Madge Love Talks is a series of live conversations held on Instagram where various wellness-related topics are unpacked and explored by experts and members of our community. The series supplements and enhances the educational information available on Madge Love, our blog and community platform, while advancing MADGE AND MERCER’s mission to destigmatize cannabis and other topics related to women’s wellness. 

In episode three of Madge Love Talks, Shauna caught up with Matthew Ravenscroft, a local plant-based chef and culinary director of Gia. They chatted about the importance of eating as diverse a diet as possible, the secrets to making vegetables fun and delicious, tips and tricks for cooking with cannabis, and other nuggets of wisdom that you can easily incorporate into your weekly meal planning. Below are some excerpts from Shauna and Matt’s conversation. Check out the full conversation on Instagram to get inspired to make vegetables an exciting part of your daily routine. 

Tell us a bit about yourself…

I really just believe in making the world more interested in eating vegetables. It doesn't mean you have to be plant-based, vegetarian, or vegan - it’s not really about that. It’s more about eating a little more vegetables every day. It became a rabbit hole of “why aren’t we interested in eating vegetables as much?” We know they’re good, we know they’re good for us, we’re just not interested. When was the last carrot we had that was exciting as a steak or a piece of cod? So it really became a challenge of constantly asking the question “I want to eat a vegetable that’s as good as a piece of meat, or a piece of fish.”  

That’s where I've landed in terms of my brand, and also making it fun. When I was a kid, vegetables weren’t interesting to me; they’re not fun, they don’t taste great. So how can we get people more excited about it. I’m a parent so I’ll have to deal with this in the future. I am the culinary director of Gia, a plant-focused, plant-forward Italian restaurant. And it’s the same idea there - let’s get people excited about vegetables. Ontario has a lot to offer; I’m a really big supporter of the locavore diet over anything – I think that has a higher impact. But I'm also someone who recognizes the reality of the situation – not everyone is going to turn vegetarian or vegan but maybe everyone will eat a little more broccoli than steak. We’re trying to gently coax you over the line and intrigue you. 

I think what you’ve done really well is use ingredients that bring out the amazing taste of the vegetable to bring it to its full potential.  

Vegetables are delicious, you just need to know how to prepare them, how to cook them. For me honestly, the secret is the sauce, I put sauce on everything, I think it’s a huge vessel. If you understand how these things taste, you can understand what to do with it. It doesn’t have to be a chore.  

When we developed MM–––001 LA CALMA with Ted Corrado it was important to me that we mask the taste of cannabis. Based on the research we carried out, women in our demographic who were looking to use cannabis for wellness purposes didn’t like the taste of cannabis. I thought the lemongrass was a beautiful choice since it's not only delicious but also masks the taste of cannabis and has anti-inflammatory properties. We recently asked you to help us with a smoothie recipe and what you came up with included some really interesting ingredients including pawpaw. Can talk about how you approached the smoothie recipe?  

A banana you can absolutely add to a smoothie, but pawpaw has a more custardy taste and a similar texture to a banana. This is a foraged product that grows in Ontario. It’s a lesser-known fruit and is the largest fruit that grows in North America, with a very small season. Trying to highlight that and where you can find the product is super interesting. I use smoothies for recovery after a run or a long day, when I want something that will make my body feel better the next day and recharge and replenish. Using a big handful of green s is something you should have with pretty much every meal. A berry to boost vitamin C and bring the flavour out. Melon is also good as it’s really rich in water and sugar for post-workout recovery. I also love adding CBD oil because it lets you choose your own amount. Plus, the lemongrass and ginger bring the flavour together, which made it feel tropical, welcoming and inviting. Sometimes where we’re consuming cannabis, we don’t know how we want to use it but we know it can be useful for recovery and to benefit us, and I think that’s important as well. 

Tell us about how you became vegetarian. 

I think your body knows and has an intuition to it – it just stopped working for me. I was the opposite to a vegetarian prior to that, very meat-focused, I spent a lot of time cooking meat, I spent a lot of time cooking whole animals. I realized it wasn’t working for me anymore. I switched it, and immediately noticed a difference. I don’t think it’s for everyone or needs to be for everyone, but if your body responds well to something and that’s functional for you, and you’re finding a better result... I found I had more pep in my step, and environmentally I know it has a positive impact if I do it correctly... it was a journey. Your life is a big journey; when I was in high school I was very vegan for 5 – 7 years, didn’t touch meat and then that changed, and now I’ve returned back to it and it feels great again, and I make even better decisions as an adult than as a teenage vegan.  

People often think that plant-based eating is complicated or difficult. Do you have any tips on things you can do to make sur you're getting the right food into your system throughout the day. 

I’ll give credit where it’s due – my wife does an amazing job at this. She cooks a lot of farro at the beginning of the week and keeps access to things throughout the week – in the fridge there's always something pickled, a hearty grain, some protein. You want to eat the rainbow as much as possible. We always have kale in our fridge because it’s so quick to clean and cut. You can treat kale like a flower – cut the stems and put them in a cold container of water. I eat a lot of kale, I think it’s great for you, I think it’s delicious... I put it in smoothies - I have a smoothie almost every day, I have a salad almost every day. I try to eat it as much as possible. Incorporating it as often as you can, sneak those greens in. 

Plant-based eating is very repetitive with a lot of soft textures – have some raw things, have some roasted things. Something I follow is G-BOMBS. 

Let’s talk about G-BOMBS… 

G-BOMBS is supposed to be something you utilize, and the different groups work in a complementary fashion. What should you be eating in a day? As many bright things as humanly possible, as many different things as humanly possible, and colorful things as possible. G-BOMBS is a framework we can all follow that has tons of rooms to play. You can have seeds in every salad, you can have onions in everything, I have mushrooms every day, I eat berries every morning... 

G- Greens 

B- Beans 

O- Onions 

M- Mushrooms 

B- Berries 

S- Seeds 

It’s helpful to try to think further ahead and plan, which can be hard when you’re so busy. So not worrying if you mess up a meal is also important. There's always time to repeat and try new things. Tomorrow’s a new day. 

Do you ever infuse meals with cannabis? Any recommendations or ideas you want to share? 

Without getting too deep into the logistics, just start slow. Maybe it’s a cookie, a pie crust, even a vinaigrette. I think what’s really interesting about the cannabis world is that despite legalization being relatively new, consumption of edible cannabis is not and there’s so much information out there. Using the internet as a resource is really helpful. How people view cannabis has been so diverse for so long. Just start small and start slow. Take it each day as an ebb and flow and recognize that your body will respond differently on different days. It’s a one-size-fits-one model – just test it out. 

What kind of fall foods are you most excited about? 

Definitely, fire roasting vegetables is something I find super interesting and fun – maybe not recommended if you’re just jumping into cooking. I love root vegetables; I’m a freak for squash and think it’s so interesting to understand how we can utilize squash in new ways, utilizing the seeds and things like that. I love the transition from summer to fall, when all the end of season summer stuff is going out of season and putting it on a roasted root vegetable... I love fruit and I love roasted vegetables together.   

Any other favourite green vegetables other than kale? 

Broccoli I love, but I eat pretty much everything. Spinach, arugula, radicchio, asparagus when it’s in season. If it’s green it’s probably good for you and so I just try to jump on as many green things as I can.  

 Anything you do for your own self-care outside of food? 

I meditate periodically, I run quite frequently. I read a lot of books. 

Thanks again, Matt for your time! Be sure to check out the full conversation for more delicious suggestions that you can try out to make veggies a bigger part of your diet. 

In wellness, 

Madge Love