Announcing The Asia’s 50 Best Bars Sustainable Bar Award Winner

Sustainable sourcing at FURA 

FURA’s food and drinks menus deliberately showcase ingredients that are in abundance, invasive or prevalent. Their food menu is mostly vegan and vegetarian, only deviating from this in serving jellyfish and insects. As mentioned, the focus is on local sourcing, working with small-scale producers in the area and highlighting them on the menus; they also host workshops to celebrate these products. Between 80 and 90% of FURA’s ingredients are locally sourced. 

When it comes to their drinks menu, the team has a list of criteria that they consider when selecting ingredients:  

• Total carbon emissions, end-to-end, 
• Food miles, 
• The farming method used and whether it causes land degradation, 
• Incorporating invasive species like insects and jellyfish, and 
• Using future-proof ingredients like cell cultured milk, air protein, seaweed and bean-free coffee. 

This is all accomplished using a creative and light-hearted approach, serving cocktails like ‘Beans, Beans, the Musical Fruit', designed to highlight the sustainable qualities of legumes and pulses, and the 'Jellyfish Martini’, which uses jellyfish, an invasive species. 

Social sustainability at FURA 

At FURA, they go above and beyond to take care of their team. For example, they provided accommodation to one team member in a volatile living situation and, on a separate occasion, paid for their bar manager's holiday. They organise team visits to the farms with whom they work and have a monthly share session on different topics for the purposes of continuing education. 

The team is also conscious of how the bar interacts with the community. They provide educational sessions for locals on gardening and composting and offer their space for freelance bartenders to do R&D and/or prep. In an ongoing partnership, people can attend a tour of a local farm, harvest some produce and then continue on to FURA for a free plant-based cooking class. With half of the drinks menu consisting of lower ABV options with a flavour-first focus, they’re also supporting healthier habits.  

Environmental impact at FURA 

Working in collaboration with their produce supplier, the ‘Ugly Delicious' section of their menu tackles food waste by sourcing fruit and vegetables that cannot be sold through usual channels and would otherwise go to waste. FURA ferments these in-house to create funky fruit wines and non-alcoholic drinks. 

The team embraces the principles of circularity in reducing non-food waste, too: they avoid the use of cling film and work with reusable piping bags and plastic bags for portioning. To prevent paper waste, they have linen hand towels in the bathrooms and even make papier mâché with used receipts – these are then repurposed as product cards for their retail items.  

Coasters are made from spent oyster shells collected from their neighbour's oyster bar. Bar stools are made by with a local sustainable material company, called Panelogue, and they give their empty glass bottles to studio GIN&G to repurpose into plates and ceramic glazes; others are re-used for their retail vermouth. For off-site events, they require reusable flatware and glassware.  

We love to see businesses like this getting creative with waste reduction, having fun with their menus and working in close collaboration with other small-scale businesses in the area. A big shout-out to Christina Rasmussen, Sasha Wijidessa and their team at FURA – this win is very well-deserved. 

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