And in addition to work ethic, I focus a lot on health, wellness, longevity, and self-care — which honestly took becoming a father to fully appreciate. I take better care of my body now than I ever did before I had kids. 

As a family, we meal-plan and cook together. I play tennis with my boys as one of the ways I exercise and move my body daily, and I treat wellness activities as a non-negotiable.

In our house we focus on whole, nutrient-dense foods that fuel the body inside and out, but that doesn’t mean we sacrifice on taste. Food can be both delicious and nourishing. This is something I have understood more and more as I get older, and has now been engrained as an important part of our family philosophy.

One of the ways my family passed their culture down to me was through food.

The traditional Persian dishes I watched my family prepare when I was young, are the same ones I still make today. The moment I smell them cooking, I’m immediately back in those memories.

This Grilled Chicken with Persian Salad is one of those recipes. 

It’s a traditional dish from my family, one of my absolute favorites. I shared it in our holiday book last year as one of the recipes most meaningful to me, and so many of you reached out after that. So it felt right to share it here properly.

This is a staple especially when our parents come over. The kids love it. It’s healthy. And man, it’s good, especially over coals. There’s something about that char on the chicken paired with the coolness of the Persian salad that I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of.

In my line of work, I think a lot about the relationship between what we eat, how we feel, and truthfully, how we look, because this plays a role in our confidence in the world.

Skin health starts well before any product touches your face. 

It starts with hydration, sleep, stress, and the quality of whole foods you’re eating every day.

This meal checks a lot of those boxes naturally. 

• Chicken thighs are a clean, high-quality protein that supports muscle repair and keeps you full without weighing you down.
• The salad — cucumbers, plum tomatoes, red onion, lemon, olive oil — is loaded with water-rich vegetables and healthy fats that support your skin from the inside.
• Greek yogurt brings in the kind of probiotics that your gut, and by extension your skin, will thank you for.
  
  

I thought this was the perfect recipe to share again this summer, and especially as we have a long holiday weekend ahead of us. One where many people get outdoors to grill, enjoying a home cooked meal on a warm summer night, shared amongst friends and family.

This is the kind of meal I make when the people I love are coming over. 

Simple ingredients, minimal cleanup, and everyone leaves the table happy. 

That, to me, is what a healthy lifestyle actually looks like - nourishing and filling in every sense of the word.