FUELING DWYANE
Chef turns NBA star on to healthy eating
S’MORES PANCAKES Makes 4 to 8 servings, to taste
FOR PANCAKES
2 cups white, wholewheat flour 2 teaspoons baking
powder
1 teaspoon baking soda 4 tablespoons cacao powder (this is a healthier option than cocoa)
1 teaspoon salt
1 ½ teaspoons bourbon
vanilla extract 2 tablespoons maple
syrup
2 cups buttermilk
⅔ cup mini chocolate
chips
1 cup medium
marshmallows
1 sheet graham crackers,
crushed
Special Equipment: kitchen torch for marshmallows
FOR CHOCOLATE SYRUP
2 cups honey
1 cup cacao powder 2 cups water 1 teaspoon bourbon
vanilla extract ¼ teaspoon salt
MAKE CHOCOLATE SYRUP
1. Pour honey, cacao, water and salt into a medium saucepan, and cook over high heat stirring until dissolved.
2. Bring mixture to a boil. 3. Lower heat to medium, and simmer, stirring constantly.
4. When the syrup reaches the desired thickness, remove from heat, and stir in vanilla. Allow syrup to cool before use.
MAKE THE PANCAKES 1. Place marshmallows on a parchment paper lined baking sheet. Ignite the torch and move steadily back and forth over the surface of the marshmallow topping until it’s toasted to your satisfaction. If your parchment paper flames up, move the torch and blow out the fire. Reserve until ready to use.
2. Combine all dry ingredients in a medium bowl, and mix well.
3. In a separate bowl, combine all wet ingredients.
4. Make a well in the dry ingredients and pour in the liquid ingredients. Mix just until combined.
5. Fold in chocolate chips.
6. Pour ¼ cup of the pancake batter onto a hot, lightly oiled griddle.
7. Cook for one to two minutes then flip pancakes once air bubbles begin to rise to the surface.
8. Plate hot pancakes, and garnish with graham crackers, toasted marshmallows and chocolate sauce.
When Chef Richard Ingraham talks about NBA star Dwyane Wade’s progress, he’s not referring to the former Miami Heat shooting guard’s dunks. He’s referring to broccoli.
Wade loved his food fried or smothered. His idea of a side dish was gravy. And he loved his lemonade as sweet as possible.
Ingraham, who has worked as the Wade family’s personal chef for the past 12 years, says there came a moment when he felt the need to bring up the veggie topic.
“I was cooking everything, from smothered pork chops to fried chicken. But at some point you have to take responsibility for your clients. I started to have conversations about bringing in more vegetables, less butter. I tried to preach portion size and moderation,” says Ingraham, author of the newly released cookbook “Eating Well to Win: Inspired Living Through Inspired Cooking” (Mango Publishing. $24.95).
A famously picky eater, Wade took some convincing. But Ingraham decided to let his skillet do the preaching.
“He would say certain things he didn’t like, like vegetables and seafood. I saw it as my job to make healthy foods taste good, healthy foods that he was sure to enjoy,” Ingraham says on a recent day by phone from the Wade home in Chicago, just before the family (and the chef himself ) moved to Cleveland for the basketball star’s debut with the Cavaliers.
Something clicked and it clicked early on. In the cookbook’s foreword, Wade thanks Chef “Rich” for helping him “gain a better understanding of food, health and nutrition.” Wade also gave Ingraham this rave blurb: “Chef knows how to incorporate the healthiest foods that will provide me the strength and energy needed when I hit the basketball court.”
That said, Ingraham’s cookbook showcases a range of dishes, from the purely healthful to the outright decadent. (Hello, s’mores and red velvet cupcakes!)
In fact, the chef has received raves for his diverse cooking from Wade’s moviestar wife, Gabrielle Union, who counts on Ingraham to help keep her in shape for her TV (BET’s “Being Mary Jane”) and film roles.
Cooking for A-List celebrities is something that seemed out of reach for a child born in Miami’s Liberty City and raised in hardscrabble Miami Gardens. In fact, cooking was not the first career Ingraham embraced. After attending Florida A&M University in Tallahassee, Ingraham returned to Miami and enrolled in cosmetology school. “I did hair for about eight years,” he says.
But, truth be told, his great love was cooking, and he never looked back when he made the move to Atlanta to attend culinary school. He recalls the feeling as he arrived at the Art Institute of Atlanta:
“I looked through those big windows and saw those students in their white uniforms, cooking. I knew that was the place I needed to be. I signed my life away with all those student loans, but it was worth it,” says Ingraham, who later worked at Atlanta-area restaurants and taught culinary arts to poor students.
When he returned to Miami, he continued to teach the poor, this time at one of the city’s largest homeless shelters. For his work with the underprivileged, Ingraham earned a “Teacher of the Year” award.
It was a confirmation that he should allow the love for cooking he had learned as a child from his mother and grandmother be his path. He kept close the memories of waking at 3 a.m. on