Customer Reviews

India's Vegetarian Cooking: A Regional Guide

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I have tried a few recipes from this book (cauliflower, broccoli, yoghurt, rice & dal dishes) and so far they have been delicious, quick to make, and relatively original. (I have many indian cookbooks,they often repeat recipes from each other.) There is little information on timing, but it does not seem to matter. She is good at producing recipes which are easy, don't have too many ingredients & taste good.

This may be my all-around favorite Indian cookbook. I like the brief but informative discussions of different regions and their foods, and I appreciate the variety of vegetable recipes (the potato, eggplant and cauliflower recipes that seem to dominate Indian cookbooks are rounded out nicely by tasty recipes for broccoli, squash, bamboo shoots, plantains, mushrooms, green beans and so on -- a good number of alternatives for a fairly small cookbook).

But perhaps what I appreciate most is how easy it is to use this book on a weeknight and still make a delicious, multi-dish meal. Many of my Indian cookbooks have wonderful recipes but oftentimes they have long ingredient lists and many steps. They may be more traditional in their approach -- I'm not sure -- but I work all day and have a long commute home and labor-intensive cooking doesn't always work for me. Bharadwaj's recipes come together easily and quickly but are just as delicious as the recipes in the other books; if she's taking shortcuts she's doing it very well.

Don't forget to try the bananas stuffed with cilantro chutney! They are superb!

got book from library and tried couple of recipes. Recipes are very easy to follow and book has good variety of regional recipes so bought the book.

This is a wonderful vegetarian book. The recipes are simple enough for every-day preparation, yet interesting enough for guests. Many of the recipes are flavorful (e.g., well-spiced), but only mildly to moderately 'hot.' The book is also nicely divided into recipes from the North-East-South and West of India.

The only thing I do not like about this book is that in some of the recipes not enough instruction is given--for example, one recipe says "fry eggplant in shallow oil," but does not say how much oil should be used, how deep, the temperature, etc. There could also be more description of the ingredients--e.g., what is a 'black lentil?' I find that I have to refer to other books for better definitions of the ingredients.

We have tried many recepies from this book. Food turns out really good and very authentic. The recepies reminded us of our childhood in India and enjoyed very much cooking and relishing afterwards. In all excellent receipe book. Kudos!

I was interested in learning about the foods of different regions of India, and I'm a vegetarian, so I bought this book. I've made a couple of recipes, and my husband (who is not of Indian heritage) has made several recipes, and they've all turned out great. This book is easy to follow even for someone who is not very experienced at cooking Indian food.

India's Vegetarian Cooking is a beautifully photographed book with a lot of additional information about the food culture of India. Most of the recipes are pretty straightforward to prepare, although a few of the ingredients may be hard to come by if you don't live by an Indian or Southeast Asian grocery store (she does suggest some substitutions, though). I liked that there's a wide variety of recipes featuring breads, veggies, legumes and desserts/drinks. However, I was disappointed by the fact that I found many of the recipes I tried to be under-seasoned if I made them exactly by the book. I often end up adding at least twice the amount of of spices or seasonings suggested to get a flavorful dish. Nevertheless, if you don't mind the possibility of doing some recipe-tweaking and are curious about Indian vegetarian recipes (or even Indian food in general), I would recommend this book as a good introduction.

This is a beautiful, well written book that would be beautiful on a coffee table even if you don't cook. The recipes seem to be well explained and she gives ideas of dishes that go well together. Lots of Indian history throughout.