About Life
A Sydney wholefoods institution has opened in Port Melbourne, bringing high glamour to what was once the province of hippies.
NO PATCHOULI HERE – this is a healthyliving retail hub for the fit and fabulous. About Life was opened by sisters Jodie Stewart and Tammie Phillips in Rozelle, Sydney, 20 years ago, and the Port Melbourne store is the seventh in the About Life stable. The store stocks everything from fresh organic fruit and veg, vitamins and naturopathic supplements to arrangements of Australian native flowers and green cleaning products. It also plays host to a café. You could do your entire weekly shop here, catch brunch with mates, and refuel with a fresh smoothie post-workout. These are our store favourites:
The nut butter bar
About Life sports an extensive range of nut butters, but the DIY nut butter bar is a more entertaining way to get your smooth or crunchy. Select from a range of nuts, to which you can add cacao for a raw choc kick, choose your grind and print a label to make your own signature blend. A 250g jar will set you back $8.25.
The café
Among the health clique, coffee is passé, baby. Turmeric lattes are where it’s at (good for your guts) and these guys know how to make a corker. Cost is $4.90. 20
The beauty aisle
A whole aisle is dedicated to beauty, ranging from natural hair dyes and cosmetics to London’s Butter nail polishes: a dream come true for organic beauty devotees. The About Beauty homebrand items are a bargain – pick up coffee bean and coconut body scrub, tubs of Epsom salts, scented bath salts and cacao and coconut body butter, all for less than a tenner.
Breakfast bar
Pudding for breakfast! Catering for the gluten, dairy, grain and sugar-free crew, the breaky bar is a buffet of interesting options, including raw cacao, avocado and chai pudding, spirulina and banana pudding and chia charcoal pudding (charcoal’s meant to be good for an internal sweep-out). Small tubs are generously portioned and $8.90 each.
Chiller cabinet
The chiller cabinet at typical supermarkets is depressing for the lactose-intolerant. Not so here, with cabinet after cabinet of non-dairy frozen desserts – including coconut, keffir and almond milk iced confections. Start with Melbourne brand Cocofrio’s salted caramel dairy and gluten-free ice cream and work your way through the other nine flavours.