Words in Winter: Fed Up and Fighting Back with Lucy Ridge and Tammi Jonas

What happens when women walk away from broken systems and start building their own?

Lucy Ridge was a chef burned out by the misogyny, long hours and barked orders of commercial kitchens. So she walked away. Her journey didn’t lead her out of food, it led her deeper in. Travelling across Australia, she discovered a world of women-led farming, foraging and food production, including Jonai Farms, right here on Dja Dja Wurrung country. Her debut book, Fed Up, charts that journey from paddock to plate.

Tammi Jonas is the farmer behind Jonai Farms. An agroecologist and president of the Australian Food Sovereignty Alliance, she and her family farm heritage-breed pigs, cattle and garlic. Her book, Eat Like the Jonai – part recipes, part stories, part manifesto – is a food sovereignty warrior’s handbook to crack the industrial food system in the most uncommonly delicious ways. Proceeds from the book helped fund her seven-year fight for a micro-abattoir on her farm, recently approved by council, offering ethical, humane slaughter and supply chain security for small farmers locked out of industrial systems.

Lucy and Tammi come together for a conversation, moderated by food journalist and Daylesford newcomer Rushani Epa, about the power of women-led farming to transform our food systems, from paddock to plate and back again.