to pursue my dreams. I made another huge jump in life guided by prayers and hope and faith. I re-launched Chef On The Run again and this time I was determined to make it a full time pursuit. I started dreaming bigger.

I didn’t want to just be a personal chef, I also wanted to do what I dreamed of doing: helping other families create healthy legacies of their own, to break the cycle of diet related disease. I hope to inspire you to bring life to your table!

I am a mom to two beautiful kids, ages 11 and 7. They are energetic and sassy and I love everything about them and pray that the “challenges” they give me, although a pain in my rear now, are merely shaping them into the wonderful adults they will become and will serve them well in the future. They love healthy food, love growing their own food and exploring cuisine from other cultures. They are my guinea pigs and sometimes just want a day to eat junk food….they go to Grandma and Poppy’s for that. My kids both enjoy being in the kitchen also, my son especially. He usually has a hand in most of the meals we eat at home. He’s a great little sous chef! I have an amazing boyfriend whom I can’t imagine life without. He inspired me to go after my dreams. He is smart and motivated and a huge source of inspiration. I am a sister and friend and my favorite thing to do is spend time with my friends and family.

photo 4 4 About Chef Kirsten!

We enjoy camping, boating and water sports, golf, football and tailgating, trying new adventures, dancing, learning about and drinking wine, enjoying amazing meals at fabulous restaurants and just living a vibrant, energetic life. I love to laugh. I want to spend more time in the future on charity functions and doing my part to help alleviate the hunger problem in our own backyard. I want to have an amazing garden again someday and be blessed enough to have the space and time to donate much of what we grow to those in need. I am thankful for every blessing and challenge I have been given.

I LOVE:

Giving back – I donate 10% of all of my monthly online profits to various charities, namely the American Heart Association. When you purchase my menu plans or services, you’re giving too!
Balance – no “you can’t have this, you have to do this.”
Ice cream – have to have it every once in awhile and enjoy without any guilt!
Simple pasta dishes – Carbonara, salsa cruda, anchovy, garlic and parmesan, mmmm! Again, once in a while I indulge- guilt free!
Stinky food – cheese, kimchi, pickles….the stinkier the better!
Creating amazing meals that are healthy that I enjoy as much as those I love to indulge in!
Really, really good beer – otherwise it’s red wine for me.
Celebrating with family and friends over an amazing meal – nibbling our way through the day celebrating all things delicious.
Showing people that you can lose a significant amount of weight and live a healthy lifestyle WHILE being able to enjoy the pleasure of food WITHOUT weight loss surgery!You can read more about my personal philosophy on food, family meals, creating new legacies for our families HERE.