Venture aloft on healthy foods

Two Birds eatery serves up food that not only tastes great, but is good for you.

A Hamilton eatery with a difference is creating a stir among the health-conscious.

Two Birds opened just over a month ago in Hamilton East and offers a range of raw, gluten-free, dairy-free and packed-full-of-goodness food choices.

Founder Jojo Gittings, 22, says the food the outlet serves up is the kind that customers can walk away feeling good about.

Jojo launched the business after she decided to put her enthusiasm for food and holistic nutrition studies into digestible form for others to enjoy.

"I've always been interested in nutrition since I was about 15. Holistic nutrition is, I think, so important because it is not standard textbook nutrition, it is looking at the whole picture - your mental, physical health too."

The eatery is run as a separate business, but operates out of the RIV bar and bistro function room in Hamilton East's Clyde St shopping centre.

Jojo says she saw an opportunity to utilise the space as the room they use is only open for dinner and functions.

"I didn't think anyone would come in the first week. I think you expect when you open a business, that it is going to be all the people that you know.

"It has been random people we've got to know around the area."

She said they are not about making money, and while they need to make a profit, it is about bringing good food to people that they will enjoy, and get the right nutrition from.

"My vision would be to get bigger and better at what we're doing, get more people through the door and show people that healthy food isn't disgusting, and it can be really nourishing and really delicious."

Julliana Wilcox, who works with Jojo, says she struggled to find anywhere to eat out as she cannot eat gluten or dairy.

"I kept feeling down, and groggy, a day [was] a challenge. I stopped eating gluten and got better, but I wasn't 100 per cent, so I stopped eating dairy. I was quite upset because I love dairy and gluten!

"It is so easy now to be around the food, and it does make a difference."

Though not all the produce is organic, Two Birds tries to purchase as many ingredients locally as possible, and uses mainly seasonal produce to keep prices down.

"Whatever we can get we will get local, our milk isn't organic yet but I am getting some this week. It is very expensive so whatever we can source locally we get."

The menu includes items such as the dairy-free, gluten-free and refined-sugar-free banoffee pie and brownie; quinoa beet salad with feta, candied walnuts and spinach; rice paper rolls; gluten-free and vegan red rice salad with herbs, seeds and nuts, and much more.

Jojo says a big hit has been their smoothies such as the chocolate peanut butter smoothie made with nuzest natural protein (not from whey), organic peanut butter, coconut cream, almond milk, cacoa nibs, banana, medjool dates and chia seeds.