Director of Food for Life Global, Paul Rodney Turner was chosen as one of the special guest chefs at the Food & Wine Festival in Bogota, Colombia (August 27-31). The festival is held all over the world and has been held in Bogota in the last 4 years. Paul was one of 40 International chefs to participate in this prestigious culinary festival. He was the only Australian chef and one of only two chefs presenting a vegan dish over the 4 days.
On Saturday, the main day of the festival, over 200 of Bogota’s luminaries came out to have breakfast made by Crepes and Waffles founder, Beatriz Fernandez, Dr-Cow Pablo Castro and Paul Rodney Turner, the food yogi. — in Bogotá, Colombia.
The event kicked off with Beatriz Fernandez welcoming the attendees and sharing her philosophy of preparing meals with love. She pointed to Paul Turner and told the audience how happy she was to have him and was looking forward to hearing about food yoga and the spiritual side of cooking. Beatriz then demonstrated one of her restaurant’s signature wraps. Pablo Castro “Dr Cow” followed her presentation with a demonstration on how to make a raw vegan granola and sesame milk. Then Paul and his fiancé Juliana Castañeda took the stage and while Juliana translated, Paul wowed the crowd with a raw vegan chocolate mousse and toasted granola, while explaining the essence of what Food Yoga is: connecting with food in such a way as to nourish our body, mind, and soul. The audience was immensely pleased with his talk and many said it was the highlight of the event.
Juliana and Paul then met with the attendees and presented their respective books, “Cooking with Jaggy” the first vegan cookbook in Colombia and “Food Yoga – Nourishing Body, Mind and Soul.”
Video and photos of the event can be found at: https://www.facebook.com/BogotaWineFoodFestival
Paul’s bio from the festival web site:
Paul Rodney Turner was born in Australia and is Director of Food for Life Global, the biggest vegan organization in the world with projects in more than 50 countries. These charity subsidiaries include free schools, orphanages, cows shelters, and kitchens of food distribution which daily serve more than 3 million of fresh meals around the world.
At his 19, he joined to the Vaisnava Bhakti Yoga tradition and lived as a monk for 14 years. Since 30 years ago, Paul has realized investigations about Vedas of India and the Yoga tradition.
Paul was a member of IVU (International Vegetarian Union), and was a senior consultant for The World Bank for 10 years. He is a gourmet chef of the Indian cuisine and Vegan chef. His hobbies include numerology and the creation of yantras (talismans) that he designs.
During his work as a volunteer for Food For Life, Paul has visited more than 65 countries, has realized training seminars in 35 countries and regions of the world, as well as the coordination of disaster relief projects, including the Asian tsunami in 2004, Katrina Hurricane in 2005 and Japan tsunami in 2011. Paul is also the author of 5 books including Food Yoga – nourishing body, mind & soul, and The Yoga of Pool.
Source: Bogota Food & Wine Festival Web site
