My Nguyen - My Healthy Dish: More Than 85 Fresh & Easy Recipes for the Whole Family

Copyright 2016 by My Nguyen

Photographs copyright 2016 by My Nguyen unless otherwise noted

Photographs on by Tuan Nguyen, TNPhotography

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available on file.

Cover design by Laura Klynstra

Cover photo credit author and Tuan Nguyen, TN Photography

Print ISBN: 978-1-5107-0343-8

Ebook ISBN: 978-1-5107-0344-5

Printed in China

This book is dedicated to my very patient husband, Harlen, and my heart and soul, Shayna and Kiera. I wouldnt be the woman I am today without their love and support.

CONTENTS

MY STORY

Excuse me, are you My Healthy Dish ? Thats a common question I get asked these days when I leave the house. I know its odd to say, but its one of my biggest accomplishmentsnot to be referred to as My Nguyen. Dont get me wrong; I love my given name and I am very proud to be a Nguyen. The accomplishment Im referring to is being recognized as My Healthy Dish , a screen name I gave myself on Instagram. A social media account that I single-handedly grew to over one million followers in less than two years launched a career for me I didnt know was possible. I did it from sharing my passion for food, cooking, health, and my life. How it all came to be was a simple act of fate.

I was born in Vietnam in 1980. From there, I immigrated to the United States when I was three, went to school, graduated college with a Communications degree, worked a desk job in mortgage financing, married my college boyfriend, and bought our first house. As a first-generation immigrant, I believed in the American Dream, something instilled in me from my parents. I was unhappy at my job, but I accepted this as the norm because, honestly, who likes to work? Work was not meant to be fun, right? I knew I wasnt the only one looking forward to 5 p.m. on Fridays and dreading 8 a.m. on Mondays. It wasnt until I lost my job that I realized there was something seriously wrong simply accepting this line of thinking.

Being set free from my job was like being freed from a prison of my own making. At first, I woke up every morning feeling lost. I had relearn myself and figure out what made me tick. To be honest, it was quite depressing because I had forgotten what made me happy. After years at a job I hated, I had nothing that brought me joy. I had a big, five-bedroom house for only the two of us, a collection of Louis Vuitton purses I wore to be envied, a 1.5-carat diamond ring that cost my husband six months of pay, a Mercedes in my driveway, and a closet full of designer clothes and shoes. Thats what I thought made me happy, but I was delusional. I hated my job, and I had bought all those things to justify working there. I always thought that work was something we had to do and our passions were our hobbies. Turns out, losing my job gave me the freedom to pursue my passion. My motivator this time was not money, but happiness.

In 2007, my husband, Harlen, and I bought our first house, and in 2008, we lost our jobs and the house, got pregnant with twins, and moved in with my parents! As bad as that sounds, looking back, it was the best thing that ever happened to us. You see, after years of trying to get pregnant and suffering a heartbreaking miscarriage, we were blessed with twins. I had been working sixty hours a week and had been under an extreme amount of stress because of it. Being unemployed and having nothing better to do than make babies, we got pregnant in no time at all. My husband eventually went back to work before Shayna and Kiera were born, and we decided it was best for me to stay at home with the girls. I traded in the Mercedes for a used Chevy Malibu, sold what we could, and stored the rest until we were back on our feet.

Still, the needs of growing babies took a financial toll on us. By the time the twins were three, getting a job weighed heavily on my mind. I wanted to help provide for my family, but I couldnt stand the idea of leaving them. Buying us some time, I held a garage sale to get rid of all the girls baby stuff. We made so much money, we decided to join the twenty-first century and trade in our Razor flip phones for iPhones. As Im technically challenged, it was really hard for my husband to convince me to get them, but Im sure glad I did. The iPhone turned out to be the answer to my prayers.

Who ever thought that phones were for more than just for phone calls? Did you know you have more technology in the palm of your hand than NASA had for their first shuttle launch? With the world at my fingertips, I did what any normal human being would do: I downloaded Angry Birds and Instagram. I was instantly hooked, not on the mean birds, but on IG. Being Asian, its intrinsically in my DNA to take pictures of everything. My family and friends got inundated all day with photos of the twins waking up, eating breakfast, crying, smiling, walking, napping, sitting, standing and, once in a while, they also saw the food I cooked. Then the oddest thing happened: I was receiving more interest in my food than the pictures of the twins, and my girls are pretty darn cute. I was extremely flattered that so many people took to my food. Cooking had become a creative outlet for me.

My following grew and soon strangers started asking for my recipes. When my following grew to five hundred, I felt like the popular new kid on IG. (In your face, old high-school me!) This small success helped me decide to take a leap of faith and start food blogging. I knew there had to be a way to make a little money from it. I borrowed $1,500 from my mom for a MacBook and sacrificed my precious sleep to build My Healthy Dish . I didnt have a sure plan or any idea what bloggers really did, so I focused most of my time on Instagram. I changed my username to @Myhealthydish_ and started posting recipes and health advice every day. In three months, my loyal five hundred followers grew to thirty thousand. After that milestone, I launched my blog MyHealthyDish.com. I then went on to celebrate one million followers within two years. I thought I was so cool at five hundred followers, but at one million, I felt like Britney Spears before she shaved her head. I know what youre thinking: what makes me so awesome that people wanted to follow? As much as I would love to believe theyre following for pics of me, I know its my recipes people love and not my #selfies.