Cooking Light Way to Cook Vegetarian: The Complete Visual Guide to Healthy Vegetarian & Vegan Cooking [Hardcover]

Editors of Cooking Light Magazine (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 19, 2010 | Series: Cooking Light

Cooking Light Way to Cook Vegetarian is a celebration of all the plant world has to offer-from colorful fruits and vegetables bursting with nutrients to hearty grains and proteinpacked beans and tofu. Even if you only occasionally go meat-free, this book has plenty to offer. It's filled with more than 700 images showing you exactly how to prepare over 150 delicious dishes as well as hundreds of cooking tips and nutrition information about the joys and flavors of vegetarian cuisine.

Vegetarian cuisine offers a healthy way of eating that can certainly meet all of your nutritional needs-the key is to eat a variety of foods so your nutrient bases are covered. Inside, Cooking Light shares healthy eating principles for a well-rounded vegetarian diet.

It also offers a world of flavor. Cultures around the globe have long been preparing delicious vegetarian meals, and you'll find a sampling of those international flavors in this book-from Egyptian koshari and Turkish carrots and lentils to Japanese tempura tofu and vegetables and Malaysian-style noodles. This book is filled with recipes and techniques to help you prepare and savor meat-free meals.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Cooking Light, America's leading epicurean magazine and authority on healthy cooking, is dedicated to helping its more than 12 million readers eat smart, be fit, and live well.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 424 pages
• Publisher: Oxmoor House (October 19, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0848733665
• ISBN-13: 978-0848733667
• Product Dimensions: 7.5 x 1.3 x 9.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (24 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #121,614 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

47 of 50 people found the following review helpful

2.0 out of 5 stars Incomplete information in several recipies November 29, 2010

By CRD

Amazon Verified Purchase

In the recipe for Polenta with Spinach, Black Beans and Goat Cheese, the instructions call for boiling the polenta for 3 minutes, but the fact that the ingredient list does not specify "instant" polenta would leave the novice cook with raw polenta if they purchased regular polenta which takes 20 to 30 minutes to cook.
I tried the recipe for corn dumplings made with masa harina. The recipe calls for a 3 minute cooking time. They were still raw inside after 15 minutes.
In the recipe for Baked Falafel Sandwiches with Yogurt-Tahini Sauce, under falafel ingredients is listed:
2(15.5-ounce)cans chickpeas(garbanzo beans)rinsed and drained
3 cups cooked chickpeas(garbanzo beans)
After these inconsistancies, I lost trust in this book. Too bad, because it is a beautifully laid-out book.

19 of 20 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Great cookbook! December 7, 2010

By ABoudreau18

I got this book about a month ago and was so excited to try the recipes! (I had previously purchased Cooking Light's Best Chicken Recipes Cookbook and loved it - but now I dont eat chicken :/) So far I have made the Szechwan Tofu with Peanuts (so yummy), the Tofu Fried Rice (very good, though I added mushrooms to make it more interesting), and the sushi (very tasty). I planned to make the tomato roasted pepper and corn soup, until I realized it requires grilling and its below freezing outside right now.

The book is set up really nice too. First off, it is diet conscience (so many vegetarians are so fat -jk - most of the ones I know need to eat more if anything) so it doesnt just insert cheese to make up for the lack of meat. And it certainly isnt full of recipes for what other people would consider side dishes, personally I find food so much more exciting now that I am not relying on the meat in my meal to satisfy me. It is also nice that the intro talks about what you need in your diet and how to get it elsewhere as a vegetarian or vegan. Also, each recipe calls out why certain things were included and how you benefit from them as a non-meat eater.

Overall I think the recipes are great - and I am very excited to try more of them!

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent! November 30, 2010

By Hardcastle

Amazon Verified Purchase

This is a lovely laid out cookbook and has great step by step directions with photos on some of the dishes. I like that all the main meals are listed as such if they have over 9 grams of protein. I have made quite a few dishes and they have been delicious. If you are tired of racking your brain about what to have for dinner or to serve for a vegetarian guest then this is a great resource. I definitely trust this cookbook and love the Cooking Light team.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Tasting & Easy Recipes, Awesome Photos - Must-have Vegetarian Cookbook April 14, 2011

By LeGrow

Amazon Verified Purchase

I have been a fan of the Cooking Light magazine for over 10 years and this cookbook is one of my favorites and probably my current most used book on my cookbook shelf (which numbers over 80 cookbooks). I was looking to add more vegetarian meals to my family's diet and this is one of the many books I purchased. Here's what I love about it:

1. Photos - This book is filled with photos. I love that - food is so visual. Most recipes have a photo of the finished dish plus special "Kitchen How-To" photos which demonstrate techniques such as the step-by-step process of cooking and assembling a frittata or the step-by-step photos of sautéing tofu cubes for a nice caramelized flavor.

2. Ease of Recipe - The recipes in this book are easy to make. The instructions are clear and the steps are straightforward. Most recipes have only 3-5 steps; these are not fussy or time-consuming meals to make. The addition of the step-by-step technique photos for most dishes makes cooking the recipes fun and stress-free. No need to guess whether you are twisting your breadsticks properly, just follow the photos!

3. Common Ingredients - I hate having to search all over town for an uncommon ingredient which may or may not make a difference to the finished dish. This book doesn't use hard to find ingredients. If you are new to vegetarianism, then some of the food listed may be new to you (such as Tempeh or Seitan) but actually can be found in your local supermarket.

4. Nutritional Information - Maybe not important to everyone but I look for this. Each recipe contains detailed nutritional information such as calories, total fat, saturated fat, monounsaturated fat, polyunsaturated fat, protein, carbohydrates, fiber, cholesterol, iron, sodium and calcium.

5.... Food that Tastes Great - Of course the recipes have to work and these deliver. The recipes I've tried produce wonderful, fresh tasting food which I have made again and again! This book has a great variety of vegetarian options for whatever your mood.

There are a few things that could be improved (but don't take away from my 5 stars). Like other reviewers, I did find the odd mistake in several recipes. However, unless you really know NOTHING about cooking, I don't think these would take away from your use/enjoyment of this cookbook. I'd also prefer if the binding wasn't hardcover but was spiral bound or a binder so it would lie open on my counter.

Bottom-line: I highly recommend this book to anyone who is interested in adding some healthy vegetarian meals to their diet - definitely try the recipes for Polenta with Olives, Tomatoes & Feta, the Peanut Crusted Tofu Triangles, or the Chipotle Bean Burritos. Of the 20 or so books I've purchased looking for great vegetarian meals, this is my go-to book.

If you are looking for books (not vegetarian) with similar qualities to this one, I highly recommend:

1. Cooking Light Way to Cook: The Complete Visual Guide to Everyday Cooking
2. The America's Test Kitchen Healthy Family Cookbook: A New, Healthier Way to Cook Everything from America's Most Trusted Test Kitchen
3. Betty Crocker Healthy Heart Cookbook (Betty Crocker Books) Read more ›

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Great eay to follow book December 14, 2010

By Ricky B

I like my cook books to have (a) lots of pictures and (b) to be easy to follow. This has both.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars My Favorite Cookbook April 4, 2011

By None of your Business

I got this book as a Christmas gift from a family friend. I've been vegetarian since I was in diapers but recently I gave up dairy for health reasons. The person who gave me the book didn't know this, however I have zero problem making every recipe I've made so far dairy-free. I've made the following so far: Three Bean Vegetarian Chili, Mexican Tomato-Bean Soup with Corn Dumplings, Vegetable Soup with Pistou, Crispy Baked Fries, Southwest Pinto Bean Burgers with Chipotle Mayonnaise, Grilled Eggplant Sandwiches with Red Onion and Aioli, and Summer Squash Pizza. The only one that wasn't that great was the Vegetable Soup with Pistou, it lacked flavor, but had a ton of ingredients and preparation. The Pinto Bean Burgers, Mexican Soup, and Summer Squash Pizza were awesome! However I made my own pizza crust, because they wanted you to use store bought pizza crust which didn't appeal to me. I read a review about mistakes in recipes, I haven't seen any of that. Then again I'm not big on reading directions, I skim them. I cook daily, I'm always in the kitchen and this is one of my favorite cookbooks. My brother is a personal chef and he loved the Mexican Soup so much that he cooks it for customers.