Life and Work with Ingrid Clay

Today we’d like to introduce you to Ingrid Clay.

Ingrid, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
As a plant-based chef/Group Fitness Instructor and Personal Trainer with over a decade of professional experience in fitness and wellness, who deeply understands the direct impact food and health has on individual success and happiness,

Food & Fitness. is part of my DNA. I grew up on a small farm in Lafayette, Louisiana where farm to table eating was the standard. At the age of three, I would stand on a stool and help my mom and grandmothers make gumbo and sweet dough pies. By the time I was six years old, this hobby was a full-blown passion and I enrolled in my first cooking class and continued weekly until I was fourteen. I mastered classic southern dishes and was featured in the local newspaper for the best applesauce cake in the parish (county). My mom’s an aerobics instructor and I frequently saw her doing her Jane Fonda tapes with weights.

While my teenage cooking career was taking off, the importance of education has always been a core value with my family, and at fourteen my mother wanted me to focus more on my academics and college than my budding cooking career. I was accepted to college where I dual majored in Electrical Engineering and Physics. Upon graduating, I was offered a position as a Controls Engineer with Gillette and moved across the country to Boston to pursue my new career. I worked full-time during the day as an engineer and enrolled in a part-time MBA program at night. I worked my way up through the company to a Project Manager position. I oversaw Gillette’s Venus Breeze project from creation to launch in 18 months through concurrent engineering. While it was exciting to oversee the engineering, product design, packaging, manufacturing, consumer insights and the chemistry component of something I would use every day, the flame for my true passion- cooking- always flickered. Which led to me starting my online food blog, FoodieGirl which featured step-by-step how to make comfort meals and desserts. Despite earning my MBA, and working as an engineer for years, I always found myself daydreaming of my first love, food. I wanted to build my own wellness company, so I enrolled in Simmons School of Management’s Entrepreneur Program. After completing the program, I left my corporate job and began building my company full-time. I started working in fitness, working on accreditations, studying from trainers who had been in the industry for years. I cooked healthier versions Southern favorites for studios and began creating customized meal plans for my clients and my meal prep company was born.

I used my engineering background to design a program to calculate clients’ macronutrients and customize their meal plans and fitness goals. Staying current, in the wellness field, I noticed a shift- people were eating less meat (something I also started doing) so I decided to attend an Advanced Plant-Based and Raw Gourmet Cooking Culinary School. There, I learned how to make plant-based cheese, sauces (both savory and sweet), milks, flours, how to temper chocolate, make natural jams, ferment fruit and vegetables, create gourmet desserts, design flavor balanced meals that were packed with an abundance of nutrients and good for you ingredients, and so much more. To further enhance my skills I volunteered at Plant, Food, and Wine in Venice, CA to learn how to navigate a demanding kitchen. My skills were sharpened and cooking flavorful, healthy, plant-based meals quickly became a breeze.

Currently, my passion for food and fitness is combined through my daily work. I am a private chef that specializes in curating group pop-up dinners and consult with various corporations on their in-house wellness programs. I am also a personal trainer with a wide variety of clients, a senior group fitness trainer at a popular international company- where I lead classes weekly and train trainers to be the best instructors possible. And lastly, I am a National Qualifier (figure & bikini), Plant-Based Bodybuilder.

I have worked in a variety of industries, I am a multifaceted leader, I create healthy, delicious meals and desserts, I’m a nutritionist and fitness expert. I am more than just a chef. I’m an engineer who now “engineers” the body through food and exercise. I thrive under pressure, love challenges, and look for opportunities to grow in any situation. My passion for inspiring others and helping others be their healthiest selves has no ending.

We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
No journey worth taking is ever without bumps.
At the time, when my career was starting to “take off” so to speak. I was in the middle of a divorce, found myself in an abusive relationship. And for the first time in my life, I felt like I couldn’t go anymore. I felt alone, isolated and beaten up. There is something that happens when we are at the bottom. There is only one way to go and thats up! I started to meditate, and find what made me or re-discover it never left I just had forgotten how special and loving I was. I found my power within again. I remembered who I WAS, my inner being my inner self.

So, my advice would be to remind yourself always about how wonderful and beautiful you are. Things will happen where you may lose sight but never forget how strong you are and WHO you really are.

So, as you know, we’re impressed with ISC Wellness – tell our readers more, for example, what you’re most proud of and what sets you apart from others.
I am a personal trainer
Plant-Based Chef
GroupFitness Instructor

I consider myself more than a trainer, I am a sculptor. I use my physics and engineering background to sculpt the body through food and exercise. I think that alone sets me apart.

I’m proud about how far I have come at building a trusting, inspiring brand. and also a brand that wants to empower. Empower people to push the limits, be fearless, and be their true selves.

What advice would you give to someone at the start of her career?
Be fearless.
Be a sponge: you can learn from anyone… take what resonates discards what doesn’t.

Be yourself. Not a thought of how you should be or how you should behave.

Be love. I find that we think its a competition. We have been raised to think that way. But I believe in abundance there is enough for all because no one is like you. No one thinks like you, creates like you, no one is YOU. So, always lead and think through love, not fear.

Contact Info:

• Website: ingridsclay.com
• Phone: 8185795298
• Email: [email protected]
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ingridsclay/?hl=en

Image Credit:
JT Photography

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