In honor her new book, Rhonda's Culinary Creations, we asked Hallelujah Acres co-founder Rhonda Malkmus to give us a glimpse into the history of Hallelujah Acres and how her recipe books have become a household standard for everyone on The Hallelujah Diet:
In 1992, when I first started experiencing the great things about The Hallelujah Diet, one of the first things I asked George was, "where are the cookbooks?" There weren’t any. So, I went looking for recipes myself. There was a little vegetarian restaurant down the street and I went there looking for a job as a dishwasher so that I could learn the recipes. About a couple of months after I worked there, I observed enough in the kitchen to know what I was doing. Then the boss came and told me that they were going to close the restaurant. And I thought, this would be perfect! I went and told George and told him that if he and I re-opened that restaurant, he’d have a place to do his seminars and I could prepare the food. So we rented the restaurant. George juiced and waited tables and I did the food prep. Every day, our recipes were different and our food was made from scratch. Some days we would make just a few glasses of vegetable juice. But by the time we closed the restaurant, we were making 100 glasses of juice a day in one little Champion juicer. All the while, the Lord was laying on my heart a burden to write a recipe book of my own. I argued with God — but of course that's a losing battle. Finally, I started writing the book but I asked God for his help. And God has a really funny sense of humor. He’d wake me up in the middle of the night with a recipe, or wait until I was in the shower, or on the phone, or driving the car. And of course it’s really hard to write things down when you’re doing all of those things. So I learned to carry a pad of paper and a pen everywhere I went. That’s how Recipes for Life from God’s Garden got written. It took about 2 ½ years to write and was first published in 1998. When I first started doing culinary classes many years later, I was scared to death! I'd never taught a class before, but God gave me the strength. My first class included 4 recipes. Now, we do 7 to 10 per class. The challenge is to come up with something that tastes really good and is nice to look at – it's important because appetite begins with the eye. That's why I really love this new recipe book; it's filled with gorgeous photos and delicious ideas for The Hallelujah Diet!Be one of the first to get Rhonda's brand new book, Rhonda's Culinary Creations! Order yours here.
What's your favorite Hallelujah Diet recipe of all time? Comment below!
