Why would you pay for water when you can drink it straight from the tap? Why indeed?

Recently I joined a throng of thirsty wine drinkers at the annual ‘NZ in a Glass’ wine tasting evening in Sydney.  Squeezing through the crowd was worth it to find fantastic wines like Te Pa Sauvignon Blanc and Grasshopper Rock Pinot Noir. But at around 500 kilojoules per 150ml glass (that’s roughly the same as eating five squares of milk chocolate) it was a relief to stumble, not literally, upon Antipodes Water. It was the elegant shape of the bottle that caught my eye and discovering that it was sourced not far from where I grew up that made me stop and taste.

“Can you taste the smoothness? It’s the silica that gives it that smooth mouth feel,”  Simon enthusiastically explained to us. I had never thought of water as smooth but, yes, I had to agree that it did taste smooth on my tongue. Very nice. He reeled off the names of some top restaurateurs who refused to serve any water except Antipodes. And then he answered my unspoken question: why pay for something you can get from the tap?

“I can’t drink alcohol and whenever I would ask the waiter if they had something non-alcoholic they would

Sorry! I haven’t added any audio, maybe I’ll add it later if there’s some interest, let me know … Cindy

Thank goodness – Australian bananas are finally affordable again! Today I bought a bunch for the same price as what just one cost a few months ago. I dumped them in the fruit bowl and with great nutritional joy told my family: “Eat as many as you want!”

To celebrate I whipped up a banana berry smoothie – perfect for a filling snack on a hot Sunday afternoon.

• 1 banana
• 1 cup frozen berries (the more you use, the thicker the drink)
• 2 cups reduced fat milk
• 3 generous tablespoons plain yoghurt (I use Jalna biodynamic organic)
• 1-2 tablespoons honey
• Optional: 2 tablespoons chia seed (for some ALA omega-3′s)

Blend in electric blender and enjoy! The finished article is pictured above.

Which food pops into your mind when you read each of the following words?

Omega-3
Zinc
Vitamin C
Iron

My guess is the answers to the first three would have been in order: fish, oysters and oranges (or kiwifruit). What about iron? Did you say beef or lamb? I would have too until recently when I did some work for Aquaculture NZ and discovered that New Zealand’s Greenshell Mussels have three times more iron than beef.

Just five Greenshell mussels provide as much iron as eating a man-sized 300 grams of rump steak. This is fantastic news for the less carnivorous of us. Five Greenshell Mussels provides