Ovolo Hotels goes green, launches vibrant Plant’d vegetarian cuisine

If you are into healthy eating and embracing conscious cuisine, then this designer hotel collection is worth a visit. Ovolo Hotels, as part of its ongoing pledge to ethical eating, conscious cuisine and innovative veg recipes, rolls out Plant’d across its hotel restaurants, becoming the first hotel brand globally to commit to a vegetarian-lead offering.

This green initiative signifies a further progressive shift for Ovolo Hotels, following its successful ‘Year of the Veg’ campaign launched in October 2020. During the campaign, the dining venues transitioned to a vegetarian only offering for an initial 365 days, serving vibrant vegetarian and plant-based cuisine.

Meat is being removed for a second year in a row at Ovolo Hotels. With a number of our Ovolo venues already serving plant-based cuisine, we have decided to go the full 100%. It’s been a strategic move, but Ovolo prides itself on being an industry leader. We believe that the world changes, therefore we continue to evolve—we want to ensure we are doing our bit to help preserve our environment, promote healthy eating and enhance the image of amazing vegetarian and plant-based dining.

Girish Jhunjhnuwala, Ovolo Group’s Founder and CEO

According to Jhunjhnuwala, there have been a lot of learnings along the way, and they want to share those insights with others in the industry as well as outside the industry who are considering making the switch to a vegetarian-lead offerings or integrating it into their existing offering.

“That’s why we have created our Plant’d Playbook white paper, which will be publicly available for all to access,” he adds.

Plant’d: Eating good to feel good

Inspired by an increasing consumer interest in the many benefits of a plant-based diet, this change reflects Ovolo’s commitment to delivering on its customers’ desires, while promoting an ‘eating good to feel good’ mentality. Guests will continue to enjoy the quality food and beverage offering they expect from Ovolo restaurants, while nourishing their bodies and feeding their souls through menus which reflect a renewed commitment to sustainability and wellbeing.

On transitioning to a vegetarian-lead offering, Ovolo’s Group Creative Culinary Partner, Ian Curley says, “Our move to vegetarian dining has been even more successful than we anticipated, and we now find ourselves part of a new wave of plant-based pioneers. The one big lesson we have learned from our bold experiment: never underestimate your guests. A key focus for us has been ensuring we are creating something that still appeals to everyone—from vegans to flexitarians, and those who are simply keen on expanding their palette. We are lucky enough to be working with some incredible suppliers across the rollout who share our passion for offering nutritious, delicious and sustainable food solutions.”

Ovolo Hotels’ Plant’d Playbook

The Ovolo team have created a Plant’d Playbook white paper which includes information on the reasons Ovolo has made the switch with their food and beverage offering; what to know before you go veg; tips on defining food and beverage menus; and learnings along the way.

The white paper will be publicly available via Ovolo’s Plant’d webpage, ovolohotels.com, to support those companies looking to move to a vegetarian-lead philosophy and encouraging industry collaboration.

Ovolo’s sustainability practices

Committed to continuously finding ways to further reduce their environmental footprint, launching Plant’d comes off the back of several eco-friendly initiatives already implemented by Ovolo Hotels in the past year. These include switching to free-range eggs, opting for a more natural-lead wine list, providing refillable water containers, using more planet-friendly paper on the menus and takeaway containers, working with suppliers and Ovolo being an early adopter of removing plastic straws to eliminate plastic.

Ovolo Hotels’ sustainable initiatives also include the group’s bold move away from single-use bathroom amenity plastics, all OMG Amenities being designed sustainably, and making use of refillable, tamper-free pump bottles which are HDPE recyclable.

The hotel collection also introduced reusable woven bags for slippers, and the use of biodegradable materials in laundry bags and packaging.

*Plant’d does not include Conferencing & Events across Ovolo Hotels to give guests freedom for their unique celebrations, or the By Ovolo Collective hotels as they are distinctive, individual concepts. By Ovolo Collective Hotels will feature a strong vegetarian offering, with a commitment to integrate vegetarian options across its bars and restaurants.

All images: credit to Ovolo Hotels

Editor’s note: Hotels and resorts that are making notable efforts towards an eco-friendly future always get our attention and support. If you know of any environmentally sustainable properties, email us at editor@travelasianow.net so we can feature their dedication to becoming sustainable.  

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