Karo Tak

In this episode Holly Skodis interviews Karo Tak about her life as a vegan activist, yoga teacher and chef. 

Karo focuses on 3 main components in her life:  FOOD, YOGA & ACTIVISM. She is a very active travelling vegan chef, yoga teacher and activist. She travels the world to teach Jivamukti Yoga, talks about animal rights, facilitates cooking classes and compassionately spreads the word for animals worldwide. She runs her own vegan cheese company: GOPAL VEGAN CHEESE & yoga apparel: SHAKTEE. She facilitates her own vegan cooking workshops, events, talks and seminars all for the betterment of the world. She is just about to start her food, yoga and activism tour travelling to Holland, Germany, Luxembourg and Switzerland.

• Jivamukti Yoga - Jiva means individual soul and mukti means liberation. The practice of Jivamukti is very strong and liberating. The Jivamukti Yoga method emphasises asana, scriptural study, devotion, prayer, music, chanting and meditation as well as veganism, environmentalism and political activism. Karo’s classes are dynamic and energetic with a smashing play-list, teachings drawn from her own life experience and work as an animal rights activist.
• Effective approaches to talking about veganism
• Going undercover on slaughterhouses 
• Extinction Rebellion: an international movement that uses non-violent civil disobedience in an attempt to halt mass extinction and minimize the risk of social collapse.
• Vanessa Van Noy Episode 10
• Queer Eye's Jonathan Van Ness' podcast Getting Curious
• Karo's vegan cheese company Gopal Vegan Cheese
  Gopal Mantra on Spotify by Krishna Das
• Karo's Raw Hazelnut Vegan Brownies. 
  So the other day I made these yummy hazelnut brownies kind of by accident as I just tried to blend a few things together hoping it would work and it did indeed work. I tried to remember amounts as much as I could, so try for yourself and just add anything else you think might work well in the recipe, the sky is the limit, my friends. 
  Ingredients: 
  2 cups hazelnuts 
  1/2 cup cacao Powder 
  3/4 cup coconut Sugar
  1 cup coconut Oil (liquid form, so it works well to let the oil sit in warm water for a while so it becomes really liquid) 
  1 tsp Himalayan salt 
  Optional: 10 soaked dates (check that there is no pit inside) 
  Method: 
  Start by blending the hazelnuts and the sugar together. You really want the hazelnuts to be like meal, powder form nearly, so really well blended. Then add the cacao. Blend again. Then you add the coconut oil and salt. Blend well together. So if you have the dates then keep the blender going while you add the dates one by one to the mixtures. The dates are like the glue which will create a perfect consistency and make the setting process a little quicker in my opinion BUT last time I made this I had no dates and it still set perfectly, so if you don’t have dates, no problem! 
  Then place the mixture in a cake form, line the cake form with vegetable paper, cling wrap or foil. Let it set for at least 24 hours in the fridge. And voila you’re in business. Enjoy! 
  *Optional you can save a few hazelnuts and crush them a little or blend them just a tiny bit and sprinkle them on the top. Looks great and taste delicious.