Author: Christy Morgan
Publisher: Ben Bella Books – 269 pages
Book Review by Laxmi Chaandi
This book features an excellent and varied selection of dishes, with full-color photos, (many of which are full page in size) and easy-to-follow recipes with the amount needed of each ingredient, cooking directions and how many people the dish would serve.
The author Christy Morgan, who is called “the Blissful Chef,” gives classes on cooking healthful foods, lectures, and provides personal chef services and private instruction as well. She also blogs about healthy living and shares her knowledge through videos.
You might not know this: vegetarians do not eat meat but do eat other food coming from other non-human beings such as seafood, eggs, dairy products and even honey. Vegans exclude all such foods as well. Some vegans do not even eat biscuits, cakes and cookies if eggs are part of their ingredients.
But even if you are not a vegetarian or vegan, you will find in this wonderful book more than 175 recipes for delicious, nutritious vegan meals for breakfast, brunch, lunch and dinner. In it are also healthful and delicious appetizers, soups and salads.
This book contains an unbelievably large range of delectable vegetable dishes, whole grains and other rich sources of protein that develops muscles (not fat) and healthful desserts that do not load your body with sugar and fat.
Before presenting her recipes, Christy writes in the intro section of the book how she has found bliss in discovering, preparing, eating vegan food and sharing her discoveries with the public through the means described above in this, her first book.
Of special value in this section are tips on how to use this cookbook, create the ideal kitchen along with a prepping station and tools needed, and stock the pantry with a variety of the best vegan foods and condiments and seasonings for flavor. Read also about cutting and cooking techniques. She provides tips on how to get started.
The main section has recipes of a very large variety. We suggest you use this main 175-page section of the book as a reference source and browse through it to pick what dishes you want to make, rather than reading it like a story or novel.
The third and last section of the book has her selections of sample menus, resources and sources of natural food and food ingredients, books, DVDs and other information media devices, acknowledgments to people who helped Christy with this book, a little bit about her, and a very large index to help readers who are new to vegan food and lifestyles.
The recipes enable you to prepare the dishes in about 45 minutes or less. They are color-coded by season depending on what items are easily obtainable that time of the year,
to make your buying (and stocking) of foods easier. There is also an “anytime” color designation for dishes that can be made from vegetables and fruits available all year long. You will also find dishes that are gluten-free or soy-free and can be made well with low amounts of oil.
Breakfasts and brunches: Browsing through the photos of the many mouth-watering dishes, I found several that piqued my interest and I cooked and tried one them. It is a breakfast dish called “vegan eggs benedict.” If you like eggs and now want to be a vegan, you will love this item.
Soups: A good way to start a meal would be to have the curried split pea soup, which is color-coded for summer but who is to say you cannot enjoy it in other seasons as well?
Other wonderful liquid refreshments for this (or any other) season are the “hearty lentil soup” and the “sweet carrot-ginger bisque.”
Appetizers: Some delicious appetizers are the “lemony-lime hummus”, the “cali-style white bean bruschetta” the “easy guacamole” and the “pineapple-cucumber gazpacho.”
Salads: If you love nuts and fruits, try the “zucchini ‘pasta’ with mint-cashew pesto sauce.” And the “fall harvest fruit salad” made with diced cantaloupe, apple slices, a cup of halved red grapes, and two sweet clementines, all topped with pecan halves and grated coconut – these are all my favorite fruits!
Vegetables: Among vegetable dishes, this one looks fantastic: the “gingery bok choy-burdock sauté” made in 1/3rd cup water with one bunch bok choy, a cup of burdock, and a 15-oz. can of chick peas – all mixed together and seasoned with a tablespoon each of grated ginger and tamari, with a pinch of sea salt added for taste. Wow, I can already savor its heavenly taste.
There are numerous sources of protein from grains and legumes. One of the most sumptuous dishes in this book providing this basic nutrient is the “black-eyed pea barbeque stew.” It can be easily made in a half cup of filtered water with one cup each of dried black-eyed peas, small cubes of rutabaga and frozen snow peas, adding diced carrots, celery stalks, half cup of barbeque sauce, and seasoned with pinches of sea salt and black pepper.
Christy Morgan wants you to feel and look great by eating plant-based meals that are tasty, fun and packed with the essential nutrients your body needs. With this highly useful, thoughtfully-organized, beautifully-illustrated, well-written book, she is well on her way to success in her mission. We congratulate her on an excellent book.
