Vanuatu’s national dish is a root vegetable cake called ‘laplap’. It is made from manioc (cassava) grated or shaved into a banana leaf with wild local cabbage that I was talking about before and coconut, wrapped into a flat parcel and cooked underground. 

Vanuatu staple root veggie ” manioc” 

plantain - cooking banana 

I found ” lap lap” in the market 

Manioc lap lap with chicken - 200 vatu 

I bought it but gave the chicken back. 

banana  lap lap -50 vatu

No plastic bag to take away, banana leaf ! 

Banana and manioc lap lap 

Rasberries are not cheap in Sydney. 

Look at these organic fresh raspberries!  only $2 !  

One punnet of raspberries is like $6 in Sydney. This is like three times bigger than one punnet. 

so you can imagine how exited I was…

 Then I ate them…nnn? Sour! very similar taste to raspberries but definitely more sour! These are not raspberries! 

Anyway, I could not eat berries alone so my creative boy friend gave me an idea. 

Mix with banana!  you see, whole bunch is $1.  

simply mushed together….

Put on my brown rice flake with goji berries…nnnn high in antioxidant :) 

Do I look younger now?? 

I had a few vegetable I have never seen or eaten in Vanuatu. 

This is called “ local cabbage” in Vanuatu

It doesn’t look cabbage, does it? Well, it is dark leafy green veggie, must be really nutritious! 

A lady making a bunch of local cabbage at the market 

It is huge but only A$1 to 2 ( 100 to 150 Vatu )

* Me and local cabbage in front of our room. get idea how huge it is? 

When I cut the leaf or stalk, slimy juice comes out. Well, luckily we have similar slimy veggie in Japan so I get exited not scared.

Why? Moroheiya, the Japanese slimy vegetable is my favourite veggie so I am hoping that this local cabbage tastes similar.

By the way, slimy veggie is normally very nutritious!! 

In Japan, we simply boil it and eat with soy sauce.

So I did it the same.  Taste? It is quite similar! Yay!

 Also put in miso soup

  I was told eat only leaves. I was eating stalk as well…..

Another my new found veggie is ” snake bean” 

not this snake beans, guys

This one!  Huge, again. I can use only half for one big dish. 

When you cut..

then peel 

* I had the worst peeler in the kitchen so I couldn’t peel properly 

cut in half 

get rid of seeds 

and cut into small pieces 

* I am using blunt and very small knife and glass chopping board ( why do they exist? ) 

Local people stir fry them. 

I put in miso soup or congee.  

Taste? nnnnn, hard to describe. I’ve had nothing like this before. Not strong taste, maybe similar to zucchini?  not taste like snake beans that I know for sure or beans. but texture is totally different. bit like …..nothing! 

Do I like it? Yes, if I can buy them in Sydney, I will buy them. 

I love travelling to discover new food xxxxx 

There are some area you can actually dine at the market

I must say this in THE ONLY PLACE that you pay meal as a local price.  All meal like chicken curry with rice or grilled fish with rice are 400 vatu ( A$1 = 107 vatu ) , quite cheap, isn’t it? 

Places are quite clean. I got scared many times at market or market dining area in South East Asia but here looks quite clean and peaceful, isn’t it? 

In Vanuatu, restaurants are purely only for tourist or foreigner who lives there.  Prices are definitely Australian price! Lots of people Australian and New Zealand actually come and live there as a second house or own business. 

We were checking all places..keep checking if we could have vegetarian meal…

then a kind lady took us to meet Esta, who can actually prepare vegetarian meals. 

Meet the only chef who cook vegetarian meal at market

Esta!!!!!! 

We had chance to have vegetarian meal at her place twice. 

Being vegetarian is not common at all in Vanuatu so, she cooked our meal to order. 

Fresh veggies cooked in fresh tomato. 

There is a big fruits and veggie market in the town in Portvila.

All fruits and veggies here are organic, well I mean everything in Vanuatu is organic anyway.

selling various veggies and fruits 

It is definitely much cheaper than supermarket. The cheapest is on the road, sometime not even people are not around but market is open 7am to 11pm and in the middle of town so we went to this market to shop or eat many times.

carrots 50 vatu       ( A$ 1 = 107 vatu ) 

washing carrots next to the shop 

skewered lettuce ! isn’t it funny way to sell? 

By the way, lettuce here is so soft….

watermelon on the floor

Taro, one of the staple food here are on the ground out side. Interesting way to display the food…

I couldn’t find cucumber in the market and wondering if no cucumber in Vanuatu then I ate cucumber in the market dining area. 

that is right, below is the one. They are yellow and thick not like thin, long and green cucumber I know. 

Cucumber from 20 vatu to 200 vatu!  all depends on size 

I had boiled peanuts in Hawaii but these are all raw. Taste? quite similar to boiled peanuts. I must say roasted peanuts tastes much better…I couldn’t finish boiled peanuts in Hawaii, again, I couldn’t finish raw peanuts…  :(  I also bought roasted peanuts here, it was sooo fresh and nice. Yes, I finished roasted one. 

raw peanuts 

veggie called ” Suzut” that I have never seen or eaten. 

I asked how to clean and cook at the market. 

First, boil with small amount of water then add coconuts milk. it is quite often served as a side dish of chicken. Quite simple way of cooking cut cleaning is bit hard. 

You need to get rid of thick bottom part of stalk and also curly part. Young thin curly parts are ok to eat but thick curly part, you have to remove. As you can see, lots of curly parts…. Even though they said, it is easy to clean but I can tell, it will take long time…. so I didn’t buy. 

I had so much fun in the market and went back many times. Well I must say, I had to go there by myself sometimes because my boyfriend got really sick of going there that often. 

I will write about more about market again ! 

Coffee is grown in Tanna island that is famous for volcano in Vanuatsu.

They are all organic!

We have been having problem finding decaf, so end up drinking tea and coffee with caffeine ( I know it sounds really ridiculous) but we found Tanna decaf coffee in Jills cafe in a town!  oh, but still no soy milk option. Well, it is holiday so I went for cow milk! 

I have been eating lots of fruits here in Vanutatsu. 

Whenever I travel, I search for seasonal, local and value fruits in each countries. 

You can see from blogs from Hawaii, Singapore, Spain… 

It seems like banana, mango, paw paw and pineapples are the most popular fruits here. All the fruits are not ” good looking” but all fruits are ” organic” here!  

Welcome fruits from the apartment where we stay 

Vanuatsu fruits salad ! 

mango, pinapple, paw paw and banana 

( Ugly fruits salad, why? gosh, I am using very small, thin and very blunt knife with glass chopping board!  Help! ) 

We went to a huge fruits and veggie market in a town, which is absolutely fantastic and I have been kept going there but the freshest fruits here is from where we stay. 

This place got lots of trees!

coconuts tree

banana tree 

Billy who works here skilfully climbed the tree and peeled the coconuts for us 

much smaller than the coconuts from Thailand that we have in Sydney. 

and open

Taste?  not as sweet as Thailand one. a little bit sour. I had some massive coconuts that has no taste in Cambodia, compare to it, it is nicer, I think. 

then Billy cut in half for us to eat flesh! 

so soft and yummy flesh :) 

I must say, Thailand one is the best,  buy hey, this is straight from the tree and healthy! I am very very happy! 

The owner of the apartment also kinky gave us bananas from their massive beautiful garden. 

Banana still in brunch! 

Then I was shocked that banana is so juicy! 

when you just peel the banana and eat, you never notice but when I cut this banana, OMG so juicy. 

Can you tell how juicy they are? 

Also when I cut not good looking at all mango, for the first time, lots of juice comes out as I cut. Seriously, I cut a lots of mango in my life, I have never ever see so much juice is literally flooded from the fresh. 

Mango here taste little bit different. It taste ” wild ” . What that means? hard to explain…when you eat game, it tastes different from chicken, right? They have more ” wild” animal flavour. so I would say, mango here has more ” plant” flavour. make sense?

I am still new to have vegetarian meal on plane.  My first one was only 6 months ago! so I am still get very exited what I am going to get on plane :) 

My flight was from Sydney to Portvilla, Vanuatsu. It is a short flight ( 3.5h )  so only one meal 

Potato and pumpkin bake - layered thinly sliced potato and pumpkin. Bechamel sauce in between. Because of pumpkin, it was sweet. 

Veggies with creamy sauce- lots of peas, carrot, red and yellow capsicum with cream sauce. The sauce has very usual taste…sour and creamy….interesting. 

with salad and orange cake 

Whenever I see dairy, I regret that why I haven’t changed to vegan meal request. I better do now for the return flight meal. 

I can’t drink much but I couldn’t resist to try Vanuastu beer ” Custusuke “ 

It was nice and light but I had a few sip and gave to my boyfriend because I get drunk so easily…

can’t wait to try lots of food in Vanuatsu! 

It is the last day of detox. Tomorrow is the photo shooting and the day after is my holiday.  

Day 4, start from salt water purge and after staying toilet for a while, had green smoothie as usual. 

Today, I am going to town that is 50km away from CBD for cooking demonstrations. I will not cook any detox food there, so I was thinking what I can bring for my lunch in despair. 

Again, still cooked quinoa in the fridge, so quickly add chickpea, avocado, tomato and pesto, lemon juice, salt and pepper. 

veggie stick to eat in the car

During detox, it is really important to carry food with me. 

then I actually found ” gluten free banana and walnuts cake” in the freezer last night after craving for sweets… when you desperate, find something! 

I defrosted over night so I had a lovely moment with cake and rooibos tea. 

then dinner, again, after having two cooking demonstration, I really didn’t feel cooking ( again! ) but I saw Facebook, then Gabbi ask if I know any good recipe for a five bean chilli. I actually never followed the recipe…

 I like the five bean chilli with lots of veggie. You know, I am not so bean person to start with and always nice to have veggie anyway. 

Then I  google some recipe that seems good, the recipe with lots of veggie version 

then I again, changed recipe…. I had eggplant that need to cook urgently so I add as well…also I had only 3 kind of chilli in my pantry. 

end up with I cooked not so fabulous five bean chilli. I put a lots of veggie though.

Then I have just noticed now that I forgot to put coriander!!!! damn. 

anyway, I still have cooked quinoa so I ate with quinoa. 

My man was eating with yellow rice that is left over from Wednesday cooking demo. I didn’t eat cos it is white rice…( even it is yellow, but originally white rice, of course ) 

I am so proud that I have made it. 

It was only four days but felt like soooo long… I was planning to have ” full” detox in January 2012, I am not sure if I want to do it again so soon…..well, let’s see. 

Day 3. Started from salt water purge. then green smoothie, exactly the same as yesterday. 

For snack, I was eating carrot like a rabbit. 

Lunch

Quinoa tabouli and pan-fried tempe with avocado salsa. 

Both quinoa and tempeh are complete protein! very filling 

Marinated tempeh - kind of soy sauce based. quite nice. 

probiotic, the good bacteria in tummy food 

Pan fry all sides

Then I got serious sweet craving….

very serious one. I didn’t know what to do. I guess I normally eat lots of rice, so my sweet satisfaction is filled with eating rice ( rice is sugar after all ) 

but I haven’t had rice at all since I started detox. 

Just had rooibos tea ( of course, non caffeine! ) , soy milk and organic maple syrup to survive.  

I put half soy milk and water then tea bag for creamier and stronger tea

then I was still hungry, so I found some roasted potato left over in the fridge, and kept eating….very sad. 

Dinner 

Quinoa congee with umeboshi ( Japanese salted plum ) 

Looks like I cooked something but ….

I must admit, I didn’t feel like making juice or cooking at all at dinner time. 

It’ my last resort

It’s the second day. I am so proud again today :) 

Even though I had a meeting at 7am, I woke up early and still did salt water purge in the morning. 

and I found new thing about salt water purge…. 

It was harder to do the purge this morning, and I know why. 

I ate the soup with buckwheat late last night! 

I was quite surprised that I didn’t have much problem doing purge Day 1. I normally eat at dinner time even when I detox but I had juice for the first time. 

My conclusion

” Eat less, then you have easy purge! ” , I think….let’s see how I feel tomorrow after behaving so well today. 

Green smoothie to start as usual 

Kale, lettuce, parsley, banana, peach , chia seeds, flaxseeds, acai berry and alkaline water. 

This morning, Mr banana lover/ smoothie maker was in Melbourne so I put more variety of green and less banana and put lots of peach. I love peach!!! so glad they are in season now :))) 

.

By the way, I have not only one glass but 2.5 to 3 glasses of smoothie during this detox. 

forgot to mention yesterday, I had sprulina. looks awful but not too bad. 

I ate two carrots for snack before lunch. 

then I had HUGE salad for lunch. ( I am learning from yesterday, not to get starved at night ) 

When Fiona came into kitchen when I was about to eat, she told me ” That’s a massive salad. Are you gonna eat all of them ?!?!?!” in shock. then Valerie goes ” She can eat, you know” cos she know how much I eat…..

I had a cooking demo today but didn’t touch any food except some mushroom and eggs. so proud of me! 

Salad with fried tempe! 

lettuce, carrot, cucumber, avocado, tomato with soy sauce based dressing. 

Salt water purge flushes good bacteria as well so it is important to  eat probiotic food. 

I just fried tempe with sesame oil and put salt and pepper. 

Then juice for dinner. 

such an artistic colour surface of juice, isn’t it? 

Juice- celery, silver beat stalks, carrot, apple

Today, I put lots of beet root. Dark red!!! 

I must say that I had lots of energy today. I think it is power of ” raw” veggie and fruits. 

I know it is better to have 80% raw food everyday but in reality, I have maybe 20 to 30% raw in daily life. such a huge difference! 

I hope I can keep high raw food percentage after the detox. 

I must confess that I had soup my day 1 detox. 

After writing the day 1 detox, I got hungry, and felt cold. I guess I just ate cold food, No, fresh living food only and also quite small amount unlike me. I normally eat at least 4 times more than that. also we are having quite cold summer this year in Sydney :( 

so I wanted to have something warm, also filling…so made kale, enoki, daikon and buckwheat soup

1. Cook the buckwheat in a boiling water until cook. Set aside. 
2. place water, daikon ( Japanese radish ) and vegetarian Asian stock in a pot and bring to the boil and reduce heat and simmer until daikon is cooked. Add light soy sauce to taste. 
3. Fry the enoki mushroom in a sesame oil.  Set aside
4. Put cooked buckwheat, enoki and shredded kale in a bowl and pour the soup over. 

I was bit weak yesterday but I felt much better after having soup. Only problem is that I had two big bowls of soup…oops! 

Just in case you are not familiar with enoki…

Enoki mushroom

Enoki mushroom is very popular mushroom in Japan. we put is in miso soup, stir fry, hot pot…and more! 

I  saw some recipes that using enoki in raw in Australia but I really don’t think it is a good idea. not tasty at all and even taste horrible. 

The best way of using enoki is ” pre fry” the enoki with sesame oil. It add beautiful sweet taste if you fry. 

I used to add enoki directly in stir fry, omelette or soup. Then I was told that ” pre fry” technique, gosh, that is right, it is much nicer! 

When enoki is raw, looks a lot but once they are cooked, they shrink a lot :( 

If you can’t use it up, you can always freeze after frying, or keep in fridge for a week. 

2011 is nearly over. It is hard time to do detox because of Christmas party season, but I MUST do this right now to cleanse myself. ( also hoping to have flat tummy ) 

My detox diet is 

NO caffeine, alcohol, dairy, gluten, white sugar and rice, red meat ( I’ m vegetarian so no meat anyway ) 

and eat lots of ” living food ” which is raw veggies and fruits, preferably in liquid not much solid food to let ” rest” intestine that work so hard for me. 

Technically I started from last night cos I had only veggie and fruits juice for dinner. I am so proud of my self… it is always good to have light meal or liquid only before salt water purge 

I started from salt water purge  that is not so fabulous feeling… if you don’t know what it is, please click. 

After staying toilet for a while, finally feel like breakfast. well, it is nothing different from my usual. I have green smoothie everyday anyway. 

Green smoothie 

kale, banana, pear,chia seed, flaxseed, acai berry powder and alkaline water. 

Almost the same as this but recently my smoothie powers up with acai berry powder! 

I made salad for lunch

various beans and tomato with tahini and ume dressing with mix leaves

I had so many teas…of course, no caffeine tea. 

I was little weak…so I had hard time kneading bread dough for cooking demonstration tomorrow….

I was so hungry so I had few snack, but it was orange, pear and roasted potato. 

I am so proud….

Dinner…is juice! 

washing veggies, I had silver beets root ( I used the leaf part for green smoothie a couple days ago ) and celery. 

washing 

apples and beet root. Pear and peach are for tomorrow’s smoothie 

red cabbage

red cabbage, beet root, silver beet root, celery, apple juice. 

Sounds bad ? no it is nice and sweet. 

I forgot to have Udo’s oil this morning so I had it ….that is actually made me full. 

I HATE this oil. Taste awful but it is ok to drink with juice. 

gosh…detox…. 

Well, I want to 

• get rid of toxins that accumulated in 2011
• look good on photo shoot this Saturday 
• look good in bikini in Vanuatsu  ( with flat tummy!!!! ) this Sunday
• have super healthy body 
• look younger
• absolute health

It’s worth it!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

I must say this is not my favourite thing to do. It is disgusting…but after drink the salt water and stay in the toilet, I can actually see and feel I am cleansing. 

I do salt water purge when I am on detox. During detox, I eat less, and clean food. 

No caffeine, alcohol, dairy, gluten, process food, white sugar or rice. No red meat if you are non vegetarian. 

I love talking about this purge and many asked what it is. I am glad that I can finally answer this 

Purging with salt-water is a known Ayurveda intestinal tract cleansing system and also a completely natural body detox 

There are many laxatives, mixes, enemas, and other colon cleansing products on the market, but they are simply chemicals or medicines. A salt water cleanse is a  natural and healthier alternative and cheap!

Benefits of Salt water purge

•    It cleanses entire digestive system
•    Natural
•    Cheap
•    Easy

Salt water purge is not only colon cleansing, but  also cleanses your stomach and small intestine. In other words it flushes out your entire digestive system. It removes all of the toxins, accumulated fecal matter, regular feces, parasites, and bacteria from your whole digestive tract.

all you need is …

Recipe

Ingredients

1 Liter (32 oz.) of warm water

 2 leveled teaspoons of unrefined sea salt. (use knife to level)

Method

Shake or stir well, then drink the entire container of salt water within 15mins!

It is important not to use iodized table salt!!!! 

I use celtic salt

This salt is slightly gray, you can clearly tell it is not unrefined!

How?

Drink first in the morning

Drink within 15min

At least skip one meal (it is the best you have light meal or just juice night before then do it first in the morning)

Do not do more than 7 days in a row

Do it at home (not to go out at least 1 hour )

Eat less !  

Try on your day off then you know what to expect…

-What to expect-

*stay in a bathroom very long 

*go to bathroom very often

( It’s like do no.2 like no.1, you will know what I

mean… )

Recommendation  

Recommend to have food that contains good bacteria during or after purge

Because we flush not only bad bacteria and also good one.

•    yogurt

( it is dairy so please don’t have it at all during detox. Also some yogurt don’t contain good bacteria so need to check the lable! )

•    Kimchi – Korean pickles
•    sauerkraut
•    tempe
•    Natto! ( Japanese fermented soybeans, stink and slimy! )

or simply take probiotics

This link is helpful. You can watch the video, a guy drinking salt water…also some tips. Check it out.

http://themastercleanse.org/salt-water-flush/

also these links are helpful

http://www.healthiertalk.com/detoxify-your-body-naturally-salt-water-flush-4340

http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-a-saltwater-flush.htm

Good luck!

Double mascarpone tiramisu

that’s right, double amount of mascarpone. I have never tasted such a texture. It is thicker, richer. Extremely naughty! 

Italian is quite dangerous. I tend to over eat !!!

Filicudi

11 Ramsay Road
Five Dock, Sydney, NSW, Sydney, NSW

(02) 9713 8733