It seems wherever you look, a thousand different forms of nutritional advice can be found — often contradictory. “Eat this”, “don’t do that”, “cook it like this”, they nag. However healthy eating shouldn’t be unpleasant. Nor should it require a monastic martyrdom on your behalf.

A recent government initiative, Go for 2 & 5 has been focusing on the basics: that people have the recommended 5 serves of vegetables and 2 serves of fruit each day. But even that might seem like an unrealistically high amount.

Until you actually look at what 5 serves means. Below is a photo of your daily 5 serves of vegetables presented on a plate, courtesy of Kathryn Elliot from the extremely useful nutrition blog Limes & Lycopene:

5 serves can sound suspiciously like something ridiculous, like 5 meals. But from the photo it’s really quite easy. If you go to a restaurant and order something with vegetables you should be covered for most of the 5 serves.

If you think of health as something that requires very drastic measures you’re less likely to do anything about it since you feel paralyzed (or you’re more likely to embark on an extreme diet that won’t last and can only harm). Realistic goals and modest but steady progress are more successful at getting you to a stage where you feel great.

About 1.1 billion people are eating on $1 a day or less. You might think “that’s not so bad, since $1 buys quite a lot of food in third world places like South Asia and Africa”. You’d be wrong: this statistic is adjusted for purchasing power. So 1.1 billion are living on the amount of food that US$1 a day will buy in the US — in other words living on nothing.

To see what it’s like, I highly recommend the One Dollar Project blog, where an American couple ate on $1 a day as an experiment. A few things they found:

• Staples become the overwhelming proportion of your diet, especially rice, beans and grains.
• It’s surprisingly hard to get a variety in the diet — they were desperately missing fresh vegetables
• You learn to be very creative with your cooking — and homemade foods taste much better
• However to cook everything from scratch (since $1/day doesn’t let you buy even canned food) is very tiring and time-consuming
• By the end of the experiment, they were extremely run down, and unable to do much physical activity

With all the economic doom and gloom that’s been prophesied for Australia it’s very important to remember that the real crisis is happening elsewhere. No matter what happens most readers of this blog are unlikely to ever go hungry. And that’s something most people in the developed world no longer appreciate, which is why it’s important for us to read blogs like the above (and increase our awareness).

Have you ever had to live on an extremely small food budget? Feel free to share your stories in the comments.

We interviewed Tony from Govinda’s, a restaurant in Darlinghurst where you can get a vegetarian buffet then watch a classic movie atop a luxurious pillow contraption.

1. Why vegetarian cuisine?
It’s healthy, environmentally friendly, non violent and it tastes great.
2. Tell us a little about The Movie Room, what makes it so special?
It’s a super chilled out space where patrons kick off their shoes and lie back on beds and cushions to watch a movie in heavenly comfort “a la” snuggled up in your bed at home watching a DVD.
3. What is Govinda’s signature dish?
So many but we are especially famous for our dahl (Indian lentil
soup) and our cauliflower pakoras. Dishes to die for.
4. What’s the restaurant’s philosophy?
All living entities are children of God and as such should be treated with love and care and not exploited for our selfish desires. We should live on this planet in harmony with all it’s residents and with mother nature.
5. What is your favourite part of your day at Govinda’s?
5:45pm when we open the doors and the happy smiling customers stream through the door. Brings a tear to your eye it does.
6. Who lectures on your workshops/seminars?
Different swamis and senior members of the Krishna movement through out the world.
7. What would you recommend first-time visitors check out in addition to the food?
I would recommend first checking out the kirtan (an interactive call and response chanting of ancient mantras with musical accompaniment) A very meditative blissful experience. The kirtans are held every saturday and sunday nights. This will give you a natural high and you’ll sail through the week with a smile.

For those who haven’t heard, a big story is currently erupting in Sydney. A major pub is currently being sued by a family after allegedly serving human feces in a bowl of free ice cream. The ice cream itself was a freebie because the family complained repeatedly about costs and service. Full story here.

We know that occasionally some kitchen staff can get nasty, especially if it’s perceived that the customer’s being unreasonable. However this does seem to be an extreme case: surely if someone from the pub did add the excrement they would be aware of how noticeable, publishable and damaging to the venue the action would be?

What do you think — is it more likely that the allegation is right or that the family is (as was alleged) simply trying to extort money? Have you ever encountered a customer trying to extort a restaurant?

Once again, our visitors horrify and amuse us with tales of dining woes.

• I had a cabonara one time and the main taste was pineapple. Hmmmm
• Visited for brunch and asked for the eggs benedict although being vegetarian we both requested that the ham be exchanged for mushrooms. We were told that could be done but we’d be charged extra for the mushrooms as ‘labour was the most costly part of running that restaurant’ and it would be more labour intensive to have the mushrooms than the ham.
• Our deserts sat at the kitchen counter […] Kitchen cleaning then commenced with cleaning spray falling around our deserts.
• On our way out, another member of our party made a comment of “how rude” he thought they had been. At this time, the manager ran out the door of the restaurant after our friend and started to physically assault him in the street. A waitress then followed him and slapped another one of our group in the head. It took the rest of us to break up the incident.
• I found a cigarette butt in my pad thai…Not impressive and when I ring to tell them they say “sorry, chef don’t smoke” and hang up
• They forgot the chicken in our ‘chicken and asparagus’ pasta
• After finishing our meals (which were very average) we noticed a large rat sitting in the room opposite us. After notifying the bar staff they casually told us they run around everywhere and they kick and stomp on them after their shifts

Have you had a particularly bad restaurant experience recently? Take a load off and share it in the comments!

We have been able to convince a number of chefs to confide in Menulog provided we keep their identity secret. Here is one of their stories.

Chef A “On a quiet night, it is no big deal and we happily honour the customers request whether it is to cook the food more or take something off the plate etc.

“But on a busy night, when you have 10 waiters walking out the kitchen with food, 30 meals on the burner being prepared and then 1 waiter walking back into the kitchen with food the entire dynamic of the kitchen changes and I have to admit on more then one occasion I have taken the customer’s meal and (in a hurry to deal with the problem) have inadvertently dropped the meal on floor, simply picked it up, given it a quick dust off and continued as if nothing had happened.”

The above comments are mild compared to what some of the other chefs have admitted but on a whole, the broad majority of restaurants seem to respect their clientele and understand that (altough it can sometimes be a pain) it is important to handle client requests with care regardless of how busy you are. Especially if you want to stay busy.

We would love to hear of your experiences either whilst working in a restaurant or as a customer - simply comment below. We will keep your comments anonymous.

Vatel Restaurant was named after the great seventeenth century chef, Francois Vatel. Vatel excelled in lavish stage productions, food displays and royal banquets. His expertise for entertaining dignitaries was sought all over France, yet his passion for his work also lead to his demise (there’s a good movie about Vatel with Gérard Depardieu and Uma Thurman). We caught up with Philippe Pinson from Vatel Restaurant, Russell Lea:

1.When did you open Vatel?
Vatel was opened in October 2004

2.Have you had much experience in the industry previously?
Originally from France where I completed my training in various Michelin star restaurants. I also worked in England in five star hotels, prior to moving to Australia where I worked in such fine dining venues as Merivale, Quay, Opera House.

3.What difficulties did you experience and how did you overcome them?
The administrative side of the business, but a proper computing system made things lot quicker and smoother!

4.Are there any tricks you wish you’d known when you started your restaurant? If you could go back in time and give yourself some advice, what would you say?
Get your head around an efficient accounting system such as MYOB, do some training and then do some more!!

5.How did you first attract new customers when you opened? Do you use different methods now?
We got couple of good reviews in Sydney’s major newspapers when we first started.
Nowadays I have my own data base of our many regulars, all promotions are now done online.

6.How would you describe the ambience of your restaurant?
Dynamic

7.What do you think makes your restaurant unique?
The set up is quite open with its large glass panel, showcasing lots of action in the kitchen.
From time to time I organize special dinners, notably Regional dinners where it gives me a chance to present cooking demonstrations at the end of the dinner. Those dinners are very popular!

8.How would you describe today’s customers? Are they more picky, more sophisticated, more generous?
At the present time the customer is very much aware of cost and value for money.

9.Is the customer always right?
In most cases yes

We interviewed Jake Greenrod of GoodLife Organic Pizza about his thoughts on organic food and pizza.

1. Why organic?
At GoodLife we are certified organic which means food produced from a method of sustainable farming that works with nature to create a balance between plants and the organisms that coexist with them. Organic growing ensures food and beverage production or farming practices that do without the use of artificial fertilisers, pesticides and herbicides with an overall approach to sustainable agriculture and fair trade. Typically we believe this also means better taste, and higher vitamin levels.

2. Tell us a little about your chef. How did you convince them to come to your restaurant?
We have a range of chef’s at GoodLife but we are not limited to one chef’s particular interpretation of our food, rather we use std recipes across each restaurant to ensure a consistent experience every time for our customers.

3. What is your restaurant’s signature dish?
We have lots of pizza’s which are popular but the signature would probably be the Free Range Duck and shitake mushroom pizza with ginger jam. The ducks are especially couriered to us from Chinatown and hand stripped to ensure true Asian flavours.

4. What’s the restaurant’s philosophy?
We have three primary philosophies at GoodLife:

• firstly we try to use Certified organic where possible (We are Australia’s only certified organic pizza restaurant)
• secondly if not organic its best possible regional SA
• we are also Certified Carbon Neutral

5. What is your favourite part of your day at restaurant?
A shot of fresh espresso coffee before the start of a busy night.

6. What are the most important things you do to keep customers coming back?
At GoodLife we aim for a consistent meal and service experience, plus having a team which loves what it does!

Food can be one of life’s great treats. But alas, this isn’t always the case. There are a plenty of restaurants that run their business to the ground with bad food, unpleasant staff and unethical practices. We continue our look at some colourful excerpts from reviews we’ve had on Menulog (part 1 here). In this part, we look at where reviews are more colourful than the experience:

• Good place to take your family (pets) to eat.
• New managers have replaced the staff of young creative beatniks with Black polyester uniform wearing unhealthy bogans.
• The staff were physically unattractive. There was also a known art thief on the premises the time I was there.
• The ‘free’ garlic bread looked like it had been cut with a chainsaw and made from yesterday’s stale bun. Not one bit of my $50 lobster poked out from the congealed mass of melted cheese they dared call ‘mornay’. The chips tasted of stale, old oil and were cold. The champagne was hot. If the Gold Coast needed an enema, [NAME REMOVED] would be where they’d stick the tube.
• …the only faults I experienced were that there was no toilet on the premises and they do not serve water. However, this problem is easily solved if you bring a water bottle and a bed-pan. If you forget these, then do not panic - there is a nice little public toilet on the other side of Pennant Hills Road, and the Maccas that lies about 1 km away will give you some water if you ask nicely.”

Time magazine just published a great photo-essay featuring 3 Melbourne restaurants and their creative flair in creating dishes. Here’s a sneak preview:

As a die-hard Sydneysider I’d say Melbourne isn’t the be-all and end-all of great restaurants, but still a Mecca of some sorts. The 3 restaurants featured by Time were:

• Añada
• The Press Club
• Vue de Monde

Congratulations to all 3. If you live in Melbourne, you might like to check out our listings for them by clicking on the links above — we have menus for all of them.

If you liked this photo-essay check out Time’s 3 part one on what people around the world are eating which highlights some of the geopolitical issues around food (Part 1|Part 2|Part 3).