My only previous experience of a vegan meal was way back in 2000 when I was flying Delhi-Dubai-Greece. By the time it came to Greece-Dubai-Delhi leg I had enough of vegan food. My next tryst with it came yesterday night at a dinner organized at The Oberoi in Delhi. The dinner was organized by The Farm at San Benito, Philippines.
The Farm is a leading wellness resort focusing on preventive wellenss. They serve desserts (you can see how important it is for me), main courses, soups and everything we are used to but it is vegan. And that means no meat and no dairy products. The Farm’s products are available in India at The Kirana Shop. The shop stocks many other organic products. I have tried their gooseberry mouth freshener and it is really good.
When I met Jennifer Hazen, the resident manager at The Farm I told her my flight story. She laughed and said tonight’s dinner would change my concept of vegan food and she was right. I asked her to say a few words to my blog readers and she agreed readily.
Jennifer Hazen of The Farm, San Benito, Philippines
While we were chatting they served me a coconut water with chili flakes. Now that was some start! In all my previous meetings with coconut water I never managed to catch it with chili flakes. The dinner was a sumptuous affair too.
The soup I had for the evening was Corn, Ginger and Lemon Grass soup. I was right there ready to change my opinion of a vegan meal. Before it I had Roamine Wrap with Thai Tomato Vinaigrette along with Pomelo Salad with Cashew and Bird Eye Chili Dressing as starters. And even though it was not on The Farm’s menu The Oberoi had provided me with some excellent white wine for the evening.
I asked Jennifer who was her target market? She said the average age of visitors was around 35 and many were interested in prevention and well being. She said if one wanted to do a detox program a minimum four night stay was recommended. But she said some guests came just to visit and be at the resort without engaging in a treatment. She said as of now they had a guest who was staying for 60 nights as well.
The Raw- Book
Going back to food the main course was Green Curry with Raw Vegetables and Steamed Tofu with Spicy Pickled Plum Sauce, Miso Marinated Shitake Mushrooms with Karware Sprouts. It was all uncooked but it was so well done. If they didn’t tell me it was raw food I would never know. It was fascinating to taste so many vegan dishes that were this good.
But for me it is the dessert that makes or breaks a deal. And it was RAW! Chocolate Chili Marble Pie and Raspberry and Mango Soya Milk Panacotta with Pecan Nut Praline. And that was when i was truly convinced that if done well vegan food can be excellent.
I am anyway a vegetarian by choice. But because of my previous flight experience I used to think that food without milk product is a waste. After all in that flight I drooled so often when others were eating cakes and I was eating food. The experience of this dinner tells me otherwise. The Farm has a vegan recipe book called RAW. It is available from The Kirana Shop. I talked to the owner of the Kirana Shop, Ragini Mehra. She had been to The Farm and she was interested in presenting good organic ingredients to her customers. She said for her it was going back to the roots.
I still think that switching completely to vegan food would require huge lifestyle changes for us but I am for sure now going to torture my family with an occasional vegan recipe. It will be a torture because I would be making it!
Good luck for the preparation 🙂
Someone is Special
Thank you 😀
I am just happy to know that Veg options are being considered in meat loving country like Philippines.
Ah that didn’t occur to me!
Go green and organic products are the trend now 🙂
And expensive too 😛
Coconut water with chillies? that’s interesting…
It was indeed interesting Rajesh.
I never can have Vegan Dish two time in a day and certainly turning a Vegan is really near to impossible for me..BTW I wish you luck in preparing this new Vegan Dishes.. 😀
Le us see Harsha 😀
My hubbys a vegeterian so to give company i started following the same and living in a place like America and then travelling around makes it so hard sometimes when i’ve to just eat veggies for lunch and dinner and ice cream at events :p but now we did finally find a couple of places where they make these vegan dishes taste like non vegeterian food 🙂 very interesting.
i’ve written about it here >> http://nomadfashionista.wordpress.com/2013/09/04/out-n-about-in-seattle/
Thanks for sharing Aditi. But I don’t eat non-vegetarian so why will I like my vegan food taste like it? 😀
An interesting read.
Its good be in good health always.. all the best! 🙂
Thank you Divya/
I buy often from the Kirana Shop (not vegan stuff though) and find their stocks are unique and it’s always a nice experience…
I am a vegetarian (okay i do take eggs) but as you have rightly pointed out, being vegan would require huge lifestyle changes…and i can;t let go of cheese…as Im addicted to a lot of them!!
http://www.myunfinishedlife.com
I too like cheese. 😀 Can’t really think of giving it up.
The menu sounded exotic and delicious.
It was, half the names I heard for the first time!
I guess anything can taste good if it is prepared carefully.
That is also true Indu.
I am curious that your blog says it is travel tale from india, but it is tales from outside. I wonder.
http://www.theindivisual.in
Pankaj your comment inspired a post! 😀
http://blogs.gonomad.com/traveltalesfromindia/2013/10/so-how-did-you-name-your-blog.html
There isn’t much difference between a vegan and a vegetarian. Just remove dairy products and byproducts from your diet and you’re already a vegan. And It takes about a month for your body to adjust to your new habits. Believe me!
People stick to their food for 4 reasons- habit, taste, convenience and culture. Humans are programmed to survive and there’s nothing we can’t do if set our mind on it. But the question is why would anybody want to turn vegan?
Broadly 3 reasons:
– People who suffer from obesity, high BP, heart issues, diabetes, cancers and many other ailments are being increasingly asked to switch to plant based diets by their doctors. Some do it albeit reluctantly.
– Few turn vegan for environmental reasons but I find that debatable. Good nonetheless.
– And then there are a lot (myself included) who turn vegan for ethical reasons. For them food becomes a very minute part of their overall philosophy. Personally I feel if you can’t visualize the plight of poor and tortured animals that make your favorite milk, curd, cheese, honey, silk etc, you won’t be able to hold on to your vegan journey.
Iam a vegan for 4+ years and in the best shape of my life. Drop me a line if you have any queries at [email protected]
oh btw, this is exotic food targeted at people splurge on holidays (or detox whatever you wanna call it). Roti, subzi, dal, chawal, pickle, chutney, idli, dosa, vada, sambhar, rasam everything a vegetarian eats at home is vegan too (Dairy byproducts, honey etc exceptions).
I tried to stay on RAW plant based food these navratri but failed. Too much travel, too many outings but at home I managed to hang on to it 🙂 I would love to visit The Farm, San Benito, Philippines someday. Thanks for sharing. Always a pleasure visiting your site
Thank you for sharing you thoughts in detail Vijay. Other than milk and eggs we hardly eat any thing else. I guess we are going to remain that way.