According to the US Patent Office, the spork- combination plastic spoon, fork, and knife, was born in 1965.  Today, Spork Foods is the name of a Los Angeles-based organic vegan cooking compan operated by two sisters, Jenny and Heather Goldberg.  Together they offer in-person cooking classes in Los Angeles, in-home healthy eating consultations, and recipe development.  And that delectable dish up there?  Fettucini Alfredo with Parmesan Crisps, a Jenny and Heather creation, vegan of course. But if you don’t live in Los Angeles, don’t fret.  Spork Foods also offers, and this super cool, on-line cooking classes!

From Sporkonline.com:

A cooking class featuring a four-course meal built around a specific theme (i.e. Italian, Southern Comfort, Fresh, Fast and Healthy & Sushi Party) will be posted online and available to members once a month.  The classes are filmed with an eclectic group of students (including celebrities, authors, activists, farmers, parents and entrepreneurs) that spark interesting conversation around the dinner table and offer their own expertise.

As a member, you get to watch their conversation unfold! Each month, the site will also offer exclusive bonus classes and recipes that focus on specific holiday and seasonal culinary traditions, all designed to enhance your cooking repertoire.  Members will also have access to archived classes.  We are launching with one of our faves, a Brunch Class – perfect to entertain your out-of-town guests just in time for the holidays!  And in the archive, members will find a Chinese Food Class and an Aphrodisiac Class available immediately.

Along with cooking classes, members will travel with the sisters as they see how vegan food and products are manufactured, meet the faces behind the products, shop for organic goodies and dish the goods with some of their favorite people – celebrity and non-celeb alike! On Sporkonline.com, members will be able to ask Heather and Jenny all of their need-to-know vegan culinary inquiries in the Food 911 page, and they’ll get back to them in writing or via a video short for all members to view.

Sporkonline.com also offers incredible vegan product giveaways and special gifts for members! Sporkonline.com is a membership-based website for anyone who wants to learn how to prepare fun, easy, delicious, vegan recipes – served anytime!  Our classes are shot and edited in HD by professional filmmakers to create a precise, entertaining and engaging experience.

Jenny was trained at the Natural Gourmet Institute for Food and Culinary Arts in New York City and has over five years of professional cooking experience. Her perfume is the scent of freshly baked cinnamon rolls or garlic and onions, depending on the menu for class.

Heather has a decade of experience in the environmental non-profit world and makes a morning smoothie that is so delicious it would make anyone happy to start their day!

I had the opportunity to ask Heather about the sisters’ evolution to veganism.  They both studied Environmental studies in college, and decided then and there to go vegan – forever.

She says,

My sister have always been environmentalists and the more we learned in college about the degradation of the planet being directly tied to the meat and dairy industry, we just knew we didn’t want to participate in it.  I had a Professor named Glenn Fieldman at San Francisco State University that really opened my eyes to this in a class called World Ecological Crisis.  Sis and I also both had vegetarian roomies in college, and we just started asking questions and learning more.  Originally our decision to be vegan was both environmental and political, as the meat and dairy industry is deeply intertwined in politics.  As we got older our reasons have become numerous and branched out to health, preventing pain and suffering of animals, and the reasons discussed above.  I worked for an environmental non-profit organization called TreePeople for 8.5 years.

Personally, I think this is such a fantastic idea for a holiday gift, or any gift really.  I love to cook, I love to hostess- but I know a lot of folks don’t.  I know even more folks who aren’t able to cook even the most basic meals for themselves who could use a bit of help.  And these classes would be perfect for anyone that may not be able to leave their homes to attend classes.  Healthy cooking made accessible to all, supporting a vegan business, supporting other vegans….I love it.

Let me tempt you a little more with another Heather and Jenny creation:

Yup, that’s what I thought too.  Yum.  More information about Sporkonline memberships can be found here:

Give someone special a 6 month or yearly membership, and they'll get new cooking classes every month as well as lifelong skills towards healthy, compassionate cooking!