Hi all,
Both Meg and myself here at Vegan Revolution hope that you’re having a happy and safe holiday break.
This is just a quick update to let you all know about an exciting and unique upcoming event – a Wildcrafting Walk at CERES Environment Park here in Melbourne on Sunday January 15th.
Wildcrafting Walk: A Tour of Discovery for Wild Edibles.
Sunday the 15th of January
10am to 12 noon
$15 per person – Book Online Here!
CERES Environment Park, Corner of Roberts and Stewart Streets Brunswick East 3057.
Learn the art of identifying edible wild foods in this relaxed two hour tour of CERES Environment Park in Brunswick.
Wildcrafting is the ancient art of harvesting valuable, healing and nutritional greens, herbs, flowers, roots and berries from non cultivated sources. Nature has provided us with a bounty of foods, many of which are commonly found in our backyards, local parks and reserves. Despite this bounty, sadly our modern society has lost much of the knowledge of the world of wildcrafting. The good news is that a small but enthusiastic movement has arisen, and future thinking individuals are actively rediscovering the wisdom of wild foods and reaping the rewards of health and wellbeing.
Would you like to learn which weeds commonly found in your own backyard are some of the most nutritious greens you can eat? Want to save money by sourcing fresh picked wild foods for your plate?
Shanti Portia and Meghan Street host this informative wildcrafting tour around well known CERES environment park and guide you through the knowledge you need to identify dozens of wild plants, from spicy wild mustard to the nutritious and medicinal dandelion.
Take the first step to learning what our great grandparents once knew, and free your mind from the ‘weed’ paradigm.
The tour lasts for approximately two hours and includes the following:
- A written handbook containing information and sketches of some of the most common edible plants.
- Identification and background information on dozens of edible plants using actual specimens found at CERES and surrounds.
- The opportunity to harvest some of your own edible weeds to take home and prepare.
- A number of living foods recipes using wild edibles as a starter for your wild food recipe collection.
- The medicinal background of many of the plants and the identification of parts used for medicinal purposes.
- Access to wild edible books to browse while on the tour.
Bookings are essential, don’t miss out on the start of your wildcrafting journey! BOOK NOW TO ENSURE YOUR PLACE!
Shanti Portia discovered raw foods over four years ago and hasn’t looked back. Her day job is a photographer and she has worked as a raw food chef. Shant has also written and ebook about eating raw in a cold climate called ‘Hot and Raw in Winter’ which is available at www.hotandraw.com. Shanti enjoys incorporating fresh edible wild foods into her meals as part of her healthy life.
Meghan Street has delighted in sourcing delicious and nutritious edible wilds for years and is keen to spread the word about the wonderful properties of foods grown in the wild. She loves to include edible weeds (in particular greens and flowers) into smoothies and salads and is an avid fan of both dandelion and lambsquarters. Meghan is a long term raw foodist and has written an Introduction to Raw Foods handbook used in her Raw 101 course and soon to be published as a stand-alone ebook.
Dont Miss Out on this opportunity – Book Online Here!
World Vegan Day Melbourne is tomorrow!
Sunday 6th November 10am-5pm at Abbotsford Convent, Melbourne.
World Vegan Day
Yes, one of the most anticipated events on the ethical calendar is happening tomorrow! World Vegan Day Melbourne is a fun filled event for everyone and anyone. Located at the Convent in Abbotsford, World Vegan Day runs from 10am to 5pm and has everything from stalls, talks, live music, delicious food and food demonstrations, family friendly activities, samples and tastings, and SO MANY PEOPLE!
Vegan Revolution’s Meg will be conducting a food demo at 2pm in the kitchen off the main hall. She will be demonstrating how make creamy raw caramel coconut custard and how to easily open a young coconut. Come and join us for this exciting demonstration with free samples! And who knows, maybe you will see Meg make an utter fool of herself with a big-arsed cleaver!
For the first time since the inception of the event, we will not be having a stall, rather we will concentrate on volunteering for Vegetarian Victoria on their stall and will sell a limited range of our stuff there. We will also be handing out free samples of organic hulled hemp seeds, so come by and pick some up!
This is an event not to be missed, if you are in Melbourne and are free. Come down for the best Sunday ever!
Meg reviews the new raw foods menu at Loving Hut in Melbourne and gives us a virtual tour of the dishes on offer.
The city of Melbourne has long been renown for it’s avant garde attitude toward new cuisine and food lifestyles, and many of Melbourne’s eating establishments have certainly relished the challenge of creating delicious, gourmet living and raw foods dishes for the enjoyment of their patrons. Loving Hut is the most recent restaurant to try their hand at a raw foods menu, and their efforts have certainly been appreciated by this raw food enthusiast!
Located on busy Victoria street in Richmond, Loving Hut is an unassuming asian-style eatery with a carefully crafted menu and an enthusiastic staff. Part of the worldwide group of Loving Hut restaurants managed by advocates of Supreme Master Ching Hai, each restaurant’s atmosphere and menu is unique to the area it’s located in and to the people that run it. There is one thing however that every Loving Hut outlet has in common, every one of them serves all vegetarian food, in particular vegan food.
I was lucky enough to be a part of the advanced tasting for Loving Hut Melbourne’s new living foods menu, having been invited by a friend who helps out there. I’d also visited them not long after they had opened to demonstrate some simple raw foods and smoothies in the hopes of encouraging them to include living foods on their menu. I was really looking forward to testing out the new raw food additions.
Having said that, I had some reservations. Many of the cafes and restaurants which had already incorporated raw foods cuisine into their menu had enthusiastically gone down the nut heavy, gourmet path. Although I do enjoy the occasional rich cheesecake and nut filled burger, I was looking for something different. I wanted somewhere in Melbourne that would experiment with tastes, and diverge from the path of always trying to recreate commonly cooked food dishes that seemed to be the central focus in the current Melbourne raw foods scene. With this in mind, I went along expecting the usual heavy gourmet selections, but what I discovered was a surprising plethora of tastes and textures not limited by traditional ideas of food preparation.
Loving Hut Melbourne has decided to take the path less trodden in the creation of their raw foods menu. Taste and freshness is paramount, with the natural flavours of the vegetables in many dishes as the central focus rather than being co opted to create another taste.
Revisiting Loving Hut for dinner at a later date from the tasting, the first thing that struck me was the size of the servings. The decently priced dishes are served in quantities reminiscent of the generous portions at The Vegie Bar, something I find most satisfying as I prefer large hearty sizes rather than small gourmet serves.
The raw food menu is small but packed with diversity, including dishes such as Celestial Curry, a filling meal made with fresh curry leaves, Spice of Life; a spicy dish with green papaya as the focus and Spaghetti Margherita, a tomatoey sensation the picture below does not do justice to. For appetisers, there’s the wonderful Seafood Cocktail, which satisfies those seeking a seaweed based flavour, and the sweets on offer include creamy raw vegan cheesecakes, and a sundae made with the most divine tasting raw ice cream I’ve experienced. I recommend the ice cream sundae as a must for any raw dessert lovers, you can see the tiny black vanilla seeds throughout the creaminess indicating attention to flavour and quality.
All in all I am very impressed with Loving Hut’s raw offerings. Having begun to tire of the nut heavy menus of other restaurants, it was a refreshing change to see dishes using crsipy, colourful vegetables as the central theme. I’m already planning my next trip there, and dreaming of the Celestial Curry.
One thing though, while there are several flavours of fresh almond milk smoothies, there are no green smoothies on the menu. I love the option of having a fruit based green smoothie with my meal, so if you feel the same way, don’t forget to mention it when you visit!
Note! The Loving Hut raw foods menu is currently only served on Friday, Saturday and Sunday.
Loving Hut Melbourne
Shop 10, 242 Victoria Street
Richmond 3121
Ph: 03 9427 8916
www.facebook.com/lovinghutmelbourne
Spaghetti Margherita. A tomato sensation incorporating zucchini noodles and fresh tomato.
Spice of Life. Spicy green papaya.
Celestial Curry. A fresh and filling curry dish that will leave the hungriest patron satisfied. Made with fresh curry leaves.
Splendour of the Orient. A colourful vegetable dish with fresh crispy vegetables as the central focus.
