Craig McAnuff - Natural Flava: Quick & Easy Plant-Based Caribbean Recipes

We would like to dedicate this book to our special family members who we lost over the past year. Uncle Tim, who was very special to us. He was one of our favourite uncles and loved to cook too. He would tell all his friends about us and our cooking journey and get them to buy our books and support us. He was so proud of what we were doing, and well continue to make him proud in his memory. Theres still no one that can better his coleslaw! Aunty Angela, who was one of our biggest supporters.

She always wanted the best for us, was always commenting on our posts, sending us messages of support and telling all her friends about us. She was so proud. We are going to miss having her around on Christmas day sharing a glass of Guinness punch. Aunty, we will continue to make you proud. RIP. Our grandad Sydney, who was part of the Windrush generation and paved the way for most of our family to have a future in UK.

Thank you for taking the decision to come to England. We will continue the legacy, we promise. Also to our Nanny and grandad McAnuff. You are never forgotten. RIP.

Our first one, Original Flava, was an amazing journey through our heritage, culture, food and family. We travelled to Jamaica in October 2018 to discover and celebrate Caribbean cooking at its source, and the array of delicious fresh produce the island has to offer, and now we have taken a different angle by using all the colourful and vibrant fruit and veg we found there to create Natural Flava. We started to explore and create exciting plant-based recipes because we wanted a healthier, more balanced diet, but we also want to show the world that theres more to Caribbean cooking than just jerk chicken. This book is packed with Caribbean-inspired plant-based recipes that are full of FLAVA. Our trip to Jamaica was a life-changing experience, and it opened our eyes to cooking in a different way. We were exposed to Ital food, derived from Rastafarian culture, and this was a big influence on our journey into the plant-based lifestyle.

Rastafarians believe that food should be eaten from the Earth, and to stay healthy and spiritually connected to the Earth, Rastas eat a natural diet that is free from additives and chemicals. This style of primarily vegan eating is known as Ital cooking Ital is Vital is often used to promote it. With this book, we are paying homage to Rastafarianism, which pioneers plant-based food and promotes a healthy mind, body, spirit and environment ethos. On our trip, we visited vegan cafs in Negril and were amazed by how much natural food was so flavaful and delicious. We remember stopping at the caf on Seven Mile Beach and ordering a meal which consisted of stew peas, curry tofu, rice and peas and cabbage; it tasted amazing fresh and filling and was truly one of the best meals we had. We realised that Jamaica was filled with delicious plant-based recipes that could be combined to create one meal.

We had started to get serious about making plant-based recipes when Shaun adopted a vegan diet for a year, back in 2018. While he was actively researching and living it, posting his meals on social media and creating amazing natural dishes, he was also seeing all the health benefits, including healthier skin and weight loss. Craig was then inspired to begin experimenting with plant-based foods too, and found he loved it. The Caribbean is rightly celebrated for its curry goat, chicken and fish dishes, but we wanted to be innovative and create new Caribbean dishes using all the natural ingredients we ate and cooked with during our stay in Jamaica. In Afro-Caribbean culture, where traditional food is high in fats and carbs, people have a much higher risk of developing diabetes and high blood pressure, which are among the leading causes of death; consuming too much meat and dairy on a regular basis is a major factor, and has long-term implications for overall health. This informed our drive to find a healthy balance, and we want to inspire our culture and help more people, especially Afro-Caribbean people, consume a more plant-based diet.

Our mother and older brother were also motivated and started to adopt a more plant-based lifestyle, and have now become vegans! Our mum previously had type 2 diabetes and high blood pressure, which she now manages through her healthy diet. However, we are in no way demanding that you become a vegan or be militant about it, and this cookbook is not just for vegans or plant-based eaters. This book is for everyone! No matter what diet you follow meat-eater, fish-eater we are sure youll find recipes youll love for yourself, friends and family. You will enjoy the FLAVA! Food is something that is really big in our family; it is what brings us all together at family functions. Our nanny and mum inspired us to start cooking because of their passion for it and, being so close to them, we wanted to do it too. Our nanny plays a massive part in our business, and our followers love her as though she was their own nan.

We introduced her to plant-based foods three years ago and at first she couldnt really see why we would make so many vegan recipes she thought being vegan was some type of religion, lol. But as time went on she grew to understand it; she loved the healthier aspect and couldnt believe how delicious the food was. Our mum is also a massive support to us. She was always in the kitchen when we were growing up, like it was her second home. Providing meals day in, day out we really respected it and wanted to support her any way we could, because our dad didnt cook much. Growing up in a Caribbean household, we dont remember having too many vegetables on our plate, but now we use vegetables in a way we never thought we could.

I mean, plantain and chickpea curry, jerk-spiced squash and callaloo Wellington and mushroom pepper steak! We are all about making these foods exciting and attractive, and appealing to a wider audience. We want to inspire people to eat more plants, even if its once or twice a week small changes can lead you towards a more balanced diet in the long run. We have found a formula that involves giving plant-based food the same treatment as meat or fish to create dishes with maximum flava, transferring traditional Caribbean methods to plant-based foods; its all about the seasoning and preparation. For example, the staple Caribbean dish of brown stew chicken is transformed into brown stew broccoli. Vegetables absorb flavour so well, creating a delicious taste like no other. We are both fathers now, which is the biggest blessing of all time.

Craig has twin girls, and Shaun has a son, and they are growing so fast! With only three months between them, they are able to grow together just like we did. Being fathers has given us a bigger responsibility to be role models to our kids and an even bigger passion to leave a legacy for them to be proud of. Food is such an important part of childrens development, making sure they get the right nutrients and vitamins in their bodies. Our knowledge and understanding of plant-based recipes has really helped us in feeding our kids and providing daily meals. As soon as they could eat solids, we would make fresh food daily, blending things like sweet potatoes, butternut squash, plantains, yam and callaloo to a paste. As they got a bit older we introduced them to more of the food we were eating, just not the spicy parts.