b"Chef Veggie's Pacific Rim-inspired dishes include ginataang kalabasa, a Filipino coconut milk stew dish; and taro Spam musubi (below), featuring plant-based Spam.Chef VeggieAustin, Texaschefveggie.comFamilies are also the prime demographic for Cristina Carolan. As an in-demand plant-based personal chef, she starts with grocery shopping for her client, incorporating local ingredients. Then Ill come to your home with my equipment, prepare the meals, package and label them, leave them neatly in your fridge or freezer, and do the all the cleanup, she says.Like other plant-based professionals, her strategy rests on big flavors. A chef who loves colorful, vibrant dishes with lots of vegetables, Carolan says, I think a secret to it is that you have to have great sauces. Like if youre doing a barbecue tofu, I think the sauces make a really big difference. Especially for people who are not used to plant-based foods, she advises retaining fats whenever possible. That is really going to bring out the flavor for a lot of food, she says. If you make everything low fatjust use lemon juice on a salad, with no olive oil and no nutsit could be really unsatisfying for people who are brand-new to this.Carolan is currently working on a cookbook called Plant-Based Pacific. Its going to feature plant-based recipes from Japan, Hawaii and the Philippines, she says. My mom is from the Philippines, so thats part of my cultural heritage. And I lived in Japan for most of my childhood.While her clients have different motivations, from animal welfare to sustainability to health, Carolan says convenience is also key: Families enjoy having something that they can heat up really easily, like lasagna. In addition, notes Carolan, I think most families want comforting foods, but they also want their kids to eat vegetables. So, soups are great. Stews are great. A lot of families want to introduce their kids to food from different cultures So usually when I create menus for families, I will include those types of dishes. And a lot of times they will be adventurous and try something for the week to see if maybe their kids would try it, and maybe they will like it. That always makes me feel excited! PHOTOS BY CRISTINA CAROLANCATERING, FOODSERVICE & EVENTS cfe-news.com49"