Malati

Myrla Malati Ocfemia has been cooking since she was eleven from the kitchen of her parents’ home in the Philippines. Then her interests in cooking and appreciation of good plant- based foods were later developed when she served as a vegetarian cook in several Hare Krishna yoga ashrams in the 1980s. This yoga group was one of the first groups to establish vegetarian restaurants in the west in the early 1960’s which brought to the westerners the sumptuous dishes of India. Her experience in Indian cooking was enhanced by her frequent visits to India. Cooking for her family for decades honed further her craft.

She recently self-publised on Amazon.com (kindle) a vegan ecookbook called Easy Asian Vegan. Her cookbook is a collection of easy to make vegan dishes for everyday and any occasion and dedicated to everyone who wants to try their hands at vegetable-based Asian cooking without too much fuss. She said she wrote the cookbook because writing it down was like ideas taking on concrete shapes. When not cooking she can be found hiking, pruning her roses, reading popular science and philosophy and doing yoga. She was at first a vegetarian and then a vegan for a total of almost 20 years. She lives in Melbourne, Australia.