Bondi Junction Wholefoods Tour

I caught up with a friend over the weekend and on hearing I'm about to start studying nutrition she suggested we meet at Earth To Table vegan cafe in Bondi Junction followed by a tour of some of the other interesting whole food grocers and eateries in the area. I'm a upper Northshore girl and visit the Eastern suburbs rarely so I had no idea what to expect.

I'll admit I was a bit concerned about the idea of lunch at a vegan cafe. All the vegetarian/vegan eateries I've been to don't have much to offer the person who's trying to avoid eating grains. Even the Nature Care College and Australasian College of Natural Therapies cafes that I visited during their open days featured predominantly grain based meals, and salads, too much of which I also seem to be having trouble with lately.

Well! I'm glad to say I was most pleasantly surprised and impressed perusing Earth To Table's delicious sounding menu and finding very little grain at all!! Woohoo!! And no sugar, no dairy, no gluten. Instead there's dishes featuring kelp noodles, spiralised vegetables (veggies shaved into spaghetti-like spirals), nut and seed meal based recipes, coconut this and that, and more superfoods than I thought a business could afford to have on a reasonably priced menu!

I was going to go with a dish light on the raw veg but then someone nearby ordered what I think was called something like Rainbow Noodles (I didn't know I was going to write a blog post about it, otherwise I would've paid more attention, and I can't find a menu online, sorry) and decided "I want that one". It looked like a pile of multi-coloured noodles but was in fact raw spiralised carrot, beetroot and zucchini with baby spinach, avocado and pesto (pictured above). It looked and tasted amazing! Although, like I said, I haven't been handling too much salad all that well lately and within an hour or so I had a mild tummy ache. Lol! Ah well. I don't regret it. I'll put it down as a learning experience and trust that the changes I'm making to my diet will soon make me more able to properly digest spectacular salads like this.

My friend had a chocolate brownie (I'm presuming almond meal or similar and sweetened with maybe coconut nectar, dates or honey) and chocolate coconut milk ice-cream (see photo on right). Oh my! How's the presentation?! I didn't taste it but man it looked good! If I hadn't already been treated to a gluten/dairy/sugar free cake that day I so would've had one as well.

From Earth To Table we wandered over past one of the local Crossfit gyms (they have more than one!) to BU Organics. Goodness! They appear to stock everything your health conscious person could possibly wish to buy, from specialised supplements that are normally only available to purchase online from the US, to water filters, to fresh organic fruits, veg and meats, to a great array of fermented foods and some delicious looking sweets and savouries. A rather ripped young woman (a Crossfitter me thinks) spoke to us enthusiastically about the benefits of combining fossil shell flour and MSM. She was a bit scary. Lol! My friend purchased us some sprouted, toasted buckwheat spread with cashew nut butter. More serious yum!

Then we headed over to aboutlife natural marketplace. I haven't visited an aboutlife since the early days of the original store in Rozelle. They've come a long way since then! What a great selection of fresh organic food and products! I picked up a dozen organic eggs at a great price as I've been eating 2 or 3 a day just lately!

We then crossed the road and popped into the controversial Pete Melov's The Suveran cafe and his adjoining whole foods shop next door. Wow, again. This Northshore girl was blown away by how Bondi has very much embraced the newer 'trends' in nutrition. It was nice to see all the things that I try to incorporate into my diet and feel a bit weird about (lots of fermented foods and grain free alternatives), totally embraced and normalised. My friend bought a fermented coconut and spirulina smoothie and me a 'carob...something' sorry! Again, if I knew I was going to blog about this I would've paid more attention!

Next was a butcher specialising in free range meats where I picked up a very interesting GAPS friendly sounding leaflet for True Foods Nutrition. I'm tempted to try some of their great sounding workshops.

Finally we had a peak through the window at the Paleo Cafe which I'll have to visit another time.

Wow. Well. I am impressed! I tip my hat to you Bondi. I think it will be some years indeed before someone in my humble northshore suburb is brave enough to open a raw vegan whole food or paleo cafe. But who knows!