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Vegetarian cookbooks


Carlovski

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I have been using this cookbook since it was initially published in the early 1980s and it remains one of my favorites go-to books for vegetable dishes.  I love the fact that it is arranged by vegetable and not by recipe. So for example if I happen to have a huge head of broccoli, I can just go to the section on broccoli and find a slew of recipes at my disposal. And more importantly, I have never made any recipe from this book that did not come out perfectly -  No failures in over 30 years.

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The Victory Garden Cookbook,  Paperback – July 1, 1982 by Marian Morash

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  • 5 months later...
On 7/2/2013 at 9:44 PM, ElainaA said:

Cabbagetown Cafe, a favorite in Ithaca in the 1970's-80's - rivaling Moosewood. I liked it better...

 

Too bad it's gone. :(

I was lucky to eat there a couple times before it closed. :smile:

~Martin :)

I just don't want to look back and think "I could have eaten that."

Unsupervised, rebellious, radical agrarian experimenter, minimalist penny-pincher, and adventurous cook. Crotchety, cantankerous, terse curmudgeon, non-conformist, and contrarian who questions everything!

The best thing about a vegetable garden is all the meat you can hunt and trap out of it!

 

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  • 2 years later...
On 7/2/2013 at 9:44 PM, ElainaA said:

Cabbagetown Cafe, a favorite in Ithaca in the 1970's-80's - rivaling Moosewood. I liked it better

 

I still think about that place from time to time.

The food was pretty good!

FWIW, David Lebovitz used to work there.

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~Martin :)

I just don't want to look back and think "I could have eaten that."

Unsupervised, rebellious, radical agrarian experimenter, minimalist penny-pincher, and adventurous cook. Crotchety, cantankerous, terse curmudgeon, non-conformist, and contrarian who questions everything!

The best thing about a vegetable garden is all the meat you can hunt and trap out of it!

 

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  • 1 year later...

Bringing this one back. My daughter's birthday is next week and I need to get her a vegetarian cookbook. Bittman's How to Cook Everything Vegetarian looks interesting. Any opinions  on this or others I should look at?

 

Thanks,

Mike

That's the thing about opposum inerds, they's just as tasty the next day.

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My top recommendation would go to Joshua McFadden's Six Seasons: A new way with vegetables.  It is not strictly vegetarian as he uses anchovies here and there and even includes a recipe for Beef with Lots and Lots of Onions but it's mostly vegetarian and does very good things with vegetables.   I've given it to 8 friends and even though it's been a couple of years, I still receive regular text messages with photos of what they are cooking from the book.  He starts the book with a "go-to" section of sauces, pickles, compound butters and condiments that he draws on throughout the book.  Some people think that's a sneaky way of hiding a recipe-in-a-recipe so be warned.  There are photos of most dishes. We have a thread on cooking from it here

 

Joe Yonan's Cool Beans is a new title that is full of vegan bean recipes.  Beautiful photos, too.  I've enjoyed what I've cooked from it so far.

 

Ottolenghi's Plenty and Plenty More have both been mentioned earlier in this thread and are both excellent.  There's a "cooking from"  thread on Plenty  here . I thought there was one on Plenty More, but I can't find it.  Both have tons of recipes with interesting flavor combinations and photos of a lot (though not all) of the dishes.  If I were going to give either of those to an Ottolenghi novice who doesn't have access to ethnic groceries, I'd include a pantry gift of sumac, za'atar, pomegranate molasses, harissa, tahini and preserved lemons (or a recipe for that last one.)

 

I don't see a recommendation for The Moosewood Restaurant Table upthread but it's a great book with a ton of (the cover says 250) recipes, most of which are fairly easy and not particularly time consuming.  I'm quite fond of the Hummus with Preserved Lemon....all the dips are good. 

 

I love Deborah Madison, too, and I prefer her Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone to Bittman's How to Cook Everything Vegetarian but while the big tomes are good for reference, they don't draw me in as much as her other books.  Vegetable Literacy is a beautiful book that will teach almost anyone a few new things about vegetables.  The book is organized into "vegetable families" and there's an informative essay to begin each chapter so it's a good guide to substituting related veg in recipes. Her book, Local Flavors is a great farmers market companion.   IMHO, The Greens Restaurant Cookbook, mentioned just above is on the restaurant-y side.  For example, most of the soups require their own stocks.  The results are generally worth the effort and there are quite a few recipes (Winter Squash Soup with Red Chili and Mint, Turnip Soup with Turnip Greens and Black Bean Chili) that I return to over and over but be aware that it's not entirely effortless cooking.    My most used of her books is The Savory Way, which I've used a ton.  Both of those are older books and lack photographs which I know is a deal breaker for some but they also happen to be my favorites. 

 

Finally, I'll put in a plug for another old favorite of mine, Mollie Katzen's Still Life with Menu. In this book, she promotes the idea of doing some prep work ahead so dinners are easy to put together at the end of the day.  There are 50 menus and each one has a list of prep tasks that can be done 1, 2, or 3 days ahead.  There are also quick pasta and stir fry meals, breakfasts and menus for vegetarian Thanksgiving,  a vegetarian barbecue and a Seder, all meals that can confound those hosting vegetarian guests.  Because of the menu planning aspect, this would be good for someone new to vegetarian cooking or someone who would like a bit of a nudge to get into menu planning or everyday cooking.  There are some weekly menu plans at the end with advance tasks to do each day.  No photos, the book is illustrated with Katzen's own artwork. 

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