Bio

BRIEF BIOGRAPHY

I have enjoyed a multifaceted career that includes professional work as a psychotherapist, chef/entrepreneur, cookbook  and fiction author, poet, and meditation teacher. I am married and have two grown children. I enjoy a variety of leisure  activities that include photography, kayaking, gardening, cooking and theater. Star Child, published in 2012 is my second book and first fiction story.

DETAILED BIOGRAPHY

I was born Kathleen Gurley in Lexington, NC but spent a lot of  growing up years in Buffalo, NY. It was there, living in a working class neighborhood in my grandfather’s house that I learned about ethnic food and cultures. It was to become a lifelong passion. Returning to the South as a teenager (practically a foreign country to a city- raised kid) and as a student at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, I came to appreciate Southern small town life, the taste of Lexington hickory smoked barbecue and the slower pace of the countryside.

In 1970, I married Buck Goldstein  and we moved to Atlanta in 1976. There I practiced psychotherapy for a number of years while occasionally catering small events for friends and selling handmade pasta. In 1979 I founded Proof of the Pudding, Atlanta’s first gourmet takeout store and catering business offering innovative American and fusion foods.

My client list included most major institutions in the city and their honored guests including international celebrities such as Richard Avedon, Robert Redford, the BeeGees, Judy Chicago, Paloma Picasso, President Carter, and Andrew Young. I expanded my business to include a restaurant in the Arts Center and became the exclusive provider of food services at the Carter Presidential Center.

In 1990, I sold my position in the company to spend more time with our growing family. I began writing, and edited the first three Zagat Surveys for Atlanta and won a national culinary competition for professionals. In 1993, I published with co-author Liza Nelson and photographer Al Clayton, A Book of Feasts, Recipes and Stories from American Celebrations (Longstreet Press) which was nominated for a  James Beard Award.  In July, 2012, I published Star Child (Vineyard Stories), a spiritual fairy tale for adults and young adults inspired by my interest in meditation, psychology and the natural world.

She has served as President of Les Dames d'Escoffier and as a regional judge for the James Beard Awards.

I continue to write poetry, essays, memoirs and fiction and is a regular contributor to the Huffington Post where she writes primarily about food, relationships, meditation, mindfulness and spiritual practice in daily life. In addition to my writing, I teach meditation which I have practiced for more than 20 years. A lifelong spiritual seeker, I work with and combine my learnings from many traditions and philosophies including Taoism, Judaism, Buddhism, Western psychotherapy, and the teachings, among many others, of Eckhart Tolle, Sharon Salzberg and Byron Katie. I hold a second degree Reiki certificate. I am especially grateful for the opportunity to work with my long time teachers Leong Tan, Neala Peake and Meg McLaughlin.

I remain married to Buck Goldstein and we have two children, Katherine (29) and Max (27). I divide my time between Chapel Hill, NC and Chilmark, MA.