As you’ve probably gathered I’m a fan of books that involve a lot of cooking and produce stunning results, so I was really excited to get my hands on this book. The author approached lots of famous (in the US) chefs and asked them to produce a creative vegan meal, then compiled them all into a book. So how did they do?
Well, there’s no denying that it’s a beautifully published book. The photos are mouth watering. But as yet I’ve not made anything at all from it. Why? Well, maybe I’d be more inspired if I knew more about the chefs. This is my fault not the book’s, but I’d only heard of 2 of the chefs. I’d be extremely interested to see a British version with chefs I know more about. Also, many of the recipes so obviously rely on really high quality ingredients and I can tell that they wouldn’t work at all with the versions I can get hold of here – for example, if a dish uses best quality heirloom tomatoes as a centrepiece, a greenhouse tomato from a local supermarket just will not do. I also can’t get hold of quite a few of the ingredients such as a variety of fresh wild mushrooms, or certain vegetables such as sorrel, jicama and salsify.
I fully intend to try something from this book and I’m glad I bought it just because it’s so beautiful, but it’s not the inspiration I thought it would be. If you’re looking for a vegan cookbook with wonderful recipes that you can slave over, I recommend an Eric Tucker book instead.
Has anyone made anything from this book? I’d love to hear about it.
Cooking the Vegan Books 
I was looking at this book the other day- seems like a lot of expensive and complex recipes
I thought a lot of the chefs in this book didn’t really try very hard. I got it from the library and am very glad I didn’t spend any money on it. I’d rather use the Millenium books. Those are much more do-able projects!
I’d never heard of this cookbook, but I like the idea. I would love to see a British version as well!
sadly, I can’t help. I have this book too… and haven’t ever made anything from it. First of all, I have to say that not many of the recipes really call out to me. Secondly, they are so complicated. But I know one day inspiration will strike. Maybe I”ll go take a peek now… it’s been a long while since I looked in there!
🙂
I’ve heard about this book, but never seen it. I’d love to flip through and look at the recipes. When it comes to cooking, I’d much rather fix comfort/soul food than gourmet artsy dishes. But I do love to look at pretty food pics.
I made the cauliflower steak, but I made it before the book came out and it had a different puree. It was really good. I think some of the breakfast recipes look pretty nice and doable.
I have the book, but have yet to make anything from it. But now I want to go home and flip through it and see if anything inspires me for dinner!
I think of this as a “coffee table” book. It’s beautiful to look at but not practical to cook from – perhaps for a special anniversary dinner some day…
I have a copy of this book, but I haven’t made anything from it either. (With the two little ones I rarely have time to get THAT involved.) Gorgeous photography, though… I’m going to look at it for inspiration when my husband’s and my anniversary rolls around again.
I have this book. It is beautiful, but I haven’t made anything from it. I too consider it more of a coffee table book. But perhaps one day…