RE: Favorite Cookbooks?

March 22, 2009

I like the works of Isa Moskowitz and Myra Kornfeld.

Kornfeld is a professional chef, and her recipes reflect it, very layered

flavor-wise. Her stuff is sort of intermediate level, so probably not good

beginner's cookbooks for any beginners out there who may be reading this.

I like Moskowitz's stuff because she and I share a similar culinary

upbringing, so much of her stuff speaks to me, as it were. Her tofu-cashew

ricotta (she's vegan, as am I, mostly), which I use to make vegan lasagna,

is so wonderfully tasty that I find myself scooping bits of it right out of

the food processor and eating it raw...

I recently got a new cookbook called Vegan Soul Kitchen, by Bryant Terry. I

just got it, so I haven't made anything from it, but I'm just blown away by

the recipes. I can't wait to make something from this book.

The most disappointing writer has been Nava Atlas. I've made three soups of

hers, and while they were edible and I ate each one the day that I made it,

I had no desire whatsover to freeze them for later consumption. Not any one

of the three.

- DJ

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Always remember: Today's mighty oak is simply

yesterday's nut that held its ground...

_____

On Behalf Of classiquepair

Sunday, March 22, 2009 8:49 AM

Favorite Cookbooks?

I'm always on the lookout for new cookbooks for my hard copy library.

Do any of you have favorites? If I had to name three, I'd say:

Some Like it Hot by Robin Robertson. Recipes celebrating the chili

pepper from around the world. Robertson updated this OOP edition to

Vegan Fire and Spice. With 25 new recipes, I'll definitely pick this

one up.

Classic Vegetarian Cooking From the Middle East and North Africa by

Habeeb Salloum. Great recipes! I've especially enjoyed the lentil

soups, so many great lentil soup recipes. And the Moroccan...great

eating.

The Art of Indian Vegetarian Cooking by Yamuna Devi. This is an

absolutely amazing book for Indian cooking, all phases. My only regrets

on this one are the massive inclusions of dairy foods. I'd prefer more

vegan recipes. But this is a great edition for the knowledge of cooking

in this style.

I also have some good books on veggie Thai and North African that would

be on this list, if I expanded it, along with a decent general cookbook,

1000 Vegetarian Recipies by Carol Gelles.

Which cookbooks do you go to more frequently?

March 23, 2009

classiquepair wrote:

>

> Do any of you have favorites? If I had to name three, I'd say:

>

The three I use most, in about this order, are:

1. Kathy Farrell Kingsley's oddly titled THE BIG BOOK OF VEGETARIAN.

It's not

famous--in fact, my brother found it remaindered somewhere, I think.

But it's terrific.

Kingsley used to be the food editor of Vegetarian Times, and of the

225+ recipes

she includes here, I'd say at least 150 make me drool. That's a

huge percentage.

2. Yamuna Devi's awe-inspiring LORD KRISHNA'S CUISINE: THE ART OF INDIAN

VEGETARIAN COOKING. I've talked about it here and won't bore you again, but

I'm a little obsessed right now with getting really good at Indian and

especially

South Indian cooking; for one thing, it's heart-healthy. And this isd

THE Indian

cookbook, vegetarian or non-.

3. The Moosewood Collective's SUNDAYS AT MOOSEOOD. It's full of recipes

that are real keepers, but even if all I'd ever made from it was the

African

peanut sauce, it would've been worth the price.

If i could find a really good Siciliam or southern Italian vegetarian

cookbook, it might knock

Moosewood into fourth place; I love that stuff.

Others I love include classic oldtimers like LAUREL'S KITCHEN, DIET FOR

A SMALL PLANET,

RECIPES FOR A SMALL PLANET, William Shurtleff and Akiko Aoyagi's THE

BOOK OF TOFU,

and Peter and Joan Martin's JAPANESE COOKING. I guess I'm getting old,

but I haven't

seen that many cookbooks from the last five years that excite me; the

trendy/foodie ones too

often crosses over into foofy, expensive weirdness. Or they take the

well-worn " 365 Boring

Things You Can Make from Overpriced Pre-Packaged Swill Because You're

Too Busy to Learn

to, You Know, Actually Cook Or Educate Your Kids' Palates " approach.

Feh.

Rain

@@@@

\\\\\

March 23, 2009

No surprises here:

Madhur Jaffrey's _World Vegetarian_

Barnard and Kramer's _How It All Vegan_ and _The Garaden of Vegan_

Sarah Kramer's _La Dolce Vegan_

I think I could manage on just those four if I had to go to a desert island (a

kitchen-equipped on, true! LOL) If I could take only one book to that desert

island? Madhur Jaffrey's _World Vegetarian_ for sure. I've been using it and

adapting from it (for personal taste as well as for vegan) for donkey's years

and I still have sooooo many recipes yet to try. Never had a failed recipe or a

disappointment.

Best, Pat

March 23, 2009

What are some of your favorite recipes from the Kramer books?

- DJ

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Always remember: Today's mighty oak is simply