The Raw Kitchen - new premises

I blogged about the Raw Kitchen before but felt a new post needed to be made since their recent reinvention. Not only have they relocated, but they have also gotten bigger.
They are now situated at 181A High Street Fremantle, in what looks like a warehouse. The interior is all high ceiling, open faced brick walls, chain link fences and shipping containers. The tables range from long wooden ones, to booth styles, with seats that look like they have been ripped out of old buses. Sad to say that the other seating seems to range from small wooden chairs to metal ones. Common denominator - all pretty uncomfortable. I was really hoping that with the new venue, they would have ditched those chairs that were obviously built to hold primary school aged kids.
Your cutlery and water gets served to you in glass jars and brown bottles, and the food on small wooden boards and little enamel dishes.

The whole look is a cross between rustic and recycled, which does not appeal to me at all. But then, that is just personal taste, I guess. Just so long everything looked and was clean, that's what matters the most to me - and this place certainly passed that requirement from what I noticed.

We were seated at one of the long wooden tables. Although this new location is much larger than their old one, the place was VERY busy and I understood that having such big communal tables saves on space. Having said that, I didn't really like sitting at a table, facing strangers while I ate. Oh well.

Apart from the food (which I will get to in a moment), the new Raw Kitchen also features the 'Sea Container Gallery' that displays pieces by local artists and craftsmen, which can be purchased.
Yoga and fitness classes, as well as raw food preparation classes are also on offer and I do believe there will be film nights planned.
The new venue also has a bigger shopping area where there are all sorts raw and non-raw  packaged food items - many of them vegan, plus books, gifts, toiletries, etc.

We found the service to be mostly good. Having only just reopened, a LOT of people are curious to see the new place, and so the place was already very busy when we arrived a little before noontime. Nevertheless, we were seated almost immediately and our orders were taken in a timely manner. The only gripe I have is that when ordering, we asked the server if there was any egg in the 'mayo' in two of the dishes we wanted. She kept saying 'There is no dairy' in any of our dishes. I had to point out to her that egg was not dairy, which gave her pause. To her credit, she did go and find out for us. The verdict - NO EGG is used in ANY of their dishes. This of course begs the question  - why do they not mark this on their menu? Their menu is marked as completely dairy free, and where honey is used, it is marked. Why not mark things as completely egg free or just use the 'vegan' tag, and be done with it? Surely, they realize that a big number of their clientele are vegans? 

For our entree, we opted for the Aromatic fennel seed roasted chats with lemon juice. 

I'm a big fan of potatoes and these were lovely. Cooked just right. Obviously, this wasn't a raw entree. Infact, there were quite a few new items on the menu and quite a few were not raw. This may bother some raw food purists and it didn't bother me one bit.

The other entree we had was the Tempeh snaps. These were strips of cooked tempeh, made from lupin and not soy, sitting on top of cooked cauliflower. The dish came with a tasty garlic and caper aioli. I am not big on garlic but found their aioli to be mild on that front, so I enjoyed it very much.

For drinks, I opted for the Blue Moon smoothie, which featured blueberries, banana, lavender, agave, and almond milk. It was delicious. You could certainly taste the lavender but it was not overwhelming.

My partner had the Dream Juice which was a mixture of pineapple, lime, young coconut and apple.

For the mains, we had a lot to choose from. I ordered the club sandwich. 

As you can see from the photo, it was jam packed! Between two layers of dehydrated flax bread, was an assortment of goodness - marinated mushrooms, mango salsa, raw cashew 'mayo', tomatoes, lettuce, cucumber, alfalfa sprouts and onion. (I forgot to ask them to leave the onion out, so just picked it out as best I could.)
The sandwich was delicious but be warned - eating was tricky business. a mixture of hands and cutlery had to be employed.


My partner had the Raw pesto pasta, which featured radish, fresh basil, avocado, capers, sundried tomatoes and baby spinach.

After all of that, we didn't have room for dessert. There was plenty on offer - tarts, cakes, slices, balls, etc. Maybe next time!

The Raw Kitchen is open Mon-Thurs 7.30am - 4pm. Fri-Sun 7.30am - 10pm

The Raw Kitchen Cafe - revisited

Earlier this year, I visited this cafe in Fremantle but had only had a dessert there. As lovely as that was, I knew I had to go back to have lunch.

This time, I was keen on trying their raw zucchini pasta. I am glad I did! When my order arrived, a large bowl was set in front of me, filled with a delicious looking pile of goodness. The zucchini noodles were long, and tender and mixed in with mushroom, kalamata olives and a rich marinara sauce. The fresh basil and the macadamia 'parmesan cheese', topped it all off very well.  (Note that in the photo below, I had already started eating before I remembered to take a shot of it! That's how keen I was to try it out! Oops!)

For drinks, I sampled the 'Choc it to me' smoothie which was thick and tasty with its banana, raw cacao, agave and almond milk.

I was pretty full but then had to have a bite of a raw 'cherry ripe' - type of slice. It was yummy but perhaps a bit too sweet for me. My partner, however, had no problem demolishing it!

I know that I will need to pay The Raw Kitchen another visit soon, as my friends orders the Nachos and it looked so good, that I knew I had to come back to try that! 

What a work of art!

For opening times and location, check out their website.

Event: Art for the Ocean, 17 November, 2012

Note this one down in your diaries if you live in Fremantle, Perth, or thereabouts.

See below for details, plus the event's webpage for more information.
(Pardon the clumsy look of this post - the image will not show the details clearly if made smaller to fit on page.)

Event: Human Chain, 18 November 2012

I attended this event last year and hope to attend this year's. Let's keep up the pressure. Let's stay visible to show our federal government and all other politicians that we abhor this disgusting 'trade' and that we will not  stop until a ban is put into place, once and for all.

If you live in Perth, Fremantle, and surrounds, I hope to see you there!

See below for details.

The Juice Beetroot Cafe

A coworker told me about this cafe, telling me how good it was. She warned me that if I went, I should go by noonish, as it is quite popular and by the afternoon, there is not much food left.

 It took me a while to find the time to get down to Fremantle on a weekday ( and it had to be a weekday, as they are only open Monday to Fridays - 10am to 4pm), to check it out.

It is easy to miss, as it is situated in a lane way, called Tum Tum Tree Lane, off High Street. The sandwich board sign by the road helped us to spot it, though. Was pleased to see it mention so many appealing things on it.  We quickly scooted in to see what was on offer for lunch. There was already a queue but that was okay, as it allowed us the eyeball the many types of salads at the counter, plus check out what hot foods were available.

Both my partner and I opted for a large bowl each of various salads. Let me just say that we were rather taken aback by the size of these bowls. They honestly did not look that large until they were filled - and they were filled to brimming fullness!

On offer were a noddle based salad, roast veggie salad, chickpea salad, pasta salad, rice salad, and so very much more. (There was a vegetable lasagna but this was vegetarian and not vegan.)

There were curries and tofu burgers on offer but the salads just took too damn fresh and good to pass up so we had as little bit of almost all of them between the two of us.

They were delicious! I had so much in my bowl that I only managed to eat half of it and the rest I had put into a container and took home for later.

It is a pity this cafe isn't open on weekends, but if you find yourself in Fremantle on a weekday, I recommend you pay them a visit. Just make sure you get in early!

Event - A special presentation by Philip Wollen, 3rd August

I am a little late with this, so apologies for the short notice. This event will be taking place THIS FRIDAY, 3rd August, at Fremantle Town Hall. Check the image below for details. 

Also, have a watch of this video clip below in which Philip Wollen debates For "Animals Should be Taken off the Menu".  Simply put, his presentation and argument  is informative, logical and clear.

Raw Kitchen Cafe - Fremantle

This lovely little cafe is central to Fremantle but is tucked away in the Piazza Arcade so you have to look for it. Having heard good things about it, we had to go and check it out.We already had lunch elsewhere, so we decided to stopped into The Raw Kitchen cafe for something sweet.

My partner ordered the Minty Moment Smoothie which I ended up sipping from. From the first mouthful, we both described it as tasting 'very real'. I know that sounds strange, but after having tasted this raw drink, it makes you realize how fake and artificial big brand, mainstream versions are. This drink contained raw cacao, fresh mint, agave, vanilla bean, almond milk and ice. It was divine!  Checking out the drinks menu, we noticed that none were made with honey, as some raw food places are known to use. Instead, agave is used for sweetening, which makes them vegan suitable. And, for 2 dollars extra you can get superfood boosts included in your smoothie. This includes spirulina, wheatgrass, chia, etc. Oh, and I loved the use of glass straws - something I had not used before.

Whilst my partner sipped his smoothie, I got stuck into a slice of raw vegan cheesecake. The one I had was apple, maple and cinnamon and was delicious! Not sickly sweet, super creamy and a right balance of cinnamon used. I also loved the fresh apple slices on top. They went very well with the cake.

I do hope to be back there again soon, to try out their savories, such as the raw pasta. They also offer raw soup, club sandwich, pizza, nachos and salads. All of their menu items are dairy, sugar and gluten free.
Because I am fairly new to raw food cooking, my mind just boggles at the creativeness of some of these items. The cafe offers raw cooking classes and inside, there is a small selection of specialist raw food ingredients and equipment.

The Raw Kitchen Cafe is open Wednesday - Sunday. Check out their website for opening hours and address.

Manna Wholefoods and Cafe - South Fremantle

I had been meaning to check out this store/cafe for a while now, but living on the other side of the city meant I had to make a special trip down. I am glad I did and I have now been back again and looking forward to my next visit.

The cafe offers all sorts of yummy things - desserts, drinks, salads, patties, wraps, bakes, raw foods, etc. Not all is vegan but they label everything clearly so you can make an informed decision on what to order. Both times my partner and I visited, the cafe was very, very busy. The service, however, was quick and efficient. On my first trip I opted for a vegan bake which was a mixture of pumpkin, seeds, cherry tomatoes, chickpeas and more. Tasty, filling and the serve was generous.

My partner chose the tempeh wrap and a tofu patty. Not being a fan of tempeh, I just tried his tofu patty and was seriously jealous! 

On my second visit for lunch, I opted for a slice of gluten free vegan pizza and a quinoa salad. Again, the portions were generous and the food delicious.

After stuffing ourselves, it was time to check out the store section. I was naturally drawn towards the books on sale. I liked the way in which they were categorized and instantly started pursuing the raw food and the vegan sections. I saw a fair amount of titles there that I had not seen elsewhere.

After the books, we explored the other shelves. Again, I must stress that Manna is not an exclusively vegan store, so shop with some caution. There was plenty of brands and products I recognized from shopping elsewhere, but also came across many others that were new to me. Their shelves were stocked well with products ranging from bulk food ingredients, confectionery, toiletries, cleaning products, etc. There is a meat freezer chest to one side of the store, which I found to be rather sad and distasteful. It just doesn't fit in with the look and feel of the store and I really wish they got rid of it.
Apart from that, I do recommend checking out this store and cafe, even if it means a fair trip to get to it.

Check out their website for their address and opening times.