by Mary Rosewood
Montana is a great place to be, even in winter, but sometimes it’s nice to get away for a bit. How about a quick trip to France to learn about the local food there?
I’ve been spending an hour on Sundays with Katrina Billard in her farmhouse kitchen near Chartres as she teaches via Zoom how to use fresh seasonal ingredients to fashion dishes like Mushroom Bourguignon and Pommes Anna. A sweet touch for the holidays was a challenging Buche de Noel from a recipe passed down from her French husband’s grandmother.
Along with a cooking demonstration, Katrina shares stories about how the French celebrate with food. Her tips include how to adjust ingredients to what you have on hand wherever you are.
Katrina is American, with ties to Montana. When her father was in the Air Force, her family moved to Great Falls, where Katrina attended elementary and middle school. She has happy memories of hiking in Glacier and Yellowstone. “I remember the big beautiful skies and the wide open spaces, the incredible nature,” Katrina told me.
When she was seventeen, Katrina read “Hope’s Edge,” by Frances Moore Lappe and Anna Lappe.
“It lit a fire under me,” Katrina said. “I really got excited about the Edible Schoolyard in Berkeley, California, that was started by Alice Waters. I decided, this is what I want to do with my life.”
Katrina planted her first garden and then helped a local elementary school start one. This first attempt at teaching children about the joy of growing their own food hit a snag. “We put in some plants behind the school, and I was going to come back the next day to put up a fence, but when I got there, the deer and rabbits had eaten everything.”
But gradually her life’s work took shape. In college she studied agriculture, sustainability, and the environment. During a three-month internship to complete her master’s degree, Katrina helped women in Tanzania grow more nutrient dense foods to feed their children.
In Denver, she taught cooking classes through the Slow Food movement, going into classrooms to focus on a national dish, using food from the school garden when possible, and teaching students about the country’s culture.
She taught friends her meal prep shortcuts to reduce food waste, and “that was the birth of the Empowered Kitchen, in 2014, when I started my business.” The “big goal” is to “help people learn to eat healthy meals, enjoy being in the kitchen, and share food.”
Katrina began learning French when she was 13 and said she “felt right at home” when she lived in France during her junior year of college. In 2022, she married a French beekeeper and moved to his family farm, now the headquarters of her food business.
Katrina lives in a mild climate, but she remembers the cold winters of Montana and knows it’s not easy to eat seasonally year round. She suggests buying local foods that store well, like root vegetables, and putting them in a cold area where they won’t freeze.
“I learned from my husband that carrots store well,” she said. “We have a big metal bucket that he fills with sand and puts all the carrots in there, and they last through the winter.”
Also, “I make big batches of pesto in the summer when I have a lot of basil, and I freeze it in ice cubes. Just don’t put the cheese in the pesto since it doesn’t freeze well. I add the parmesan when I heat it to make the dish.”
If you can’t store or preserve food, focus on buying things in season, like those root vegetables, cabbage, and citrus fruits.
“My favorite thing to make in January is a fennel and citrus salad. Shave the fennel and use blood oranges or other oranges and grapefruit, and make a citrusy dressing to put on it.”
Katrina shares her tips for eating well in any season in cooking classes, both in person and online, in French or English. She also uses cooking to teach team-building for nonprofits and companies like Microsoft. This year she’s hosting a retreat near her French farm.
I recommend Katrina’s Cooking Circle, where people around the world meet online to cook seasonally.
“I want to inspire people to get in the kitchen and fall in love with food and flavors and all the good things around food,” Katrina said.
Contact Katrina at katrina@empoweredkitchen.com or visit her website at empoweredkitchen.com.