PACIFIC VEGAN – Healthy and Sustainable Recipes from Pacific Plants

I would like to write a cookbook, “Pacific Vegan”, to promote the vegan diet in Fiji and the South Pacific. The book will give people new ideas of plant-based recipes that can be prepared easily and cheaply from local produce. This will be the first ever vegan cookbook promoting a plant-based diet using Pacific indigenous produce.

One of biggest problem in Fiji and in the region is that many people abandoned their largely plant-based traditional diet to adopt a Western-style diet based largely on high-fat animal products (and junk food). One of the reasons for this is that traditional cuisine is no longer considered appealing as vegetables were mostly boiled and eaten without seasoning (which is often perceived to lack taste).

As part of my work in Fiji as a nutritionist, I create tasty vegan recipes focusing on nutritious ingredients that can be found easily and cheaply at the market. I teach vegan cooking classes and have a blog where I share healthy recipes with local ingredients.

My blog is the only healthy vegan blog focusing on Pacific ingredients and has more than 2900 followers.

Website: healthyeatingfiji.com
Fb: www.facebook.com/healthyeatingfiji

All my recipes are budget-friendly, which is very important in a region where most countries are developing or even least developed (such as Samoa, Vanuatu, or Solomon Islands).

By way of background, when I moved to Fiji in 2017 veganism was unknown and there was no local vegan community. However, veganism is now becoming more mainstream also thanks to many of the activities I contributed to initiate, such as my vegan cooking classes and VegFest, the first vegan festival ever held in the South Pacific (www.facebook.com/VegFestFiji). The activities are now very popular, with many classes, dinners and events sold out days in advance.

The cookbook is the continuation of this work and will contribute to keep the "vegan momentum" going.