102. 15 Years, 4 Books, One Photographer: The Story Behind Everyday Ayurveda [VIDEO]

For fifteen years, Cara Brostrom has been the photographer — and co-author — behind every one of Kate's Everyday Ayurveda books. In this episode, Kate and Cara sit down together for the first time to tell the whole story: how a free PDF of five spring recipes and five photographs, made on a whim and shared on early Facebook, racked up 30,000 downloads and landed in front of an acquiring editor — and became The Everyday Ayurveda Cookbook, now a perennial classic translated into seven languages.

From there, they walk book by book through the evolution of the series and Cara's own evolving relationship to the materials she was photographing:

• The Everyday Ayurveda Cookbook — described by Kate as "party time": bright color, Indian textiles (including Kate's own saris), and a sensory introduction to the full range of Ayurvedic tastes and foods.
• Everyday Ayurveda for a Calm, Clear Mind — a deliberate shift to simplicity, mirroring sattvic cooking itself, including the now-legendary challenge of making congee look photogenic.
• The Everyday Ayurveda Guide to Self-Care — a turn toward dravya guna, the Ayurvedic science of substance, where Cara found herself photographing milks, ghee, and medicinal substances so closely that she began ingesting and living with them herself. This is also where Cara first felt the tension of photographing plants — like neem and shatavari — that don't grow where she lives in New England, a tension that quietly started pulling her toward Western herbalism.
• Everyday Ayurveda for Women's Health — built around lunar and seasonal rhythms, this book took Cara out into the field across all four seasons, photographing plants like motherwort and echinacea in local gardens. It was on one of these shoots that she met the herbalist she'd go on to apprentice with for years — and it became the last book she photographed before pivoting fully into writing and herbalism.

Cara also shares an early look at her forthcoming book (title still under wraps for now, expected to be announced around January), which brings together 19th-century poetry, plant lore from her own Anglo-European lineage, and present-day Western herbalism practice — including a surprising thread she's uncovered about how 19th-century New England housewife manuals centered almost entirely on digestion.

The episode closes with a fun rapid-fire round: Cara's morning tongue-scraping and oil-pulling ritual, her go-to first drink of the day, and her seasonal wind-down (bare feet in the grass in summer, wood stove in winter).

About Cara Brostrom:

Cara Brostrom is a writer, artist, and herbalist, and co-author of The Everyday Ayurveda Cookbook, a perennial classic translated into seven languages. She is a Nautilus Book Award Gold Winner, and her creative work has been recognized by the National Endowment for the Arts. Cara holds a Master of Arts from Aberystwyth University, where she conducted practice-based research on landscape narratives, performance documentation, and the archive; her performance art and installations have been shown at festivals across the US, England, Wales, Scotland, Canada, and Finland, and her photography has appeared in group shows in Boston, New York, and San Francisco. Her words and photography have been published in The Boston Globe, Wildling Magazine, Origin, Mother Earth Living, t.e.l.l. New England, and others. She has spent many years in apprenticeship and study with master herbalists in the Northeast, and now teaches workshops on herbalism and folklore. Cara lives in Western Massachusetts.

Connect with Cara: https://linktr.ee/carabros

Mentioned in this episode:

• The Everyday Ayurveda Cookbook (co-authored by Cara Brostrom), Everyday Ayurveda for a Calm, Clear Mind, The Everyday Ayurveda Guide to Self-Care, and Everyday Ayurveda for Women's Health — all by Kate O'Donnell
• Hannah Marano, the herbalist Cara apprenticed with
• India Culinary & Nutrition Immersion, February 2027 — a 10-day immersion in Mysore. Learn more and enroll at ayurvedicliving.institute

This episode is supported by:

Banyan Botanicals — Triphala tablets for digestion and daily detox: https://alnk.to/bPhiKjx

Connect with Kate: https://www.healwithkate.org

Culinary Training in India
https://ayurvedicliving.institute/ayurvedic-culinary-nutrition-training

Fall Cleanse
https://ayurvedicliving.institute/kitchari-cleanse-ayurveda-fall

Ayurvedic Living Institute Membership: https://ayurvedicliving.institute/membership

Women's Health Collection: https://courses.ayurvedicliving.institute/collections/womens-healthhttps://courses.ayurvedicliving.institute/products/courses/copy-of-fall-community-cleanse-2024

Panchakarma in India: https://ayurvedicliving.institute/panchakarma-in-india

Thanks to our Sponsors:
Banyan Botanicals
https://alnk.to/eOQb34q

Triphala Support:
https://alnk.to/bPhiKjx