Taking place at the Scouts Headquarters in St Ann’s on April 6, from 10 am-6 pm, this year’s edition is gearing up to be an immersive experience connecting culture, health and sustainability, and serves as a platform to spread awareness on the healing and energising impact of natural foods on our bodies.
The festival brings together chefs, home cooks, farmers, conservationists, naturalists, wellness advocates, and will showcase the richness of plant-based food and its role in personal and environmental well-being.
Empress Carissa, owner of Ital is Vital TT plant-based catering and Ital Food Festival founder, said the goal of her event is to help people rethink their current food choices and evaluate how it is impacting on their health and daily living.
[caption id="attachment_1147708" align="alignnone" width="1024"] The Ital Food Festival brings together chefs, home cooks, farmers, conservationists, naturalists, wellness advocates, and will showcase the richness of plant-based food and its role in personal and environmental well-being. - Photo by Jordon Briggs[/caption]
“It is a conscious movement that we’re trying to spread, one of what choices we’re making. Your health is your wealth and you are what you are eat. If you keep putting negative energy food in your body you’re not going to feel rejuvenated. We’re trying to help people make a paradigm shift in their food intake,” she said.
[caption id="attachment_1147707" align="alignnone" width="576"] Items on display at the Ital Food Festival on March 24, 2024. - Photo by Jordon Briggs[/caption]
Carissa has also partnered with US-based NGO with outreach in the Caribbean, Rethink Your Food, headed by Liz Ross (director/founder), who came on board this year because of the festival’s objectives to provide people with healthier options and an ideal way of eating.
[caption id="attachment_1147706" align="alignnone" width="1024"] The Ital food Festival objectives to provide people with healthier options and an ideal way of eating. - Photo by Jordon Briggs[/caption]
Featured on the day will be a delectable variety of creative plant-based breakfast and widespread, local plant-based cuisines. There will also be live cooking – some on a three-stone fireside – vendors demonstrating how to create value added products from flowers and grated goods.
Additionally, there will be demonstrations on how to substitute regular white flour to locally-made flour from local foods.
[caption id="attachment_1147702" align="alignnone" width="576"] The goal of the Ital Food Festival is to help people rethink their current food choices and evaluate how its impacting on their health and daily living. - Photo by Jordon Briggs[/caption]
A special wellness area was designed to provide healing and demonstrations including chair and foot massages, acupressure, yoga sessions, body stretching and myofacial release by Abagail's Art Massage. Also present would be psychologist Greisy Gonzalez.
Carissa said that the
