Tuesday 6 November 2018

Cooking for Gina Yashere / London VegFest 2018

October somehow always ends up being the busiest month of the year for me, and it was no different this time around. Between a 9-5 job and a million personal projects related to 'The Vegan Nigerian', I had to remind myself to breathe and take each day as it came. Don't get me wrong, everything I had to do was either fun, exciting or wonderfully challenging, but as someone who isn't much of a planner, seeing my calendar packed out a month in advance made me feel queasy at times. The anticipation builds and builds, but then the satisfaction of getting through each event is unlike anything I can adequately describe, so I suppose it's always worth it!

Aside from the launch of my Plantain Cookbook (have you bought your copy yet?) I also had to prepare for another stint on the London VegFest cooking demo stage. This year's concept was simple: to showcase a couple of recipes from the cookbook. It was an absolute blast. From feeding off the energy of an engaged audience to getting to talk about something I'm passionate about to sharing recipes that I'm proud of, it was simply great to be there again. So much so that I'm now sniffing out more opportunities to organise or participate in workshops and presentations - watch this space.

The day after the buzz of VegFest, I hosted a dinner for comedian extraordinaire Gina Yashere and her amazing friends. If you've been living under a rock and haven't watched any of her stand-up specials or seen her killing it on the likes of The Daily Show with Trevor Noah, then you need to get it together! Browse through her tour dates and grab yourself a ticket to one of her shows - you won't regret it. The few clips in this week's video really don't do the experience justice, and in many ways it was far better to enjoy the fun moments in real time rather than worrying about capturing every single detail of it on camera. Gina and her friends were lovely, welcoming and encouraging in so many ways. At the end of that whole weekend, I was on complete and absolute cloud nine.

2 comments:

  1. I've been watching Tomi for a while and so pleased to see her star rising and putting the greatest cuisine on earth, on show. I'm Nigerian myself and have been vegan for 10 years. I've been telling people if I hadn't been Nigerian, veganism in the beginning wouldn't have been easy for me. Our cuisine sooo easily supports the vegan diet without needing processed foods to get nutrients. And our food stays tasty. Keep rising Tomi.

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  2. It has been a while since I visited your blog. I am thrilled to learn you have a book! I want to commend you for balancing a 9-5 alongside vegan Nigeria This is super encouraging! I wish you more success! Keep going the sky is the limit.

    www.raetalks.co.uk

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