Lyndi Cohen recently flew from Sydney to Bundaberg to check out the region’s macadamia nut farms for herself

She has an online following of more than 100,000 people, now dietician and ‘nude’ nutritionist Lyndi Cohen has another fantastic achievement to add to her list.

She has an online following of more than 100,000 people and is a Today Show regular and food author, now dietician and nutritionist Lyndi Cohen has another fantastic achievement to add to her list - a visit to Bundaberg’s macadamia fields.

Ms Cohen paid a visit to the property of Rae Stuart and Tony Pashley, two local macadamia farmers who have been using an incredibly innovative system since deciding to make macadamias their main crop.

Rae Stuart and Tony Pashley on their macadamia property.

Rae and Tony decided to convert their 45 hectare property into a macadamia farm six years ago after recognising strong potential for growth in the industry.

The farm is home to 15,000 macadamia trees and a typical day for the growers begins with dehusking the nuts from the previous day’s harvest.

Once completed and the ground is dry enough, Tony proceeds with the harvesting process while Rae continues dehusking and sorting the nuts in their farm’s shed.

Lyndi observes production at the Pashley macadamia farm.

At around 3pm Rae will head out on the property and mow behind where Tony has been harvesting, while he continues to retrieve macadamia nuts with the harvester.

As evening dawns, Rae and Tony head back to the shed to clean up and prepare for the following day.

Ms Cohen said she had been working with Australian Macadamias and said it was “exciting”.

Sydney dietician and nutritionist Lyndi Cohen paid the Bundaberg region's macadamia farms a visit. She met with local growers and enjoyed a macadamia-themed lunch.

“I’ve never been to Bundaberg, this is the first time I am here and I kinda feel like it’s a really exciting food spot

Ms Cohen got the chance to spend time with growers to understand firsthand the work that goes into producing the little nuts.

“I feel like most people in Sydney probably do’‘t know much about macadamias. They wouldn’t be able to spot a macadamia tree, they wouldn’t know what it looks like, they might not even know that it comes from a tree,” she said.

Sydney dietician and nutritionist Lyndi Cohen paid the Bundaberg region's macadamia farms a visit.

“So it’s really cool that I get to go and take what I learn and share it online, hopefully with lots and lots of people.”

Ms Cohen described the region as “beautiful” as she talked about the work she does with Macadamias Australia to promote the locally grown, Australian nut.

“What I’ve been doing with Aussie Macadamias in general has been creating recipes for them, chatting on TV about how to get people excited about using macadamias in food.”

A relaxing winter day on the macadamia farm.

Ms Cohen said it was worth celebrating the fact a macadamia is an Australian nut.

“Nutritionally a macadamia nut is a perfect little whole food, it comes complete in its shell, it‘s got these beautiful healthy fats. It’s really satisfying and I think people have this idea that eating nuts is fattening because they contain fats but now what we know is that eating healthy nuts is really good for you - especially macadamias are loaded with healthy fats, essential nutrients and and plenty of good stuff.”

Ms Cohen said it was a no-brainer to encourage people to eat more macadamias, with a lot of research backing up the nutritional content of the nut.

Sydney dietician and nutritionist Lyndi Cohen paid the Bundaberg region's macadamia farms a visit.

“They’re such a foodie, healthy food, they’re so delicious.”

Many macadamia growers in the Bundaberg region are new growers who are just getting into their first commercial quantities.

It makes for an exciting time in the farming industry.

Growers and industry representatives have a chat about growing macadamias.

Meeting up for lunch at Rae and Tony‘s farm alongside Ms Cohen, a number of local growers talked about their experiences and how many had made the switch from farming cane, peanuts and even cattle.

They say farming is “in the blood”.

Macadamias will give a small crop after three years, but it takes about four years to get a commercial crop.

Sydney dietician and nutritionist Lyndi Cohen paid the Bundaberg region's macadamia farms a visit.

The growers spoke about the “huge issue” of Paradise Dam as they nervously await water allocations on July 1.

“It doesn’t look like there’s going to be any significant rain, so it’ll be around 10 per cent allocation so there’ll be a lot of people who suffer,” Mr Pashley said.

Graeme Dahl said drought was an even bigger factor than irrigation because the soil had lost its moisture.

Farmers Maree and Graeme Dahl.

“I dug underground into the clay and the clay‘s dry, a metre down it’s dry and powdery and normally clay holds water.”

The growers said the knock-on effect was to the town, not just farmers.

They said while macadamias can survive some deficit, avocadoes couldn‘t and would just dry without enough water.

The growers said many people came to Bundaberg and paid good money for land because of water security, but the situation with Paradise Dam - which they said had been built quickly and shoddily - had thrown that into chaos.

With strong demand for the healthy macadamia nut, growers are hoping for good news on water allocations as they venture into a bold new era - about 10,000 hectares worth.