Vegan Ready offers whole food, plant based cooking for Sudbury residents

Trent Falldien never imagined watching a Netflix documentary would eventually lead to him taking on a second job and completely changing his eating habits.

A few years ago, Falldien watched a documentary called Game Changers. It's the story of James Wilks, an English former professional mixed martial artist, through his journey of moving to a plant-based diet.

Falldien, a full time lawyer, decided to try going vegan at that time. Since then, he hasn't looked back and is now the owner of Vegan Ready in Sudbury.

"We've gone to whole foods, plant based cooking, which is of course vegan, but also, we don't use oil or sugar, and we use very low salt in everything we do," he said.

"We cook everything from scratch. So there's no processing outside of our own kitchen."

The menu features a lot of everyday sounding items, including a Chili Dog, which is actually a roasted carrot with vegan chilli on top.The buns, burgers and dogs are homemade and feature whole wheat flour, along with shredded cabbage and carrots in the dough. Sides, including potato wedges and sweet potato wedges, are cooked in an air fryer without the use of oil.

Falldien said when he initially thought about changing his diet to vegan, he decided to try it for two weeks to start.

Since then, he's been sticking to that lifestyle and said he really enjoys creating new recipes.

"Right now, our menu is kind of limited but we've got great ideas moving forward," he said.

"That's my favourite part of the job is product development."

'Grateful' for opportunity

For Jen Jusic, the manager of Vegan Ready, there was no question in her mind about applying to the restaurant when she saw the job posting. She used to work with her sister who ran a vegan diner where she did all the baking.

She said when she started eating vegan food about six years ago, it took awhile to adjust. She said it's important to have options for different types of food when eating out in Sudbury.

"Anytime you're driving down the road, all you see is fast food places. Everything is deep fried and there's oil and so much sodium," he said.

"We don't have oil. There's no oil in the building. There's no sugar in the building. We're trying to prompt health and also consider the animals. That's huge."

Nadia Curry, Falldien's sister, works at Vegan Ready. She said she never imagined she'd be working alongside her brother.

"You know what, I never dreamed I'd be vegan," she said with a laugh. "But I'm really grateful for this opportunity."