You’ve spoken previously about being quite health conscious, how would you fit your healthy eating habits into such a jam-packed schedule?
It’s hard, particularly with the travel factor. There’s lot of things I do. I struggled with chronic fatigue in my early 20s and had to play a little bit of a health detective and had to take control of my own health because I wasn’t getting a lot of the answers that I was needing.
For me, I wake up every morning and I just choose the healthier versions when possible. If it’s not, if I’m at an event and I haven’t eaten and I’m hungry and there’s not something that’s going to cater to my needs, I won’t be too hard on myself if I need to do that.
But there’s so many alternatives nowadays. Everywhere you go, there’s an option – dairy-free, gluten-free etc. Dairy is one of my biggest intolerances, I steer clear of that and there’s not many times I find myself in a place where I have to eat dairy. But it is about having that discipline I think and I have had to develop that discipline over the years.
Being someone who was quite loose with my eating in my teens and my early 20s and then when I got really sick, I started to educate myself around eating nutritional foods that have the nutrients and minerals that our bodies need. It was a bit of a flick of a switch. It was like, hey you’re unwell and now you’ve got to heal so I didn’t have the choice of sort of dabbling in being a bit healthier, I actually had to overnight really change my lifestyle.
Do you have any health and wellness tips for those starting out or struggling with their own health journey?
Definitely seek out expert opinion but if what they’re saying isn’t working for you, seek out a second or a third that is giving you a plan that is actually making a difference to your health. If you are someone who is having any health issues, everyone’s case is very different but my biggest piece of advice is don’t give up and don’t just be looking at physical health, look at emotional health as well and how that might be impacting your physical health. For me, it was a bit of a puzzle.
What’s your day on a plate in general?
It changes day to day. I eat very intuitively. If I need some meat that day, I will seek out some meat. If I’m feeling I need carbs, if I need mental energy I’ll go with my carbs.
But to give you an example, for breakfast I would have muesli with coconut yoghurt with collagen mixed in and then a fresh array of berries. Wild blueberries is my current thing. Then for lunch, some sort of really hearty salad so not like your rabbit salad but something with lots of good fats, avocado, nuts, seeds, olive oil, goats’ cheese. I like to experiment with lots of fruits in my salads so I’ll throw some strawberries and goats’ cheese in.
I can’t stand boring food. I think when people are transitioning into a healthier lifestyle they sometimes think food has to be boring and life has to be miserable but that’s not the case at all. Dinner, let’s say some miso salmon with some coleslaw salad and some air-fried sweet potato fries. My air fryer gets absolutely flogged at the moment.
From a fitness side of things, do you have any favourite exercises?
I like walking. I do lots of long walks and I really do like my Pilates. I do try and throw in a bit of strength session when I can and lately, I’ve been really into doing breathwork classes
You’ve recently partnered with NESCAFÉ NATIV Cascara, which uses upcycled coffee berry husks to create the beverage. Why did you team up with the brand?
So many reasons! Obviously our values are very aligned . This product is such an exceptional product, it’s such an exciting addition to market. I was very interested to hear about the ingredient cascara and all the reasons where they’re contributing to sustainability and that’s something that after the year we’ve had that I’ve very conscious of so yeah, many reasons why I aligned but I was really excited about the sustainability point of view.
What kind of things do you do in your own day-to-day life to follow that sustainability lifestyle?
It’s been something that I’ve been learning and I’ve been a lot more conscious of probably in the last year. I’m trying not to get a new coffee cup everyday, I’m trying to take my portable one with me and buying Australian-made has been a big one for me in the last year.
I think when COVID happened, then all of a sudden we had to buy Australian and everyone was having to source their own ingredients and things from here and I have been making a more conscious choice at looking at where things are coming from. Which if I’m honest, I didn’t always do.
They’re some of the main things but I’m still learning all the time as we all are. It’s very fascinating to hear that we’re now using part of the coffee berry that has been discarded.
