Brisbane-based authors and dietitians Desi Carlos and Lisa Peterson of Two Greek Girls Cooking will host the Mediterranean Diet Expo at The Greek Club on Sunday 21 October.

The Mediterranean Diet Expo is a day where all Australians can understand the health benefits of traditional Mediterranean eating for nutrition, weight loss and chronic disease prevention. Desi and Lisa are passionate about bringing the traditional Mediterranean diet to Australian shores through their cookbook Mediterranean Eating: Cook, Eat, Live and coming to Brisbane for one of the city’s first Mediterranean Diet Expos.

Expo speakers include a Clinical Psychologist, a General Practitioner specialising in Diabetes, an Exercise Physiologist, Dietitians, an Oral Health Specialist and Psychiatrist as well as renowned Cardiologist Dr David Colquhoun, Consultant Cardiologist at Wesley Private and Greenslopes Private Hospitals. Two Greek Girls Cooking will be demonstrating how to easily incorporate a Mediterranean way of eating and living into daily life, with cooking sessions, food tips, and stalls throughout the day.

The pair hope to educate the community on a more balanced approach to food, as opposed to swinging from mindless eating to a very controlled mindset. “In one corner, we are busy, and reaching for things, usually packaged, with little thought for where our food has come from, and what it has in it. In the other, we have this culture of restrictive and fad diets. Neither of those approaches are healthy or sustainable,” she says.

Two Greek Girls Cooking believe that the changes can begin on a wider level, by making food an important part of daily life, a way of showing care and love to friends and family. A culture they were lucky enough to learn in their traditional Greek childhoods. “In the Mediterranean culture we grew up with, food isn’t a side thought. It’s an expression and a celebration. Traditionally, Mediterranean people grow and cook food at home, and it is eaten together often. It’s very mindful and the bonus is, traditional recipes are borne from the abundance of highly nutritious foods,” Lisa says. “The fact that these two beautiful things exist together in one food culture is what makes the traditional Mediterranean diet so exciting for Australia.”

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