Farrell: Whole Foods, Plant-Based Supper Club teaches healthy eating on Hilton Head -- complete with oxygen cocktails

When Karen Holland was 4 years old, she snuck down to her parents' basement and ate all their hot dogs.

She knew they were there, forgotten in a freezer, and when she realized that her family's switch to vegetarianism meant her favorite food was now off-limits, she devised a plan -- to eat every last one of them before anyone could stop her.

"It was the one meat thing left in our house," Holland laughed at the memory Monday night after a gathering of the Whole Foods, Plant-Based Supper Club at the Hilton Head Island Seventh-Day Adventist Church.

As it turned out, those hot dogs were the last "meat thing" she ate. Ever.

And she doesn't miss it.

"My daughters say I was born with the salad gene," she said.

Holland, a longtime Hilton Head resident, is now a soon-to-be grandmother and a marathon runner who not only adheres to a plant-based diet -- which is like vegetarianism but with the additional exclusion of dairy and eggs -- she teaches others how to make that lifestyle change.

She is fit, glowing and can execute a friendly, happy Mom Shrug like no other.

Since March, Holland and the church's pastor, Jason Belyeu, have hosted a monthly dinner and cooking demonstration to show people that making healthy, vibrant, nutritious meals and desserts is within their reach.

"It's so simple," Holland said as she showed a group of about 40 people how to make dairy-free vanilla ice cream, which we later ate with blueberry-mango shortcake.

I attended the dinner because over the years I have read a little about "Blue Zones," those five areas of the world identified as special by author Dan Buettner in "The Blue Zones: Lessons for Living Longer from the People Who've Lived the Longest" and subsequent books.

Blue Zones are where people live better than the rest of us, where a strong sense of community, natural activity and healthy diets are abundant. Where being a smiling, active 100-year-old is perhaps more commonplace.

Turns out, Holland grew up in one of these areas, Loma Linda, Calif. -- the only Blue Zone in the United States. It's an area with a large population of Seventh-Day Adventists, a Christian faith that also emphasizes health and wellness.

"Our bodies are God's temple," Holland said. "I'm not trying to convert anyone. It's about what you can do to improve your health and just be the best you can be wherever you are."

On my drive to the church, I thought about what I'd do with the extra few hours of life I was hoping to get from this meal. Maybe I'll see a movie at my nursing home. Or sneak in an extra porch-sit. Maybe I'll eat a cheeseburger with a friend.

I'm not a vegetarian, but I often wish I were (about as often as I'm glad I'm not). It's a very confusing way to live, I'll admit. I love healthy food but am often tempted by the other stuff. I know I'm not alone.

Before the dinner started, I watched as Holland and church volunteers put the finishing touches on dishes. The church hall smelled exactly the way I imagined Gwyneth Paltrow's house would smell -- like freshly cut herbs and newly juice-pressed farm-fresh vegetables.

"Wait until the oxygen cocktail later," Holland told me.

Oxygen cocktail! I wasn't sure what that was, but I pictured us sitting around with tubes in our noses, like those oxygen bars from the late '90s. I kind of hoped it was exactly this, because I had missed that trend. Or maybe it's something seltzer-based, I thought, which is great because I love seltzer.

Belyeu started and ended the event with a blessing that asked God to help attendees use food as medicine to keep us disease-free and to help us take time for healthy thinking as well.

The menu included red cabbage and jicama spring rolls with peanut sauce, a truly addictive avocado spinach quinoa salad, zucchini boats with garlic cream sauce, roasted tomato kale tart and fresh strawberry-watermelon lemonade.

Everything tasted like a good decision, but delicious and even indulgent. Attendees learned how to cook with the ingredients and were given the recipes to try on their own at home.

I sat with a few members of the Eat Smart, Live Longer Club at Sun City Hilton Head.

Esta Macri, who has been meat-free for a year, says the decision to forgo animal products has been a life-changer for her.

"I sleep!" she said. "I sleep all night now."

Paulette Shaw, also of Sun City, said that when she told her kids she was going meat-free, they teased her.

"'I'm not eating anything with eyes,' I told them. My daughter said, 'Nothing with I's, mom? No kiwis?!?'"

Macri laughed. "I's ... k-I-w-I."

This was the third time both had attended a Whole Foods, Plant-Based Supper Club dinner. They told me about a recipe for a caprese sandwich made with tofu instead of mozzarella that they had tried at home after the last dinner.

"It was so good," Macri said.

Shaw said that making the switch to a plant-based diet takes some work, but that it's worth it.

"I'm hoping to get my husband to one of these," she said.

Sometime before dessert I heard rumblings about this oxygen cocktail again, and I got excited. "I can't wait for the oxygen cocktail," one woman told another.

Oxygen cocktail!! OXYGEN COCKTAIL! I can't wait either, I thought. I could use an oxygen cocktail right now. Why doesn't Starbucks have oxygen cocktails? Everyone should have them on their menus.

After our plates were cleared, Belyeu and volunteers passed out two strands of blue crepe paper to each diner, and we were all invited to stand ... for the oxygen cocktail.

Before I could run around the room "Soylent Green" style, yelling "Oxygen cocktail is exercise!!!!!" and knock the crepe paper out of people's hands, the music started and everyone started dancing.

And smiling.

Oxygen cocktail. It's the thing you do to help your body better digest your food. It's the thing you do for a better life.

Follow columnist and senior editor Liz Farrell at twitter.com/elizfarrell and facebook.com/elizfarrell.

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This story was originally published July 28, 2015 at 4:51 PM with the headline "Farrell: Whole Foods, Plant-Based Supper Club teaches healthy eating on Hilton Head -- complete with oxygen cocktails."