Community & Stories
Visit To Islensk Hollusta
On a recent visit to Reykjavik, we were delighted to visit the Islensk Hollusta factory, and learn more about how they produce their amazing Icelandic teas, seaweeds and salts. They even took us to a part of the coast where they forage their dulse and sea truffle from. Here is the Arctic Thyme being dried. Arctic Thyme grows wild all over Iceland, and is distinguishable by its pretty purple flowers. It is a medicinal plant that has been consumed by Icelanders for thousands of years. You can make a tea from it or add a little to your savoury dishes. Here is the Seaweed Salt being mixed. They take Icelandic geothermal sea salt and mix it with ground kelp and dulse. Here we are picking dulse. It was cold and extremely windy! Dulse is one of my favourite foods, and it was wonderful to see where the dulse that I eat actually grows, and to learn more about the harvesting and production methods. Next time you enjoy some Icelandic seaweed or herbs, give a thought to the hardy souls who go out in extreme conditions to gather it for you! Shop Islensk Hollusta seaweeds, salts and herbs here.
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Visit To Clearspring
One beautiful sunny day in June, I cycled over to the Clearspring warehouse in West London, to learn more about the products and the business. Clearspring is a family-run company, founded by Christopher Dawson in 1993. They specialise in working with Japanese organic farmers to produce high quality traditional Japanese foods. Even in Japan, a lot of these products are difficult to find in organic form, and so many of the farmers that Clearspring work with are dependent on them for their business. Christopher was even recognised by the Japanese Government in 2007, one of the only non-Japanese people to receive the Award for Overseas Promotion of Japanese Food, for his distinguished contribution to the promotion of Japanese organic food worldwide. The team gave me an in-depth talk on miso and umeboshi production. Clearspring produce six types of unpasteurised miso, all working in conjunction with Japanese farmers who have been using traditional methods of miso production for many generations. These range from a sweet white miso (rice and soya), to dark hatcho miso (pure soyabeans). The darker the miso, the longer it is fermented. They also recently launched a Chickpea miso, which is an innovative soya-free miso. Although technically not a raw product, because it is made from cooked ingredients, unpasteurised miso is a living foods product, because due to the fermentation process, enzymatic activity is still occurring. I am a big fan of umeboshi, and found it fascinating to learn more about umeboshi production. Clearspring produce Ume Su vinegar, Umeboshi Paste, and Umeboshi Plums. Their umeboshi has been grown on a mountain farm in a region which is known for producing the best and fattest plums, and has been grown there for four generations. The plums are harvested once a year, in late June, and then pickled. The plums can be added as a garnish to dishes, used in a broth recipe, or you can even make tea out of them. They are super alkalising, and support the liver; a Japanese superfood! The paste is easier to use, and I love to spread it in nori sheets when I am making cauliflower sushi, or make a salad dressing with raw tahini. The vinegar is another easy way to get the benefits - use it as a salad dressing, or try adding it to sparkling water for a refreshing alkalizing beverage. It's a great alternative to apple cider vinegar, being equally good for the digestion. Because the ume plums are pickled in salt, no heat-treatment or pasteurisation is needed, and they are still in their raw state. I love to learn more about the food I eat, and through chatting with Chris and his team, I really got a greater sense of the dedication and care that goes into producing these foods. I probably use a Clearspring product every day, and I will appreciate even more now, how lucky we are to have access to these traditional Japanese ingredients in organic form. It's wonderful that in this era of mass-commodification, they are keeping these artisanal food preparation methods alive. Shop Clearspring products here, including sea vegetables, cold-pressed oils, Japanese seasonings, and teas, as well as miso and umeboshi.
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Fushi Factory Visit
I recently had the pleasure of visiting Fushi at their home in West London, to learn more about how they make their wonderful oils and herbal products. Fushi is founded by Rannesh Jansari and Ria Pattni, based on Ayurvedic recipes handed down by their grandparents. They source herbs direct from farmers and growers in India and beyond, and import them to their factory, where they grind up the fresh herbs and encaspulate them the same day to preserve freshness. Some of the herbs also go into barrels to be infused in oil that then make some of their award-winning formulations such as Really Good Hair Oil, or my personal favourite, the Muscle and Joints Oil. I saw the Shatavari being encapsulated, and learnt more about the different products that they create, and the amount of effort that goes into producing everything with the utmost care and integrity. Shop Fushi here.
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Natural Products Expo
In April, we exhibited at the Natural Products Show at the Excel Centre London, for the first time. Natural Products is the UK's biggest trade show for the health food industry, including beauty, supplements and foods. We had a great time, met customers old and new, and caught up with friends in the industry like Chris Dawson from Clearspring, Richard & Amanda of Ombar, and Dale Pinnock, star of ITV's Eat, Shop, Save. Everyone loved our bright and colourful displays, and the biggest hit of the day was our Shilajit; people are really starting to catch on to the wonders of this mineral-rich resin. Brexit has made importing and exporting increasingly difficult, so we are actively seeking out new UK shops to stock our products in. If you have a local independent health food store that you would love to see us in, put us in touch! Just email hello@rawliving.co.uk, and we can send them out a catalogue and some samples.
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Made In Hackney Visit
Last week, I had the joy of visiting the Made In Hackney community kitchen. It's set up in the Queen of Hoxton nightclub in Shoreditch; they use the dancefloor to serve up the meals before the post-work revellers start to arrive in the evening. Everything is community funded: as well as fund-raising projects, they are sponsored by the enormous generosity of local restaurants and food businesses donating leftover food, and volunteers who come to help chop veg and serve around 200 meals a week. I turned up to chop a copious amount of cabbage, peel potatoes, and stick labels on take-away containers. It felt really good to be back in a busy working kitchen again, and I had a wonderful time, meeting lovely people and doing something truly worthwhile. I was introduced to Made In Hackney by Asa Simonsson, naturopath and author of "Fermentation", who had come to some of my events. I was looking for a space in London to run my Raw Chef Certification Courses, and she recommended them as a community venue, I think probably in 2013. I wanted to support Made In Hackney for a few reasons. Firstly, I am Made In Hackney! I lived there until I was 7, and my earliest memories are all in Hackney. I went to Hackney Infants school and my mum worked in the playground in Victoria Park. She was a single parent with no support, and Hackney was very rough back then. One of my earliest memories is of my little kiddie plastic trike getting stolen from the front garden! So who knows, if it was a few decades later, we could be a household who was applying for the meal service. As a long term vegan (33 years now), veganism is obviously very important to me, so I love the fact that everything Made In Hackney do is vegan without making a song and dance about it. I think although our business model with Raw Living is quite different from MIH, at the heart, the ethos is the same: a desire to help people improve their lives through providing them with organic plant foods, produced and made with love. I am passionate about a lot of things, but giving people access to high quality nutritious foods and witnessing how much better they feel about themselves when they start eating well, is probably my biggest passion in life. I also feel strongly that we are here to serve. In yoga, they call it "Bhakti Yoga"; living life from a place of selflessness. I feel that once we are ok for our own survival needs - food, water, shelter - then our responsiblity is to help those in our community meet their own survival needs. It's not to amass material possessions and elevate ourselves above others. So I feel like its important to do that, and important to be seen doing that, and set a different example than the Hollywood celebrities with their multiple homes and yachts and extravagant lifestyles. It upsets me deeply that theres so much unnecessary suffering in the world, when it should be a simple thing to make sure everyone has food and shelter. That's why I always say, women are the leaders of the future! Because it's our instinct to say, "Have you had a cup of tea? Have you got your coat on?" rather than, "Lets go to the moon! Lets invade that city!" So I love that Made in Hackney is taking that ethos literally. Doing their best to ensure that everyone in their community has access to good quality plant-based food, made with love. We are supporting them with superfood donations for the community kitchen and the cookery school, and I will be getting involved in various fund-raising activities throughout the year. On October 15th, I am dressing up as an avocado and joining them on their charity run. You can donate here https://localgiving.org/fundraising/MIH-Veg-Dash-Team-Sarahs/. If you want to support them further, you can also "Donate A Plate" here. Just £3 covers the cost of the salaried staff and any food and equipment that has not already been donated, to make one delicious vegan meal for a person in need. Kate
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Charity Partners - Made In Hackney
Made In Hackney's mission is to tackle health inequalities and food access, and bring communities together using the power of plants. They work across cultures and communities to ensure everyone can adopt a climate friendly, health-supporting, compassionate diet, and they do it all with joy and respect. Originally setting out to provide critical food education, giving people the skills to grow, cook and eat more plants, when the government restrictions of 2020 were brought in, and they found themselves unable to offer their usual classes, they pivoted to providing thousands of emergency plant-based meals for households across Hackney in need of food support. Today their in-house team of chefs and volunteers prepare over 1200 meals a week with input from the community meal service family on what dishes they’d like to see on the menu each week. The service is more than a meal. It’s care, it’s connection, it’s community. Learning to cook and eat more plants is one of the most impactful things you can do for the health of people and the planet. Their joyful, culturally diverse cookery classes support people to evolve to a plant-centred, planet friendly diet in an inclusive and enjoyable way with delicious, nutritious food at the centre of all we do. Having the confidence and skills to cook meals from scratch is a vital tool in tackling food poverty, child-hood obesity and lifestyle related diseases such as diabetes type 2 and cardiovascular disease. Their classes are available both in-person and online and they work with a range of community groups from young carers and young people in care, families, pensioners, people with long-term health challenges, hostel residents, people in recovery and other community groups. We support Made In Hackney with regular donations of super foods like Goji Berries, Shelled Hemp Seeds and Cacao Powder, so their community can receive the benefits of these wonderful foods. You too can get involved by supporting them with a donation next time you shop with us. Just £3 buys an organic plant-based meal for someone in need. Donate A Plate here! Learn more about Made In Hackney.
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Charity: Water
As well as our partnership with Trees For Life, we also support charity: water with a monthly donation. We are passionate about hydration and believe this charity is doing amazing work. You can find out more about them by watching the video below. charity: water is a non-profit organisation bringing clean and safe drinking water to people in developing countries. Since 2006, charity: water supporters have funded 91,414 water projects that will bring clean water to more than 14,762,215 million people in 29 countries. Shockingly, 771 million people in the world live without clean water.That’s nearly 1 in 10 people worldwide or ten times the population of the UK. The majority live in isolated rural areas and spend hours every day walking to collect water for their family. Not only does walking for water keep children out of school or take up time that parents could be using to earn money, but the water often carries diseases that can make everyone sick. But access to clean water means education, income and health - especially for women and children. Clean water changes everything. Diseases from dirty water kill more people every year than all forms of violence, including war. 43% of those deaths are children under five years old. Access to clean water and basic sanitation can save around 16,000 lives every week. In Africa alone, women spend 40 billion hours a year walking for water. Access to clean water gives communities more time to grow food, earn an income, and go to school -- all of which fight poverty. Clean water helps keep kids in school, especially girls. Less time collecting water means more time in class. Clean water and proper toilets at school means teenage girls don’t have to stay home for a week out of every month. Women are responsible for 72% of the water collected in Sub-Saharan Africa. When a community gets water, women and girls get their lives back. They start businesses, improve their homes, and take charge of their own futures. charity: water work with local experts and community members to find the best sustainable solution in each place where they work, whether it’s a well, a piped system, a BioSand Filter, or a system for harvesting rainwater. And with every water point they fund, their partners coordinate sanitation and hygiene training, and establish a local Water Committee to help keep water flowing for years to come. And unlike many other charities, they make sure that our money is going direct to the people they are trying to help. They track every penny we raise and show the projects we helped fund with photos and GPS coordinates. They’ve consistently received the highest grades available for accountability and transparency. Generous philanthropists and Gift Aid cover their operating costs so 100% of our money can fund water projects. You can learn more about charity: water and make a pledge yourself by visiting their site.
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