How vegan chef Shannon Martinez benefits from gardening | My Garden Path | Gardening Australia

Chef, restaurant owner and author Shannon Martinez is credited with popularising vegan food in the highly competitive Melbourne dining scene. Subscribe 🔔

As the owner and chef of successful Fitzroy vegan restaurants Smith & Daughters and Smith & Deli, she has introduced her plant-based creations to a whole new audience.

Her love of food began at a young age, with a father from Spain, Shannon was raised with “some pretty amazing food”, which inspired her to become a chef.

Cooking with strictly plant-based ingredients at her restaurants, means no dairy, eggs or honey, just “purely what you can grow in the ground” with plenty of creativity thrown in.

“When you start taking away things like animal proteins and dairy, you really have to start thinking outside the box and how you can develop these in incredible dishes using purely plants,” said Shannon.

When she’s not getting her hands dirty in the kitchen, she’s in her garden growing veggies, something that has brought her solace.

Shannon has an array of produce including an essential ingredient in her vegan dishes, garlic, describing her home-grown crop as “garlic on steroids”.

“It’s hot, it’s spicy, super pungent, definitely not the sort of thing you want to eat on that first date – there’s nothing like it,” she said.

An essential ingredient in her cooking, Shannon said garlic can be used fresh or dried, helping to build the flavours when other ingredients in vegan dishes have been removed.

But one of the easiest and most rewarding vegetables she has grown is chillies, with a few varieties planted, each with a varying degree of spiciness to suit every dish.

“You put them in the ground you make sure you treat the soil right and they’ll look after you,” Shannon said.

“They give you constant pleasure and when it comes to the end of the season, I like to trim them all down and hang them up, dry them out and then I’ve got chillies all through the winter.”

Another favourite vegetable is the tomato, not just for the taste but for their versatility, with Shannon using them in salads, sauces, pickling the green ones and even frying them. “The things you can do with them are limitless,” Shannon said.

Despite the success of her two restaurants Shannon has not been immune to life’s challenges. In mid-2020, not long into the pandemic, she was diagnosed with triple-negative breast cancer.

What followed was a trial of immunotherapy combined with chemotherapy followed by radiation with surgery in between. Being immunocompromised meant she was housebound, instead focusing all her energy into gardening.

“This amazing thing happened where for one of the first times ever I just felt this total sense of calm,” Shannon said.

“Getting cancer has definitely reminded me that I’m not invincible and that none of us are invincible, and I’m very grateful for being able to make it through to the other side.”

Vegan garlic prawn recipe:

This traditional Spanish dish is given a new interpretation with vegan prawns substituted for the crustaceans. Entirely plant-based, these ‘prawns’ are made from konjac, an Asian root vegetable known for its starchiness. The tuber-like part of the stem is grown underground and once dried is very versatile.

What you need:
– Garlic
– Three different chilies
– Parsley
– Spring onions
– Smoked paprika
– Lemon juice
– Vegan prawns made from konjac

What to do:
1. Grab a pan and drench it in lots of olive oil, more than you would normally.
2. Slice up your fresh garlic in fine slithers rather than chopping it.
3. Chop your three chillies using half of each one.
4. Roughly chop your spring onions and parsley.
5. Add the ‘prawns’ to your oil, they are already cooked so don’t need much time in the pan. Then add the rest of the ingredients, except the parsley and fry.
6. Add some smoked paprika then the chopped parsley and finish off with a big squeeze of lemon juice.
7. Serve with some crusty bread.

Featured Plants:
CHILLI   – Capsicum cv. 
TOMATO  – Solanum lycopersicum cv. 
GARLIC  – Allium sativum cv. 
SPRING ONION  – Allium fistulosum 
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