Interview: Chad Sarno, the Gordon Ramsay of raw food

[Guest guest]

Channels: Food News, People News Tags: vegan, raw food, sustainable

 

In a couple of weeks London's East End will be the home of the first official vegan gourmet restaurant in the country, Saf. The man behind the venture, Chad Sarno, has been hailed as "the Gordon Ramsay of raw food" -- he helped start the organic revolution in Turkey and has opened other vegan restaurants in Istanbul and Munich.

With the flagship Saf restaurant in London, Sarno hopes it will help position vegan and raw food firmly in the mainstream. We've had a look at the opening menu and it's impressive and exciting, featuring grub like macadamia cheese, greens, flowers, lavender panna cotta and hemp praline. We can't wait to check out the cocktails in the 100 per cent organic restaurant bar, too.

SmartPlanet: Tell us a bit about yourself, Chad. Chad Sarno: I've been on the raw food scene for about 12 years now. I started a company, Raw Chef, which focused on education and I was travelling around the US telling people everything I knew about raw food and raw food preparation, and I saw the need for restaurant consulting. The teaching turned into chef training and now I have a team of chefs I work with and really we're the only raw food restaurant consulting group around. About two years ago I joined Life Co, which is an international lifestyle company, with my 'green gastronomy' concept, as I call the idea of using high proportion of raw and vegan food on the menu. So, my project with the company is to operate the restaurants. We've got a takeaway and two restaurants in Istanbul, a restaurant in

Munich and now we're launching this one in London.

SP: So, do you only eat raw food? CS: No, I'm vegan. I believe in balance and what it comes down is I'm a chef and I love food and vegan food limits me enough [let alone raw food]. About 80 per cent of what I eat is raw and I do believe highly in eating raw food -- it's my life-path and I did eat only raw food for six years -- which was great, but then I didn't operate a business.

SP: So will we be able to get cooked food at Saf when it opens? CS: Yes -- but it is all vegan.

SP: What is it that's so great about raw and vegan food? CS: I got into veganism for health reasons. I've suffered from asthma for my whole life and when I stopped eating dairy products it disappeared within a few months. Then I got into raw foods, which tied into the spiritual path I was on at the time. As I've developed over the years, I've learned more and more about the culinary side of things and what keeps me going now is the gastronomy side of it. It's so incredibly interesting. When I create a dish, it's likely nobody has ever made that before and that's the excitement around it. My take on raw and vegan food is that of course the health aspect and the conscious way of life of eating a pure plant-based diet -- and a compassionate diet -- is the foundation of it. But tying it into a mainstream industry by creating exciting dishes is the exciting bit. Currently, if you look at where raw food is at in the mainstream now, the

awareness is growing, but it is still being looked at as an extreme variation of the vegan diet. My mission is to make it known as a culinary speciality.

SP: What do you mean by "compassionate diet"? Do you mean it's ethical and green? CS: Well, I believe vegan food is compassionate because it's free of animal products -- it's free of suffering. I wouldn't call raw and vegan food a 'green diet' as such as ingredients such as nuts and exotic fruits can have a high carbon footprint. That's why I don't want to call Saf a 'green restaurant' either. We don't want to get dissected by the green fans here in the UK [laughs]. However, most aspects of the restaurant will have a green element to it. We're only using non-toxic paints -- even the artwork that prides the walls in the restaurant is created with non-toxic paints. The detergents and cleaning products are as eco-friendly as possible, the wood in the restaurant is either sustainably harvested or reclaimed and we're using the most energy efficient equipment in the kitchen.

We can't call ourselves 100 per cent green anyway because we have over 150 wines on the menu and although they're all organic or biodynamic, but they're imported from South America, Australia and other places around the world.

For the food, I would say I know where 99 per cent of our food comes from -- I know where my salt comes from, I know where all my oils come from and I know that all ingredients are organic, local or Fairtrade. Around 50 per cent of what we've got on the menu is local.

SP: So in that sense you're very much keeping up with the green trend CS: Very much so, but my whole thing is that we don't want to be labelled. We will have information in the restaurant about what we're doing, but we don't want to be seen as having jumped on the green bandwagon. We want these things to be the foundation of what we're doing -- not the reason for our existence. We are here to appeal to the mainstream and get [gourmet vegan and raw food] out there.

SP: Why did you decide to open your flagship restaurant in London? CS: London is one of the top three cities in the world and gastronomy is really kicking off here. It's the perfect city and it's perfect timing for setting up a vegan restaurant here. For a proper vegetarian dining experience there are only three top restaurants: Mildreds, Manna and The Gate. We'll be the only vegan and raw food restaurant in London. And our bar will be 100 per cent organic, too.

SP: Are you hoping you're going to contribute to making vegan and raw food trendy in London and the UK by opening Saf here? CS: I sure hope so. I've moved my family here and am planning to stay for a while. This is just the first of many products we're going to launch in the UK. We're looking into takeaways and other locations. We've got quite an ambitious roll-out planned.

SP: Can we talk about vegan and raw food becoming a trend? CS: I don't think trend is the appropriate way of putting it. Trends come and go because some celebrity is doing it and it's fashionable. I would rather call it a revolution (laughs). Luckily healthy and green living is fashionable now, but it's also a need and a must. There's no turning back now.

 

Chad Sarno's beetroot ravioli

 

Chad Sarno's chocolate tart

Peter H

 

 

Sent from Mail.

 

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