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Should You Study Food Photography?
Are food photography workshops really worth the time, effort and investment? In this blog post I share my honest opinion about who should consider them and who should steer well clear!
Sometimes all your stars align, destiny firmly grabs hold of the steering wheel and you are lead in one direction and one direction alone. Guess what? That’s exactly what happened with me and this pistachio yoghurt. Personally, I even think the pistachio yoghurt fairies were calling my name super loudly cuz this yoghurt just had to happen and this is the story of how everything came about:
Read MoreTada, so here it is! THE post I’ve been hinting at for a quite while now - Goldilocks's Raw Vegan Porridge! I am beyond excited about the video (watch it here) and I’m so keen to hear what you all make of it. I do you enjoy it.
The day of the shoot was loads of fun (with some boring and repetitive bits in between, but it’s all for a good cause, right?). I got to work with the lovely husband and wife team, Jo and Raf from Joasis Photography, who also took the pictures of me on my ‘about’ page. They are talented with a good eye for detail and they are always the people I turn to for anything to do with photography. So when the idea of a video came up, it felt natural to approach them about it. They were super enthusiastic and had lots of ideas and this, my friends, is the end product!
''When I practice I am a philosoper. When I teach, I am a scientist. When I demonstrate, I am an artist.'' - BKS Iyenger - 14/1218 - 20/08/14
A few weeks ago I shared snippets of my life as a yoga teacher. You can read all about it here, but today I wanted to muse about the joys of being a yoga student and the wonderful yoga retreat I took…
Let’s start with the obvious, shall we: Being a yoga student is pretty awesome! I get to listen and follow the sound of my breath and observe its ebb and flow as I move every muscle and work every joint in my body. Moreover, when I step into the practice space I feel happy, I feel alive and I feel free. (Of course, there has been some blood, tons of sweat and loads of tears but that story is for another day...).
The best part of my practice however comes at the very end; it is then that I get to indulge in a long, peaceful savasana (corpse pose, the part where you lie down and can just ‘be’) and feel like I have arrived at the place I was always meant to be.
In a perfect world and in the perfect home, I’d be the perfect wife, perfect mother and perfect cook who does all her meal plans weeks, no, MONTHS in advance. There would never been over-ripe fruit lingering in the fruit bowl or unused veg in the fridge as everything would be bought at the right time and in the right quantity. Of course, that’s not what happens in our house! Instead, I buy what catches my eye, a little more if it’s on at a special price and too much if I’m super greedy.
That’s the story behind the papayas I used for this recipe. I just went crazy and bought LOADS. A week after my purchase they looked rather neglected, but smelled sweet and inviting. So I did what I often do, go to a magical place called Pinterest (I LOVE it there by the way) and typed in ‘vegan papaya dessert’. There was just 1 dessert that really caught my eye – a recipe by Medha who write the stunning blog Farmonplate. Thank you Medha for your continual inspiration.
Read More“I have been a seeker and I still am, but I stopped asking the books and the stars. I started listening to the teaching of my Soul’’ - Rumi
At the end of this year I will have completed my 6th year as a yoga teacher! How can that be - I still feel more like a yoga student than a teacher!? And 6 eventful years they have been; from starting off in a cold room with a leaky roof and dodgy floor, to finding myself surrounded by 16 pregnant yoginis in a stunning converted warehouse – I couldn’t have asked for more. And this week I hosted my first event as The Little Plantation: An Urban Yoga Retreat and Nourishing Vegan Brunch!
NOTE: The pictures for this blog post were in part updated in June, 2016.
Hi everyone! If you're here for the fresh, summery and sexy watermelon gazpacho recipe, then please scroll down to the end of the blog post. You'd find the easy vegan recipe there. If you're happy to read about my wonderful visit with my amazingly talented sister, then please read on and get to the recipe later.
Question: What’s even better than making some fabulicious, seasonal plant-based food? Answer: Making it and sharing it with someone you ADORE. And for this week’s blog post I got to do just that as my gorgeous and über-talented little sis’ Sumera flew all the way from Berlin to come and visit hubby, son and ME in our humble London home.
Sumera might look familiar as she was one of the finalists on the Dutch X Factor a few years ago and apart from being graced with a voice that sends chills down my spine, this little tweety bird can put together a fierce plate of food too. We were ‘cooking’ up a storm in the kitchen, preparing a recipe handed down to us by my mama. So a true family affair all the way ‘round which resulted in a bowl full of LOVE.
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The avocado is a bit of a star in the raw vegan world, isn’t it? And it is easy to see why - avocado is so versatile, wonderfully nourishing and utterly delicious. Consequently, it is often used in green vegan smoothies and luscious raw ‘cheese’ cakes. Essentially, what the avocado does to perfection is lend all these desserts a smooth, creamy texture without impacting negatively on their taste.
It’s mind-blowing all that it can do, but my husband says that we’re corrupting the poor avocado; that it was never meant to be hidden in some sweet drink or worse still a raw vegan chocolate mousse. Instead he feels avocado should take centre stage in a savoury dish, the good old fashioned way. (Although ironically, on a recent business trip to Indonesia the locals were appalled when they saw my husband sprinkle salt on his avocado. After much persuasion, they tried it, apprehensively, with a polite smile, before quickly scraping the salt off and reverting back to using their avocado where it belonged – in a sweet smoothie, thank you very much! LOL!)
But I’m with my husband on this one. Though I love raw vegan desserts that use avocado, I think it’s most enjoyable as part of a savoury dish without sugar overpowering its delicate and subtle flavours. I just like to keep any recipe involving avocado super simple, so that the avocado can really shine. Hence why I love this recipe so much and love sharing it with you; it ALWAYS turns out marvellous, it is ALWAYS a big hit at parties and it is ALWAYS so satisfyingly yummy!
NOTE: The pictures were updated in July 2015
Hi everyone! If you are here for the easy, yummy and raw vegan Persian Herb salad recipe, then please scroll down to the end of the blog post. You'd find the super easy recipe there. If you're happy to read me rambling about living in London, then please read on and get to the recipe later.
This month, exactly 14 years ago I moved to the UK. YIKES, how time flies! Will I stay in London forever? Gosh, that’s a tough question. Actually, that’s a very tough question. Thing is, I’ve got a little bit of a love/hate relationship with this place. You see when the days are dark, gloomy and grey and it feels like I’m living on Noah’s Ark because the rain just keeps on falling, then I absolutely hate it!
And then, slowly but surely the clouds clear away and Spring arrives in all her glory. With her appearance the short dark days make way for longer and lighter ones. And as if by magic, suddenly and gracefully London comes into her own. London’s countless open spaces turn a lush and beautiful green and it’s then you know that London’s reputation as the greenest city in European is well and truly deserved.
I recently received an e-mail from one of my readers asking me about my stance on sugar. WOW! Big question there. It’s one though that I ponder about quite a lot myself and seeing that I’m posting yet another dessert recipe, Mango Nice Cream, I feel it’s time to share my (still evolving) thoughts briefly.
Like most of us, I love sweet treats (I really, really, really do!). And if it's plant-based and raw, even better! But I also think it’s wrong to assume that just because a dessert is refined sugar free, vegan, raw or gluten free that it’s automatically healthy for us and/or that we can consume it in unlimited quantities.
