Tuesday 12 May 2009

Veggie heaven

Over at Allotment 2 Table, Mangocheeks wrote a thought-provoking post about vegetarian cooking and cookery books. Mango is a veggie but has always carefully perused non-vegetarian cookbooks for tempting ideas - I'm not a veggie but about three-quarters of my diet is non-meat so I have a goodly collection of books by Deborah Madison, Denis Cotter, Simon Rimmer and I've just bought Maria Elia's The Modern Vegetarian. My veggie bias is partly, I think, because when I was growing up, meat was considered rather luxurious and tea (eaten at 6pm - we're talking impoverished with high ideas) was always some kind of egg on toast, or baked beans on toast. So meat isn't necessary to make a meal. I can go without meat in a way that I can't go without cheese and eggs.
But Mango's post made me think about vegan cookery - I don't have any vegan cookbooks, even though I'm happy eating non-dairy food. Mango points out that she looks in cookbooks that aren't written for vegetarians - I think I should investigate vegan cookery in a similar persuit for good ideas. Does anyone have a fave vegan cookbook?

3 comments:

Shaheen said...

Hi Fran39,
I am so pleased that my entry touched a chord with you.

I am so glad to hear your view that meat on the plate does not have to make a meal complete.

I would highly recommend Veganomicon by Terry Hope Romero. The recipes in the book use ingredients that are accessible in the UK, unlike some vegan cookbooks I have come across.

franmouse39 said...

cheers, Mango! I'll search that one out. It occured to me that as I love the cooking of other cultures, it was a bit crazy not to explore vegan culture.

Michele said...

Lots of veggie cookbooks have vegan options. There are also many vegan food blogs.