Arianne Schreiber: the Yummify chef and her okonomiyaki pancakes
Victoria Cosford
Arianne Schreiber has a confession. ‘I pretty much sleep with cookbooks’, she tells me – and I completely empathise! Those for whom cooking is one of life’s great passions are insatiable in their eternal quest for a new recipe, or method, or combination of ingredients.
In Arianne’s case, it’s plant-based food. ‘I love plants,’ says the woman who stopped eating animals at the age of 12, ‘and feel happy and healthy with a plant diet.’
Regular market-goers would be familiar with the cornucopia of colours at her Yummify stall, ‘I just love playing with rainbow colours that are seasonal and organic’, she tells me, ‘grown by all the awesome farmers we know.’ There she is, when not serving customers her famous potato pastry quiches or her very popular okonomiyaki pancakes, poised over a vast hot-plate tossing and stir-frying a variety of vegetables, the air fragrant.
Born in South Africa, though raised in the UK, Arianne was part of the music industry in London for many years but would come out to Australia in the winter months to visit her brother, eventually making the move here some 16 years ago. She’s both a self-taught and trained chef, having undertaken ‘every vegan chef training I could’, she says. Constantly researching and studying, she is always working on new dishes, although certain ones like lasagna and eggplant parmigiana never leave her menu. All the cheeses she makes herself: ‘I can make any seed or nut into cheese’, she says. ‘I ferment it and add secret ingredients.’
I’m drawn to the bao buns stuffed with what looks like shredded lamb but is in fact jackfruit. It’s a clever cook who can make a non-vegan salivate!
Yummify is at Mullumbimby Farmers Market every Friday from 7–11am.
