Author: mandyjj

Shopping can be a daunting task, especially when embracing a new way of eating and changing old habits. With thousands of products from which to choose, here are a few ideas to keep you on the right track.

Don’t be scared of the freezer section.

Foods found in the freezer in the supermarket very rarely contain preservatives. Use your home freezer for leftovers, homemade breads, chopped herbs, chopped chillies, homemade dips, smoothie bananas, etc. If you aren’t sure if something is safe to freeze, search online for information.

Keep it simple.

Many staple foods you already buy are vegan. Peanut butter, jams and marmalades, baked beans, dried pasta, rice, almost all bread, many types of gravy granules, vegetable stock cubes, chopped tomatoes, oven chips and hash browns, coconut milk, lots of curry pastes, many breakfast cereals, herbs, spices, tomato sauce, mustard and pickles, olive oil and vegetable oils, soy sauce, fruit juice, tea and coffee, lots of biscuits, crackers and of course fruit and vegetables – fresh, dried, tinned and frozen.

Shop around.

Sometimes the best place to buy veggies may not be the best place to buy dry or frozen foods, so make sure you do your homework when it comes to price, quality and trustworthiness. Shopping online has transformed the way we can purchase our food. You can order organic and locally produced fruit and vegetables from reputable small businesses and have them delivered to your door. Nearly every major retailer offers online shopping, and you can often choose your hours of delivery – no more last-minute, crazy shopping to buy dinner. Pick n Pay ASAP and Checkers Sixty60 have excellent delivery services.

Get vegan versions of your faves.

There are now vegan versions for almost everything, so you can simply switch like for like. In supermarkets, you will find a range of plant-based milks (oat, soya, almond, coconut, hemp, rice, and more) including flavoured milks (chocolate, strawberry, iced coffee) in the refrigerator. There, you will also find a range of plant-based yoghurts in various flavours and styles, and cheeses.

In the freezer section, you will find vegan burgers, sausages, sausage rolls, mince, fish and other convenient products that help you keep the foods you love that just don’t contain the animal parts. Just make sure to double check that they are vegan, a lot of these products contain milk or eggs. All Fry’s products are 100% vegan and are available at all major retailers (Checkers, Shoprite, Spar, Pick n Pay) nationally. You will find them in the frozen vegetarian section, in bright green boxes. x

On the shelf, you will find vegan mayonnaise, chocolate and many more everyday items.

Never forget the golden rule: do not shop when you are hungry.

Avoid pre-prepared meals and convenience meals; they’re often expensive and have very small portion sizes.

[MEDIA RELEASE – 2 March 2022]

It was announced yesterday by Penguin Random House Publishers that the plant-based cookbook and lifestyle guide, Made with Love & Plants, written by Tammy Fry, has taken the prestigious “Best in South Africa” spot for the category “Corporate Tie-In” at the Gourmand World Cookbook Awards.

Making the awards shortlist of sixteen nominees down to six, Tammy’s book will now compete for Best in World at an awards ceremony in Sweden taking place in early June 2022 at the Umea Food Symposium.

On their website, the Founder and President of the Gourmand Awards, Edouard Cointreau said that the selection of the Gourmand Awards give an overview of the best around the world – showing just how prestigious these awards are. “In total, we estimate there are now over 100 000 food and drink culture books and documents every year, in print or digital, free or paid, with or without ISBN…. There is approximately 1% chance to be selected [on] this Gourmand Awards list!”

Tammy poured years of learning in the plant-based space into Made with Love and Plants. “I am thrilled with this acknowledgment. When writing the book I really tried to tap into my lived experiences as a plant-based athlete, nutritionist, advocate, mom and marketer to create something that was authentic, inspiring and easy to use,” says Tammy Fry.

“My dream was always to create something valuable and accessible that both inspires people to explore their own journey and support those that are already on one,” she adds.

Beverley Dodd, lifestyle publisher at Penguin Random House in South Africa says that a plant-based cookbook created by one of South Africa’s leading advocates for the lifestyle was an obvious choice for them.

“Tammy’s deep experience and understanding of what plant-based living means shone through in this book. It is a beautifully relatable, easy to follow guide for anyone, at any stage of the journey.”

Beverley adds that Penguin Random House, who were also recognised by the Gourmand World Cookbook Awards as Best Cookbook Publisher in South Africa, have seen a notable increase in demand for plant-based lifestyle content.

“There has been a definite increase in awareness around health and environment when it comes to food choices and our Best in South Africa winners reflect this. Congratulations to all the authors – we could not be more proud of you.”

Made with Love and Plants is packed with 75-plant-based, whole food recipes and loads of easy-to-follow information for people wanting to introduce more of a plant-based lifestyle. Tammy explains that she created her recipes through trial and error to make them as simple as possible. “I know what has worked for me and my busy family and I have tried to impart those learnings in the book.”

Tammy’s whole life has been fundamentally linked to the growth of plant-based living. As one of the Fry daughters, and a co-founder of The Fry Family Food Company, she has been at the forefront of helping her parents pioneer plant-based foods in South Africa and across the globe.

Chief Marketing Officer of LIVEKINDLY Collective Mick van Ettinger says that this kind of recognition is an incredible acknowledgment of the power of real stories behind real brands.

“I love how this beautiful cookbook, created with such love and passion by Tammy, has been so prestigiously recognised for its corporate tie-in to the Fry’s brand. The incredible work the Fry family have done in building their brand, pioneering plant-based living and supporting new and existing consumers to explore their own journeys grew out of an authentic desire to gently change the world. The brand, the family and their story are intrinsically linked in a truly authentic way – and this award reflects the strength of that.”

LIVEKINDLY Collective is the global plant-based food company that joined forces with the Fry’s brand in 2020.

Made with Love and Plants is available through all major book retailers.

IG – @tammyfry_

Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/seedbytammy

Issued by Genevieve Cutts on behalf of The Fry Family Food Co. For media enquiries please contact genevieve@thelivekindlyco.com or 082 546 4043.

About The Fry Family Food Co.

It all began in the Fry family kitchen in South Africa over three decades ago, where Wally and Debbie Fry learnt how to make delicious meat-free burgers and sausages to feed their family.

Debbie and her daughter Tammy (both born vegetarians) had persuaded Wally (an avid meat eater) to give up meat. On a mission to find nutritious and satisfying meat alternatives for his family, Wally started experimenting in their kitchen.

30-years later, the Fry’s award-winning range of vegan products is available all over the world and the brand, under the continued guidance of Tammy, has pioneered the plant-based food space by making tasty meat-free alternatives that are simple and fuss-free.

The Fry’s range of vegan food was awarded Best Vegan Meat in the VegFest Awards in the UK two years in a row (2020 and 2021). In 2021 the brand’s Chicken-Style Burger was the only plant-based chicken burger to make it onto abillion’s Top 10 Plant-Based Burger list and their ‘beefy’ Big Fry Burger won the inaugural Plant-Based Food Award at the Symrise Food Review New Product Competition. In 2022 Tammy Fry’s cookbook, Made with Love and Plants, received a prestigious Gourmand World Cookbook Award.

In 2020, The Fry Family Food Co. joined forces with LIVEKINDLY Collective as part of a leading global movement to make plant-based living the new norm. This unique collective is now on track to become one of the world’s largest plant-based food companies.

Fry’s website is www.fryfamilyfood.com

About LIVEKINDLY Collective 

LIVEKINDLY Collective was founded by Blue Horizon Group on the belief that plant-based alternatives have the power to make the global food system sustainable. Its mission is to make plant-based living the new norm.

As a collective of founders, entrepreneurs and business leaders from across the globe, LIVEKINDLY Collective is uniquely positioned to create impact with speed, at scale.

Through its portfolio of brands, Oumph!, The Fry Family Food Co., LikeMeat, No Meat, and The Dutch Weed Burger, LIVEKINDLY Collective is providing consumers around the world with healthy, sustainable and delicious food options.

Furthermore, the company is the voice of the plant-based movement, communicating informative, entertaining and inspiring content through its media and lifestyle platform, LIVEKINDLY, at www.livekindly.com

LIVEKINDLY Collective has 500 employees and sells in more than 40 countries around the world.

LIVEKINDLY Collective was recently awarded Best Plant-Based Business in the World Plant-Based Awards 2021.

To learn more, visit www.thelivekindlyco.com

It’s the month of LOVE and whether you are celebrating the Feast of Saint Valentine with a beloved face-to-face or remotely due to pandemic pandemonium or using the day to focus on the most important relationship one can have – yourself! Cooking up a storm can be a great way to show your loved ones how much they mean to you. Ditch the risk of crowded restaurants, light some scented candles, turn up that smooth plant-based-cheesy jazz, throw on an apron – maybe only an apron, who’s there to judge – and go to town with these delicious, vegan, Valentine’s Day recipes. Plant-based eating can be a great way to bond over shared ideals for the good of the planet, a healthy body, and mind, and has the added benefit of improving your energy levels, wink!

PRAWN-STYLE RICE SPRING ROLLS WITH SOY GINGER AND PEANUT SATAY SAUCES

These light and flavourful rice wraps are the perfect meal to make together and a great excuse to get a little handsy with your food. The end result is sure to be Instagram-worthy! Hot-tip: For an extra romantic flourish include some edible flowers and get creative with your placing.
https://www.fryfamilyfood.com/za/our-recipes/vegan-prawn-style-rice-spring-rolls-with-soy-ginger-and-peanut-satay-sauces/

CRAFTED SAUSAGE ON A STICK IN A COUS COUS AND POLENTA HERBED BLANKET

Great for nibbling and dipping and whiling away an evening together these golden crumbed sossies on a stick not only look impressive, but they’re also playful and a whole lot of fun to eat.
https://www.fryfamilyfood.com/za/our-recipes/crafted-sausage-on-a-stick-in-a-cous-cous-and-polenta-herbed-blanket/

VEGGIE NICE TORTILLA CONES

This recipe is super easy with a fun and fancy twist! Bright, colourful beetroot hummus contrasted against some zesty guac is a celebration of colour and life, what could be more romantic than that?
https://www.fryfamilyfood.com/za/our-recipes/vegetarian-tortilla-cones/

SPAGHETTI AND NON-MEAT BALLS

Name a more romantic scene than famous spaghetti sharing scene in the classic Lady and The Tramp! Share in your very own spaghetti kiss moment with the bonus of being animal cruelty-free. https://fryfamilyfood.com/za/recipes/spaghetti-no-meat-balls/

Valentines Day Truffles

Is it ever really Valentine’s Day without chocolate involved? Pull out all the stops with these handcrafted delicacies from The Fry Family’s own Tammy Fry to finish off your evening with a flourish.

Want to get more recipes? Head over to our cookbook page where there are dozens of free creative plant-based recipes for you to download.

To all our loyal friends, customers and suppliers,

I wanted to touch base with everyone on what 2020 was like for Fry’s and what 2021, and beyond, promises to be.

2020 was a life-changing year for so many. There was great sadness and hardship, but at the same time incredible stories of resilience and determination. We all learnt so much about ourselves, and the world we live in. We saw the best of humanity, and to some degree the worst.

It was also a really, really important year for us as a family.

In 2019, we realized that it was time to explore ways to future proof our business. The plant-based food sector had grown tremendously, and in order for Fry’s to remain relevant and competitive, we needed to partner with someone to help us grow, but (importantly) grow in the right way.

Fry’s is our family’s legacy – my parents have worked tirelessly to build it from a few products made in our kitchen, to producing for 30 different countries. As you know, despite our growth, we’ve always been motivated by principles over profit – making sure that the business lives our personal values at all times. This is why it was essential that we found the right partner – not just a large corporate that was only driven by profit. We had many offers (as a market-leading, established, plant-based food company we had a lot to offer) and it took us a long time, and many long nights around my parent’s kitchen table, to decide who that partner should be.

In early 2020 we finally settled on the then unnamed LIVEKINDLY Collective. With a few investors on board, and a small team of passionate food industry leaders who are determined to change the global food system (including the esteemed Kees Kruythoff our CEO), the LIVEKINDLY Collective showed us that they were totally aligned with our values. Their vision was our vision continued. We could clearly see that the company would grow, and be enormously successful, but would always live a value system that was aligned with our family’s. Through that success, we could see that we would be able to achieve our mission to make plant-based living the new normal. The Fry Family Food Co. under The LiveKindly Collective would be able to make real, sustainable change in the world.

How could we not be on board with that??

It was an exciting but nerve-wracking time and there were hours of backwards and forwards creating the deal that would keep Fry’s intact as the brand and business we’d grown, while also helping us to achieve new heights, reaching even more people, putting even less meat on plates, changing even more hearts and minds.

It is now almost a year since we signed the deal, and I can comfortably say we made the right choice. Fry’s is about to launch in the USA in the retail chain called Sprouts, we are working closely with LIVEKINDLY Collective’s product development teams to create extraordinary innovations, we have extended our factory at Fry’s which has allowed us to treble our output. We are also finally able to actively roll out what we call ‘Project Green’ which is a greening of all our packaging. It is still a work in progress, and there have been some ups and downs but I believe we are getting there.

However, some things have not changed. We still produce out of our factory in Durban, we are still actively involved in operations and new product development (my sister Hayley heads up our NPD department), and I am still leading the growth of the brand locally and globally. We are the only heritage brand in the Collective and our lived experience growing this business is called upon often to advise other teams in Europe, USA and elsewhere. I am incredibly proud that we can take what we learnt building and running Fry’s and use that to help other plant-based brands grow.

There has been change, and change is often hard. But I believe with all my heart that this change is for the betterment of the world, and all the beings we share it with.

We are celebrating 30-years of Fry’s this year and the Fry family will be front and centre of this celebration and we hope you will join us. We want to honour our loyal customers, our passionate colleagues and teammates and my parent’s legacy that will ultimately be part of something that changes the way we eat.

Yours in hope

Tammy Fry