My twin brother lives in Melbourne and we decided to visit and celebrate our birthday this year. We had such a great time away, he has two boys who are a bit older than Jensen and it was lovely for the cousins to spend some quality time together. Even though we were only there for four full days it felt like we were away from home for weeks!

My brother isn’t plant-based (yet ha ha!), so we had to plan ahead a little and took quite a lot of packaged food with us. Jensen is still at a funny stage with eating where he doesn’t eat full meals and still nurses a lot. I wanted to have lots of plant-based friendly snacks on hand incase we got a ‘hangry’ toddler! Our time in Melbourne was actually easy when it came to accessing plant-based food, it ended up being a non-issue. Also food in Australia seems to be much cheaper than NZ. We took advantage of the abundance of fresh, cheap, tropical fruit and the planning we did do paid off. We also approached eating out with flexibility, we were there to have a great time with family, not stress about eating the ‘correct’ foods.

What we took:

-Baby food pouches - 2 x per day. One fruit based, one veggie based. These were great as a quick on-the-go breakfast or dinner if needed.

-Organic Only apple flavoured rice cakes - 2 x bags. Jensen absolutely loves these and we used them as a distraction when we were flying.

-Fooze Balls and Tom & Luke Snackaballs - We took quite a few packets of these as snacks for the grown ups. The Tom & Luke container of bliss balls is also a great size for travelling with.

-Microwave rice pouches - These aren’t particularly healthy but we took them for a quick and easy dinner backup if needed. Jensen also likes them too.

-Baby Mum Mum crackers - Jensen ate these a lot as a baby and they are easy to travel with since they are individually wrapped (I did feel a bit guilty about all the packaging though!).

-Pretzels - Another snack treat that Jensen loves. Great for distraction or bribery when we are particularly desperate!

-Animal biscuits - Yet another treat food that we took to give to Jensen if other kids were having non plant-based snacks. His cousins ended up liking them too and we may have used them as bribery to get everyone in the same photo smiling!

-Veggie Crisps - I’d never tried these before but thought I’d get some to see what they were like. We didn’t end up opening them in Australia and when I tried them home they were way too salty for me or Jensen. Our goats ended up enjoying them!

What we brought there:

-Oat milk - x 4 boxes. - My brother had also brought some for us and we went through six boxes while we were there.

-Fresh fruit & veggies - We brought heaps of fruit as it was so cheap! We got mangoes, a pineapple, blueberries, strawberries, cherry tomatoes ,and new season sweet corn.

-Carman’s Cereal - x 2 boxes. I love cereal but don’t eat it often as I go through it so quickly it’s not cost effective. I’d discovered Carman’s in Singapore and enjoyed it so went a bit nuts when I saw it in the grocery store. I didn’t realise it was an Australian brand.

-Carman’s muesli bars - 1 large box. These were yummy and a great on-the-go snack, Jensen enjoyed them too.

-Multigrain bread - 2 x loaves. We packed lunch a couple of times and made sandwiches. The bread in Australia was so good!

Food Dairy

Here’s a super quick rundown of what we ate each day. We started everyday with cereal and coffee (much needed!) and snacked on bliss balls and fruit.

Thursday

We travelled literally all day on Thursday. The plant-based meal on the AirNZ was really good and Jensen devoured his bag of Only Organic apple flavoured rice crackers.

Dinner: That night we went out to dinner to a Japanese restaurant called Nishiki. They had lots of vegan options labelled on the menu so ordering was a breeze. The vegan dumplings were divine and edamame always goes down a treat.

Friday

Lunch: After a walk and a play on some of the best playgrounds I’ve ever seen we had lunch at a local cafe called Crema Sutra. They didn’t have any vegan options on the menu but were able to do a plant-based version of their Avocado on toast without the cheese. The meal was simple but delicious.

Dinner: We had fish and chips before my brother’s sons’ school disco and there were vegetable samosas on the menu that were plant-based.

Saturday

Lunch: We caught up with friends that we met in Thailand that now live in Melbourne at a local playground and took a picnic lunch. Our packed lunch was Vegemite and tomato sandwiches, blueberries, and chopped mango and pineapple. The fruit was great on a such a hot day.

Dinner: We had Thai takeaway for dinner. I got a satay tofu vegetable dish with coconut rice and some pumpkin coconut fritters.

Sunday

Lunch: My hay fever was really bad in Melbourne so I stayed home on Sunday while the boys went to Lego Land. I didn’t eat much this day and had strawberries, blueberries, and cherry tomatoes for lunch.

Dinner: We had more than enough Thai leftover from Saturday night so had this for dinner. It always tastes better on the second day anyway!

Monday

Lunch: We had a day out in the city on Monday and had lunch at a vegan cafe called Mantra Lounge. I had lasagna with a beetroot salad and matcha latte, it was so delicious and reasonably priced. Jase had a ‘sausage roll’ and said it was amazing and that he wanted to buy one for all his meat eating friends! Jensen had already had lunch by the time we arrived but snacked on a soy fluffy and blueberry muffin.

Dinner: Everyone was worn out after a hectic weekend so we had a simple dinner of fresh sweetcorn and a microwave rice pouch each. It was the first corn we’d had since last season and it was just lovely, so sweet and juicy.

Tuesday

Lunch: We had a simple lunch of peanut butter toast and some strawberries and blueberries before we packed up and started the long journey home.

Dinner: We had a quick snack in the AirNZ lounge and I was impressed with all the plant-based options they had. I snacked on beetroot salad, barley and raisin salad, and fruit salad.

We had such a great long weekend away and were exhausted in a good way at the end of our travels. With a little bit of preparation eating plant-based while we were away really wasn’t an issue and food is so much cheaper in Australia! We enjoyed all the fresh fruit and it was nourishing for our souls to catch up with family after so long too.