Features | Veggin' Out And About

Planteaters – A Plant-Based App for Navigating a Carnivorous Planet!

Posted by Danielle Bussone on Nov 19, 2013 in Features, Living Plant-Strong! Profiles & Articles | 0 comments

Planteaters, a newcomer to app scene, directs hungry diners to meals from a variety of veg-friendly, though not necessarily vegan and vegetarian restaurants. It can be downloaded for free from www.getplanteaters.com. Planteaters is the brain child of Dave Hersh from New York City who developed it out of a need to, as he says, “scratch his own itch.” He found since becoming vegan four years ago he usually has to make greater compromises than his meat-eating friends when dining out together, often having to order a salad or abstain from eating altogether.

Hersh saw a need for an app which will direct diners to restaurants which offer plant-based meals as well as meals for their carnivorous companions. It is worth noting there are a number of non-vegan restaurants out there that offer excellent vegan meals. For example, Dave mentions a restaurant near where he works that offers the best vegan burrito he’s ever eaten and the name of the restaurant means “Three Meats!” Planteaters is the only app available which focuses on individual meals as opposed to vegetarian or vegan restaurants per se.

Planteaters iPhone App

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Grow Crowd App Connects Farmers Directly With Their Customers!

Posted by Danielle Bussone on Nov 19, 2013 in Features, Living Plant-Strong! Profiles & Articles | 0 comments

By Danielle Bussone

Grow Crowd App provides a local marketplace for organic food producers to sell fresh, organic products (vegetables, herbs, fruits, nuts, mushrooms, etc.) directly to their local communities. It is essentially a virtual farmers market. Users can browse local farmers and their products to find the freshest food available at the moment of purchase. Customers can order their produce on-line and pre-arrange pickup times and locations.

Grow Crowd, was created by Johan Steneros of Southern Spain. A backyard organic gardener for the past three years, Steneros became aware of the growth of organic farming as well as growing demands of the consumer for organically grown produce. Johan has a background in web design, building applications as well as creative projects. “I am very much involved in the App world and mobile communication, says Steneros. “I did my research and saw there wasn’t very much happening in this area so I thought I’d get it moving.” He began working on the Grow Crowd App a year ago and it was launched October 8, 2013. It is available on iTunes and the Apple AppStore worldwide as a free download.

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Natural Imports of Asheville, NC is the Go To Market for Authentic Japanese Culinary Fare

Posted by Danielle Bussone on Nov 19, 2013 in Asheville, NC, Features, Grocers, I-240, I-26, I-40, Living Plant-Strong! Profiles & Articles, Organic and/or Non-GMO | 0 comments

By Danielle Bussone

Once in a blue moon I’ll discover a truly unique gem of a resource that I simply feel duty bound to share with the world. Natural Imports of Asheville, NC, is one such discovery. Natural Imports is a purveyor of traditional Japanese culinary products of the highest caliber. Great care is taken to assure excellence, offering foods of a medicinal quality, prepared in time honored traditions by skilled Japanese craftsmen. Mass production and quicker, low-quality methods are threatening the livelihoods of these Japanese artisans, who prepare foods using the principal of Ishoku Dogen, “medicine and food have the same source.” You’ll find no mass market food and no arsenic laden Chinese seaweed here, only traditionally crafted products and sea vegetables grown in deep waters of Japan, protected for centuries with organic, sustainable practices.

Natural Imports Interior

Bruce MacDonald, now semi-retired, is the founder of Natural Imports. His daughter, Crystal, has been his partner and business manager since its inception in 1993, since she was 19 years old. Crystal speaks fluent Japanese and is a wealth of information about all aspects of how the seaweed is harvested, the medicinal and nutritional ingredients of every product, the sustainability practices of her suppliers and any glitch that effects the ecosystem and thereby affecting the quality of their products. She is a dynamic powerhouse who stays on top of all issues pertaining to Natural Imports.

Crystal MacDonald

Crystal essentially grew up in the business. Her parents divorced when she was young and she spent summers working at Commodities, a Japanese import store Bruce owned in New York City, where she learned about Japanese food. Bruce had previously worked for Erehwon in Boston, which was the original importer of natural foods in the US and subsequently for Erehwon West in California and later for Bread and Circus, which was sold to become the original Whole Foods Market.

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Charlottesville, Virginia Vegetarian Festival Serving Up Healthy Choices!

Posted by Danielle Bussone on Oct 13, 2013 in Charlottesville, VA, Charlottesville, VA, Eclectic, Features, Veg Fests | 0 comments

by Lisa Harris

The Charlottesville Vegetarian Festival, held at the end of September (28th), although not as crowded as years past was still very pleasant and packed with useful information and services that were beneficial to those interested in eating healthier, gardening, fitness, pet care and the environment as a whole. Children played freely, adults ate and mingled, and dogs both large and small rested under the slightly overcast sky.

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What To Do If Your Hospital Doesn’t Offer A Plant-Based Menu? Ask For It!

Posted by Danielle Bussone on Sep 19, 2013 in Features, Living Plant-Strong! Profiles & Articles | 4 comments

by Danielle Bussone

Last week I was hospitalized for a recurrent problem created years ago by an inept surgeon who cut the wrong body part. I was hooked up to IV antibiotics and given medication for pain. For me, the big question was, “What am I going to eat?” Hospitals vary in the quality of food offered. One of the most prestigious hospitals in the country where I once had the misfortune to become a resident has offered some of the worst food on the planet. I was not a vegan when I first had surgery but I was nevertheless shocked to see quality of the food served to me at each meal. Eggs and bacon, fatty sausage gravy and biscuits, red meat, fried chicken — foods which are more likely to send someone to the hospital rather than aid in recovery. We do not have to be stuck with these unhealthy food choices while our weakened immune systems are trying to recover.

Green Beans, Grilled Yellow Squash and Cherry Tomatoes Over Rice, Fruit Cup and Whole Grain Roll

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Veggin’ Out and About Gets A Little Love From The Press!

Posted by Danielle Bussone on Aug 27, 2013 in Features, Living Plant-Strong! Profiles & Articles | 1 comment

Mountain Times of Boone, North Carolina has featured Veggin’ Out and About in an article by food reporter Jesse Campbell. Click on Mountain Times to read the article. Also featured are my yummy Summer Rolls with Spicy Peanut Sauce!