Vegetarian Epicure

For the past 20 years, this has been my favorite cookbook. The sight of the cover still makes me happy. Recently, I prepared 6 recipes as part of my personal challenge to cook from all of my cookbooks. The Russian Vegetable Pie is still an all-time favorite of mine, but some recipes now seem a bit too sweet (e.g. Mushrooms Berkeley). I will still revisit this cookbook, as it holds memories in addition to recipes, but for fresh ideas, I am likely to look elsewhere.

This cookbook is incredibly similar to the Moosewood Cookbook. So if you like that one, you should like this one as well. The main drawback was that I often found myself wanting more precise directions both while cooking and afterwards while eating what I had made. Some of the recipes had complicated directions that did not seem worth the effort, and too many seemed to require vast quantities of dried "dark mushrooms”. Some of the recipes were heavy on dairy, but the Cauliflower Curry is a great example of a very flavorful and visually appealing dish without dairy, but with an excellent mixture of spices. There is a wide range of recipes and those we tried did turn out good tasting healthy vegetarian dishes.

A classic, dating from the era when vegetarian food was just catching on outside the hippie communes. A beautifully designed volume, with not bad recipes.