Sustainable Kitchen Consultants

07/08/2026

You are what you eat, eats. Read that again. It’s not a typo. It’s the key thing we need to consider when we’re sourcing meat (and all produce actually!)

Is it British? Is it local? What’s the price? Good questions to ask of course, but not the whole picture.

What was that animal eating? Was it grazing diverse pasture? Fed conserved forage from species-rich grassland? How was that feed grown, and what farming system produced it?

Because researchers have shown that farming method actually shows up in meat. They have found the more of an animal’s life spent eating pasture and forage alone, rather than topped up with grain, the better the balance of fats in the meat.

Researchers at Newcastle University compared steaks from four UK systems; non-organic, organic, certified pasture-fed, and conservation-grazed cattle.

Pasture-fed sirloin had roughly double the omega-3 of the non-organic comparison, and a far better ratio of the fats we want more of to the ones we want less of. https://lnkd.in/e5yNHMGw

More recent research from the US goes one step further, tracing it right back to the soil. Pasture fields had significantly higher organic matter and minerals than cropland used for feed. That richer soil grew richer forage, with results showing over a hundred times more of the beneficial plant compounds you’d find in grain. And that showed up in the meat: several times more antioxidants, and notably higher vitamin A and E, compared to grain-fed beef.
https://lnkd.in/eZVdWceJ

It’s why I recommend my clients source from Pasture for Life assured farmers.
So whilst we should be reducing meat on menus, we need to source less but better meat, from better sources that are good for people and planet.

Because provenance of our ingredients isn’t just geography. It’s the whole system behind an ingredient. The soil, the plants, the animals, the farmers, and the relationships between them.

If we want more resilient food systems, we need to get curious about every link in that chain. Including what our food eats.

04/08/2026

We measure food by weight, size and price. We should be measuring it by what’s actually in it.

For decades, we’ve bred and grown crops for yield, shelf life, and aesthetic uniformity. Nutrition has never really been a priority metric.

Nutrient Density of crops has been shown to be driven by soil health. Healthy, biologically active soil produces plants with higher levels of vitamins, minerals and photochemicals.

Which is why nutrient density needs to be a big consideration in ingredient sourcing. And the great news is that when we (all sides of the food chain) optimise for it, we get 2 wins for the price of 1: Better human nutrition, and Better soil, biodiversity and resilience for the environment.

Right now we mostly measure food quality by appearance, yield, and price. None of those tell us what’s actually in it.

That’s changing thankfully, and I’m looking forward to discussing Nutrient Density and One Health at Norway’s first Regenerative farming festival - Jord festival, in Trondheim next week.

This snippet from a podcast recording ahead of the Festival with co-founder Michael Owen is a glimpse into why we need to be thinking about Nutrient Density, and why I believe food businesses that treat people, animals and environment as one interconnected system are the ones building something that actually lasts.

If we want healthier people and a healthier planet, the food system needs to start valuing what’s underneath the surface. Literally.

Curious to hear what you think? Does nutrient density sit in your sustainability conversations today?

29/07/2026

Farmers are adapting to a changing climate every season. We need to make sure the rest of the food chain is too.

Every harvest of wheat is shaped by the season that grew it, and those seasons are changing.

Wheat’s been part of UK farming for 10,000 years, and it’s still our biggest arable crop today.

In this video I talk about protein content, why it matters for us Chefs, for gluten development, dough strength and texture, but also why it is not the only part of the story.

Wheat is a living crop, grown outdoors, through weather and growing conditions that are becoming more unpredictable with a changing climate.

Farmers are already adapting to that uncertainty every season. This creates a real opportunity for chefs and food businesses to do the same, getting closer to how ingredients are grown, and using that understanding to adapt and create recipes that work with the crops they can grow.

Have a watch and let me know what you think.

23/07/2026

What if one of the most valuable crops in a farmer’s field is one that’s never sold?

What you’re looking at is a cover crop: a mix of clover, vetch, rye and others, planted not for market, but to keep living roots in the soil, feed biology, build structure and lock in moisture.

It’s a shift from the old default of leaving fields fallow, and it couldn’t be more timely. After weeks of unusual heat and dry weather across the UK, the limits of rain-fed crop farming are showing. There’s no irrigation tap to turn on for arable farming; the resilience has to already be in the ground.

And the unusual spells of hot weather is not just a UK issue either. Regions many food businesses source ingredients from: France, Italy, Spain, Morocco, Tunisia to name a few, are all facing the same escalating heat and drought pressures.

So this brings real questions for any food business, over and above understanding carbon numbers and price: How exposed are your supply chains if the regions behind your ingredients keep facing climate extremes? How resilient are their farming systems to continue to grow future crops?

Sustainable sourcing isn’t just about food miles or carbon numbers. It’s about whether the people growing your ingredients are building soil fertility and protecting biodiversity for the long term.

Because what we grow matters. How we grow it matters more.

Let me know what you think.

21/07/2026

Food environmental sustainability and human health aren’t 2 separate conversations. They never have been for me. Thankfully, more people in the food sector are waking up to this.

Right from when I first worked in the food sector, my education as a Nutrition trained Naturopathic Chef, which combines culinary school with the lens of balancing every mouthful with the health of people and planet, a “food as medicine” ethos has shaped how I approach Sustainability: our ‘Healthy People, Healthy Planet’, or One Health approach.

One Health recognises that human health and planetary health (our environment including the animals we share it with) are fundamentally interconnected, and that profit should never come at the cost of either.

Many sustainability conversations in food still start and end with carbon. Carbon only thinking misses the bigger picture, and it’s actually why so many “sustainable” decisions in food businesses end up creating unintended consequences elsewhere, often at the expense of human health.

My MBA in Sustainable Food & Agriculture dissertation dug into exactly this: What happens when food businesses don’t look at sustainability holistically? The answer, consistently, was unintended harm. That research backed up the need for my One Health frameworks that I have used in every part of my work; from my Green Food Skills Training, to my work with farmers and suppliers right through to the hospitality businesses I create sustainable sourcing strategies, menus and recipes for.

Nutrient Density has also been a big focus. It’s the thread that runs through soil health, human gut health, and ultimately, how the food on your plate tastes.

I’ve been fortunate to speak on these topics at places like and with and now I’m bringing these to next month.

This podcast recording with Michael Owen is a glimpse into that thinking, and why food businesses that treat people, animals and planet as one interconnected system are the ones building something that actually lasts, and truly sustainable.

Curious what you think. Are your team looking holistically?

15/07/2026

I absolutely LOVE getting the opportunity to talk about the subjects I’m most passionate about with young people, to foster stronger connections with nature and where our food comes from.

So that’s why I’m excited to be part of the Magic Meadows Festival Saturday 25th July at Home Farm in Elstree, Hertfordshire.

If you’re looking for something fun and educational to do with the kids, come and join me at my session: “Eating for Healthy People & Healthy Planet.

A hands-on, interactive family session exploring how soil health, seasonal eating and food diversity are all connected to human health. Using vegetables, roots and simple sensory demonstrations, the session helps children and parents understand where food comes from beyond the supermarket shelf, showing food as the outcome of living ecosystems rather than isolated products.

You’ll get to explore 3 main themes:

Soil health: pull up real roots and see the fine hairs and branching systems of plants exploring underground.

Seasonality: a table spread of July’s best: peas, carrots, beetroot, herbs, strawberries. Smell and taste your way through mint, basil and parsley, and find out why strawberries really do taste best in Summer.

Food diversity: a colourful “variety plate” of veg, herbs, and legumes sorted by colour with seeds, pulses, and grains to handle. We’ll talk about dietary diversity is one of the best thins you can do for your gut and immune health.

The season will finish with everyday takeaways families can put into practice straight away, from growing herbs at home to noticing what’s in season and asking where food really comes from.

Tonnes of other awesome sessions on - find out more, and to book go here: https://lnkd.in/ej5ed72e

17/06/2026

I get asked this constantly: “So, is sustainable hospitality just code for going vegan?” And here’s why it isn’t.

Sure, we create a lot of plant-forward and completely plant-based recipes for clients, as part of sustainable menus. But whether a menu is sustainable or not is not as simple as how plant-forward or plant-based or not it is.

In this podcast hosted by David Chenery from Reassemble we talk about this very point.

Menus in restaurants can account for upwards of 60-80% of a venue’s measurable carbon impact, and meat and dairy are often the biggest single contributor within that. So it’s an easy leap to make: cut the meat, solve the problem.

But it’s not that simple. Well-farmed meat isn’t the enemy. Pasture-fed beef, for example, is nutritionally superior to a lot of the alternatives people reach for instead. The research on this is genuinely hard to argue with.

Sustainable hospitality isn’t about meat or no meat. It’s about redefining what “good” actually looks like, across 3 pillars - people, planet and profit.

That’s the approach we take, to help our clients run sustainable and profitable businesses, and customers still deserve to eat what they want, just with a clear picture of where it came from.

Because the real question isn’t “meat or no meat.” It’s: do you know how it was produced? That’s where provenance and traceability come in, and it’s the standard I apply to every single ingredient on a menu, not just the meat.

Link to full episode in comments

10/06/2026

If carbon is the only sustainability metric shaping your sourcing decisions, you’re missing most of the picture.

The food sector has done important work on looking at carbon impact of their operations, including supply chain. And supply chain is often where the most carbon is emitted, so looking at the carbon impact of ingredients is not unnecessary work, it’s vital to help get to net zero.

But in focusing on it as a singular metric, we risk creating a new version of the same problem, which is optimising for one number while ignoring everything else.

Soil health. Biodiversity. Nutrient density. Flavour. These aren’t soft, secondary concerns. They’re indicators of whether a farming system is genuinely regenerating our environment and our human health.

And for food businesses, that distinction matters. Because your customers aren’t eating a carbon score. They’re eating the food. They want to know more than just its carbon impact. In survey after survey they’re more often valuing health over environmental concerns.

The most powerful sourcing question isn’t ‘what’s the carbon footprint?’ It’s ‘what kind of system produced this?’ That’s the holistic approach, which has better outcomes for all.

Watch the video for more on why, and I’d love to know how your business is thinking about this.

04/06/2026