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Mela Eckenfels, is a nerdy, dorky geek girl, former unix system administrator (BSD-flavoured) and passionate roleplayer, that still flips in her daily cooking agenda between 'larval stage' and the culinary geek.

Growing up a vegetarian in a meat-adoring family forced her – while attending 'gymnasium' - to take her first steps in cooking. Later in life, while living in a Berlin (squat) commune, she developed her skills for big stews. (Till her fellow housemates appealed fiercely against the daily stew.)

During her days as a freelance system administrator her cooking skills declined to dry soup mixes, sandwich toasts and Chinese fast food, until her friendship with Petra, and then a bigger kitchen at home, helped to awaken the long-buried cooking skills again. With a new love for good food, especially soul food and Japanese, Mela started to cook again - for her nerdy husband, friends and bigger groups. (Mostly catering for live-roleplaying events.) And not just stews, this time.