I am in the kitchen at Como Shambhala Estate amid bucolic rice terraces near Ubud to learn the secrets of turning nuts, seeds, fruits and leafy greens into desirable raw dishes, courtesy of executive chef Chris Miller, a Sydneysider and a staunch advocate of raw food, also known as living food.
"Instinctively, raw food just makes sense," says Miller as he presents our class with a dazzling array of ingredients. "A fresh-picked peach tastes better than canned, right?" Miller, who trained with Neil Perry at Sydney's Rockpool, points out that Bali's fertile land and seasonal variations make the island particularly well suited to the style. He tells us the best Balinese produce comes from Bedugal, deeper in the island's interior and farther up along its rich volcanic terrain.
Dewa Putri, Miller's executive sous chef, shows me how to slice young coconut flesh into noodle shapes that make a surprisingly convincing stand-in for the original ingredient. For our dressing, we use almonds soaked for the six to 12 hours necessary for blending with tamarind and chilli. I quickly become addicted to the shallots used as a garnish on top, which are dehydrated, not deep fried.
No raw kitchen is complete without a dehydrator, Miller says. Ingredients such as the shallots are laid out flat along trays and placed in the dehydrator. I master dehydrated fruit muesli in almond milk, zucchini, basil and semi-dried tomato lasagne, and a luscious strawberry agar-agar with cashew ice cream.
According to raw foodists, cooking foods at a temperature higher than 48C dehydrates cells to the point of destroying nutritional value. Uncooked foods, they argue, contain a much higher percentage of digestive enzymes, vitamins, minerals and nutrients. Equipped with the recipes I've gleaned from Miller, and seriously considering buying a dehydrator to keep up the good work, I check out of this idyllic wellness resort and head to the heart of Ubud to speak to American chef Leah Rinaldi.
Over raw tacos made from root vegetables in place of meat, salsa, guacamole and cashew sour cream served on romaine lettuce leaves, Rinaldi tells me raw food cured her digestive problems and back pain, and "it's a really fun way to make healthy desserts". Rinaldi is credited with introducing raw chocolate mousse to Bali's nascent living-food community. She also helped create raw food dishes for Ubud cafes before launching The Art & Science of Living Food Cuisine, three-day raw cooking and eating retreats held in the rice paddies north of Ubud. On the menu are foods such as pineapple granola with vanilla cashew milk and Rinaldi's signature raw chocolates filled with orange or basil. Morning yoga and massage treatments balance the taste testing.
At Puri Ganesha beachfront villas at Pemuteran in northwest Bali, owner Diana von Cranach tells me she discovered raw food at a yoga camp in Byron Bay. Over a deliciously filling bowl of living green soup ("everything green blended together"), von Cranach says she was excited at the prospect of incorporating raw food practices with the Balinese medicinal leaves used by villagers in the area.
"If you put something living into you, your immune system is automatically boosted," she tells me while delivering the next course of watermelon and seaweed salad in tahini dressing. We move on to her signature urab terrine, which is a raw adaptation of a local dish made with steamed vegetables. It tastes as fantastic as it looks: piled high with shredded coconut and topped with just-picked tomato sambal. Cooking classes are also available here and soon this vibrant 60-year-old, who credits living food for her high energy, will launch a pan-Asian raw cookbook.
After all this activity there's nothing else for it but to tie on a bikini and go horizontal under the raw sun with a sugar-free fruit fool made from papaya and banana pureed with fresh vanilla, raw cacao beans and north Bali raw forest honey. My Bali feel-good holiday just took on a whole new meaning. News from theaustralian.news.com.au
