The Native Foods Restaurant Cookbook [Paperback]

Tanya Petrovna (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 4, 2003

When people ask Tanya Petrovna, "Are you a strict vegetarian?" she replies, "No, I'm a fun vegetarian!" As head chef of the popular Native Foods chain of restaurants in Southern California, Tanya treats her customers to a vegan cuisine that is so tasty, satisfying, and hearty that it draws praise from nonvegetarians and vegetarians alike. Tanya is known for creating delicious and satisfying meat substitutes from soy and wheat products such as tofu, tempeh, and seitan. And with signature dishes like her dairy-free cheesecake made from cashew nuts, she proves that healthy, animal-friendly eating can be indulgent and fun.

Now, with this book, Tanya's best recipes can be made at home, including: "Fun Mung Curry," "Seitan Olé Mole," and "Rockin' Moroccan Skewers." Plus, there are plenty of outrageous desserts such as "Elephant Chocolate Cake with Cinnamon Peanut Butter Topping," "Sam's Vegan Cheesecake," and "Chocolate French Silk Lingerie Pie."

The Native Foods Restaurant Cookbook also features instructions on basic cooking methods, helpful definitions, nutritional information, and a simple kitchen pantry setup.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"The recipes are wonderful. Each one has a twist—a surprising ingredient or presentation that lifts it out of the ordinary. . . . If you want to share your vegan enthusiasm with the rest of the world, this cookbook belongs on your shelf."—Veg News

"What I especially appreciate here is the lavish use of a very rare ingredient: joy. It's expressed in the goofy sense of humor, the energy, and the apparently limitless enthusiasm that accompanies Tanya in her mission to get everyone to eat well without eating a bite of anything to do with animals."—from the foreword by Deborah Madison, author of Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone and Local Flavors



"Tanya's broad range of recipes have panache and soul, yet they are remarkably simple. Anyone who is looking to improve their diet and/or the planet will find her cookbook indispensable."—Didi Emmons, author of Vegetarian Planet and Entertaining for a Veggie Planet

From the Inside Flap

When people ask Tanya Petrovna, ?Are you a strict vegetarian?? she replies: ?no, I?m a fun vegetarian!? As head chef of the popular Native Foods chain of restaurants in Southern California, Tanya treats her customers to a vegan cuisine that is so tasty, satisfying, and hearty that it draws praise from nonvegetarians and vegetarians alike. Tanya is known for creating delicious and satisfying meat substitutes from soy and wheat products such as tofu, tempeh, and seitan. And with signature dishes like her dairy-free cheesecake made from cashew nuts, she proves that healthy, animal-friendly eating can be indulgent and fun.
Now, with this book, Tanya?s best recipes can be made at home, including: ?Fun Mung Curry,? ?Seitan Olé Mole,? and ?Rockin? Moroccan Skewers.? Plus, there are plenty of outrageous desserts such as ?Elephant Chocolate Cake with Cinnamon Peanut Butter Topping,? ?Sam?s Vegan Cheesecake,? and ?Chocolate French Silk Lingerie Pie.?
The Native Foods Restaurant Cookbook also features instructions on basic cooking methods, helpful definitions, nutritional information, and a simple kitchen pantry setup.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: Shambhala (November 4, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1590300769
• ISBN-13: 978-1590300763
• Product Dimensions: 7.5 x 0.8 x 9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (20 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #26,864 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #70 in Books > Cookbooks, Food & Wine > Natural Foods

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

88 of 98 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars The smallest details can ruin a great recipe!, January 23, 2006

By 

Greater Than Pearls "a riddle wrapped in an e... (Virginia) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Native Foods Restaurant Cookbook (Paperback)

I would love to give this book five stars. When I first bought it, I certainly would have. However, as I worked my way through the book and cooked with more of the recipes, I found myself with headaches as often as I had great food.

Here's why: This book is not edited well, and it is not written with a beginning or even an intermediate cook in mind. That combination spells disaster. In roughly a third of the recipes in the book, vital details are missing, details that might seem minor to a casual reader or obvious to advanced cooks but mean the difference between beautiful food and a disgusting, and in some cases expensive, catastrophe.

Here's a good example. Many of the book's recipes call for a meat substitute called seitan, a sort of gluten loaf cooked in broth. A recipe for seitan is provided in the early chapters of the book. Interested in making at home what can be a very expensive item in the store, I set out to make seitan one day according to the recipe provided in Petrovna's book.

So, I followed the directions to the letter, going through the entire process of making the dough and rinsing out the starch and kneading the resulting gluten ball, a process that takes place over the course of hours. Then, I prepared the broth that the gluten is cooked in - a very salty broth, I should add - and put the whole thing on the stove to cook, a process that also took hours. However, as I put the pot on the stove, I found myself rereading the directions over and over again, hoping that I'd find a clue as to whether or not to put the lid on the pot while the seitan cooked. There was none, except a picture of the seitan cooking, which featured a pot with no lid on it. So I decided to take a chance and leave the lid off.

What I got at the end was a very time-consuming, very messy ball of salt. This is no exaggeration. Eating the seitan was comperable to taking a shot of salt and washing it down with another shot of salt. The liquid had boiled down, depositing all of the salt in the gluten loaf. I had no way of knowing that this was probably not the intended effect until I tasted the seitan and found it completely unedible. Had I been instructed in the directions to simply put the pot lid on, I might have had something to show for my effort besides a huge loaf of gluten-flavored salt.

Unfortunately, there are a ridiculous number of this type of omission in "Native Foods." Slips as simple as forgetting to instruct readers to grease a pan, to drain canned vegetables before using them, or to add more water if a recipe gets dry can leave all but the most experienced cooks with a disaster instead of dinner. Most of the recipes in this book are fun and imaginative, and if the directions are clear they come out beautiful and delicious. Unfortunately, every time I use this book I feel like I'm playing Russian Roulette, so I've come to pass this book up for ideas unless I've got a lot of time and money to buy groceries.

24 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Finally, yummy vegan recipes (even for non-vegans)!, July 7, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: The Native Foods Restaurant Cookbook (Paperback)

This book was recommended to me by a vegan chef whom I hired to teach me how to cook some healthier meals.

The Tempeh pate recipe (serve it w/plain, unsalted rice crackers, mmmm . . . ) is worth the price of the book alone. I have tried the tempeh provencal recipe, and I didn't find that to my liking, but I think some of my ingredients weren't of the highest quality and may have been old . . . I have eaten at the Native Foods Restaurant a couple of times and the food is excellent - if you get a chance eat at one of her locations (I frequent the Westwood one). She has a website: http://www.nativefoods.com/

I have eaten a lentil soup, a cauliflower "Cream" soup, a baja surf ("fish") taco and the Bali Surf Burger at the restaurant. Unfortunately, only the Surf Burger is included in the recipe book - but all were FABULOUS. I am no culinary expert by any stretch of the imagination, but I am picky and these recipes are easy to follow - and that Tempeh Pate, you just have to try it (a sidenote: the deglaze recipe for the tempeh can get a little salty, so I used 1/4c of soy sauce for the deglaze instead of the 1/2c the recipe calls for)!

Even though I haven't had the chance to try many of the recipes, I am looking forward to trying more . . . judging from her restaurant fare and the pate recipe, I'm confident this book will earn a prominent place in my cookbook library!

20 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Best Vegan Cookbook Ever!, June 19, 2005

By 

Dara Perales "Dara is a vegan" (Oceanside, Ca USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Native Foods Restaurant Cookbook (Paperback)

If you're vegan, one thing you sorely miss is ranch dressing. If you only make the Black Creek Ranch Dressing recipe, you will have already spent money wisely. The recipes in this book are easy, delicious, rich, and outstanding. Try the Kissed French Toast, and you will want to make it for everyone you know. I have the pleasure of living close enough to eat in Native Foods restaurants, but if you don't, please do yourself a favorite and buy this book. Heck, even if you do live close enough, you can make some yummy treats at home. Includes recipes for vegan bases, in case you don't have access, and it is a very informative, entertaining book as well.