MEDIA RELEASE Thursday 19 March, 2015 Celebrity chefs throw their support behind Earth Hour Leading international and Australian chefs have today announced their support for
Earth Hour
2015, using their influence and involving their restaurants to highlight the impact global warming is having on Australian food and farmers. British celebrity chef and prior Earth Hour Ambassador Jamie Oliver will visit Australia over the weekend of Earth Hour (Saturday 28 and Sunday 29 March) to speak about his
Food Revolution
at the Opera House, encouraging Australians to cook with and eat Australiangrown fresh food and produce. His flagship Jamie’s Italian restaurants in Sydney, Canberra, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth will host “lights out” candlelit dining on Earth Hour night on Saturday, March 28 to show their support. Oliver will also endorse the global movement to his 4.2 million Twitter followers and fans on Thursday, March 26. Top local chefs are also getting behind the initiative, using their influence to spread awareness about how rising temperatures and more extreme weather events are affecting the fresh and healthy produce that Australians enjoy in their daily lives. Kylie Kwong, Luke Mangan, Matt Moran, Guy Grossi, Shannon Bennett and Margaret Fulton are among the long list of celebrity chefs who have signed on as Australian Earth Hour ambassadors. Kwong’s new Potts Point restaurant Billy Kwong will host “lights out” dining, as will Matt Moran’s Chiswick in Woollhara and Guy Grossi’s Melbourne restaurant Grossi Florentino. Mangan will create a unique Earth Hourthemed cocktail at his Waterloo restaurant MOJO by Luke Mangan. Guy Turland and Mark Alston of Bondi Harvest will host a special “Nose to Tail” dinner with free range pork farmers Matt and Sue Simmons, whose story appears in Earth Hour’s new cookbook
Planet to Plate
,
a collection of 52 recipes from Australia’s top chefs that uniquely incorporates firsthand stories from farmers on the frontline of global warming. River Cottage Australia host Paul West and MasterChef winners Emma Dean and Andy Allen are also Earth Hour ambassadors. MasterChef runner up Lynton Tapp stars in Earth Hour’s documentary
Appetite for Change
, which will be screened nationally on the afternoon of Earth Hour on Network Ten. Fresh food retailer Harris Farm Markets is throwing its weight behind the campaign and will close its Potts Point and Boronia Park stores early on Earth Hour night in a show of support for Australian farmers. “It’s wonderful to see so much support for Earth Hour from Australia’s top chefs,” said Earth Hour National Manager Anna Rose. “Australia’s food industry has a unique role to play in communicating the impact that global warming is already having on the fantastic fresh food we grow in Australia.” ENDS For more information, interviews or images, please contact: Gina Dombosch, Earth Hour, 0419 012 062, [email protected]. Notes to Editors ● Planet to Plate: The Earth Hour Cookbook
is available online at
www.earthhour.org.au/cookbook
for $49.99 including postage. ● All restaurants and cafes are encouraged to host lights out dining on Saturday, March 28 and to register at
www.earthhour.org.au
. ● Earth Hour will take place at 8:30pm local time, Saturday, March 28, 2015. ● In 2014 one in three Australians took part in Earth Hour, turning off their lights to show their support for cutting carbon pollution and tackling global warming. ● Earth Hour began in Sydney in 2007, initiated by WWFAustralia to raise awareness of the effects of climate change. 2,200 businesses and over 2 million people took part. ● Earth Hour has now spread to 162 countries and over 7,000 cities, making it the world’s largest environmental movement.