Paige Vondran, BS

The ketogenic diet is a high fat diet that can be quite unpleasant, lacking in flavor and texture, and causing a significant amount of compliance issues among children. As the medical chef educator at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP), it is my role to create toothsome and simple recipes that both the keto kids and parents love.

In 2015, I completed a culinary internship at CHOP under the supervision of the ketogenic dietitians. During my internship, I developed an array of different recipes ranging from carbohydrate-free breads to tofu shirataki spaghetti and meatballs. Although the ketogenic diet was much different than what I was training for in college, I loved the food science perspective that the internship gave me and decided that I wanted to pursue a career in culinary nutrition.

Following my internship, I worked part-time in CHOP’s Division of Neurology as their ketogenic research chef, focusing on the development of recipes for the ketogenic diet and other low-carbohydrate diets for epilepsy treatment.

After graduating from The Art Institute of Philadelphia with my Bachelor of Science degree in Culinary Management, I joined CHOP’s Clinical Nutrition Department full time in 2017 as the first medical chef educator. This position includes management of the Ketogenic Diet Teaching Kitchen, development of recipes for epilepsy treatment, office visits with patients, video filming of cooking demonstrations for the website, and private cooking classes for families to increase compliancy with their prescribed diets.

I enjoy working as part of the Dietary Treatment Program team to help provide the best quality of life to our patients. We now not only have over 100 delicious recipes for epilepsy treatment, but are in the process of writing a ketogenic cookbook.