Fit Foodie Blogger We Love: Lori Rice of Fake Food Free

Last week we featured the fabulous Lori Rice of the super awesome (and natural!) food blog Fake Food Free over on FBG as one of our fave fit bloggers. And today, we’re chatting Lori up some more about her blog, her favorite healthy eats and the food she most wishes she could magically make healthy!

Q&A With Lori Rice of Fake Food Free

When and why did you start your blog? I started my food blog in May of 2008 while we were living abroad in Brazil. It began as a spin-off of my expat blog I started in 2007. After several years of working in nutrition, exercise and public health, my food views were beginning to change. The source of my food was becoming much more important to me along with exploring culture through food. The blog started as somewhat of a nutrition platform, but now it’s evolved into a creative platform for developing real food recipes, food photography and exploring the world through food culture.
How did you come up with the name of your blog? The concept of fake food is something that I talked about often with a good friend who I worked with in public health. As I became more interested and determined in reducing processed (fake) foods, fake food free seemed to fit. The extended title, real food from every corner of the world, came to be when I closed out my expat blog and began including food and travel recaps on FFF.
What’s the most misunderstood thing about your blog or healthy blogging in general? My definition of healthy. A lot of people see the title of my blog and automatically assume my eating style is vegetarian, vegan, raw, gluten-free, 100-percent organic or any number of labels that they associate with health. I tend to lose some readers when I start posting about bone marrow or defending different types of agriculture. I think my About This Blog page sums up my philosophy pretty well.
What’s your favorite post and why? Any of my posts that recap food combined with travel. Those times when I’ve experienced something out of my comfort zone. They aren’t always past examples of my best writing or best photos, but they are definitely my most memorable experiences.

• Feasting for Hours: Rijsttafel in Ubud-Bali
• Lunch on the Elephant Trail
• Finally Feijoada
• Foods of Minas Gerais
• Two of Our Favorite Things: Kaya and Sup Tulang

What is your favorite healthy meal? Just about anything topped with a well-cooked poached egg, especially roasted potatoes and sauteed greens.
If you could only eat three things for the rest of your life, what would they be? Pizza (I’m seriously addicted to pizza of every kind), Asian noodle dishes (ramen, pho), and then peanut butter and blueberries would be at a neck-and-neck tie.
What’s the one kitchen appliance or utensil that you couldn’t live without? My microplane. Garlic, onion, parm, citrus zest … I use it every day and no other tool does what it does.
What’s the weirdest thing you’ve ever eaten? Looking back, really all the fat-free, no-sugar fake stuff I used to eat is what I should be defining as weird. But when it comes to things that often get a look of shock from others, it’s sup tulang at a hawker in Singapore (link above). It’s mutton bones cooked in an amazing red gravy. You suck the marrow from the bones.
If you could make one unhealthy food magically healthy, what would you choose? Sweetened condensed milk. I rarely touched it until we started traveling more, and I realized how prominent it is in Brazil and some Asian countries. Desserts, coffee, alcoholic drinks, straight from the can — that stuff is so good.
Okay, so clearly I need to try sup tulang! Thanks for the fab Q&A Lori. Now, what’s the weirdest thing YOU have eaten? (Snackwells come to my mind … haha!) —Jenn