The Rawesome Vegan Cookbook Review & Giveaway

I met Emily von Euw from This Rawesome Vegan Life at King’s Cafe, a vegetarian Chinese restaurant in Toronto. She was having a little dinner meet-up with some of her fans. In all truth, I had no idea who she was when I arrived. Not classy, Sam. Lisa from The Viet Vegan had invited me to attend, and when I heard the words “vegan” and “food” I didn’t need to ask more, I was in.

Emily came in with her buzzed haircut and unbelievable perfect glowing skin (serious skin envy going on here). I was just a wee blogger at the time but was absolutely determined to make my blog work as a full-time career, so meeting someone like Emily, who already had a successful blog AND multiple cookbooks, I was taking in every bit of wisdom she had… and Chinese barbeque buns… I was taking in every bit of those delicious things as well.

Fast forward a year and a half (my oh my a lot has happened!), we are now internet buds and she was kind enough to send me all three of her cookbooks to review, woot!

The Rawesome Vegan Cookbook
Rawesome Vegan Baking
100 Best Juices, Smoothies and Healthy Snacks

I decided to test three recipes from The Rawesome Vegan Cookbook for this review, but I can assure you those smoothie & dessert books look insanely good as well.

WHAT I LIKED

This book is divided into two sections “raw” and “cooked”. Since I was reviewing this book in March, I was happy there were warm recipe options!
This book reminded me to eat more veggies. Yes, as a vegan I do eat a ton of veggies, but sometimes I get into routines of pasta and rice. This was a reminder that I should be eating a big bowl of fresh veggies and greens every day.
The recipes were fairly simple. Many of the dishes appeared complicated, but when I actually went to preparing them, I don’t think I was ever in the kitchen for more than 20 minutes!

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW

While a lot of the recipes use pretty generic ingredients, other recipes called for harder to find healthy food store or farmers market types of ingredients, such as candy cane beets, hulled hemp seeds, kelp granules, kohlrabi, radish sprouts, romanesco broccoli, morel mushrooms, and young coconut meat.
These recipes are sprouty-kale type recipes. And by that I mean they are not likely going to woo a meat eater to stop eating chicken wings. If someone is looking for a dish full of health on the other hand, this would be perfect.
Emily tells us not to worry about following the recipes exactly, and I think that’s the perfect approach for this book. A lot of her sauce recipes would go great with any kind of veggies!

On to the recipe testing!

The first recipe I tried, was my favourite, The Spicy Noodle Bowl. It had me at “pad thai inspired”. The tamarind sauce was to die for delicious. I borrowed my roommate’s

I borrowed my roommate’s spiralizer to make zucchini, carrot, and beet noodles and tossed them with the sauce… YUM! So healthy and incredibly good that I had the exact same thing for dinner the very next night. The only trouble I had was that the tamarind paste I had was really really tough, so the sauce ended up a bit chunky. I think I would double or triple the sauce recipe next time, so it would fill my blender better to blend smoother, and that way I would have lots of leftover sauce to pour over

The only trouble I had was that the tamarind paste I had on hand was really really tough, so the sauce ended up a bit chunky. I think I would double or triple the sauce recipe next time, so it would fill my blender better to blend smoother, and that way I would have lots of leftover sauce to pour over everything. Omnomnom.

The second recipe I had was the Soba Noodles with Avocado Carrot Ribbons, Shredded Spinach + Maple Miso Glaze. I’m guessing that from that title, you can tell exactly what it tasted like. This was a nice and simple dish, that you could easily swap out almost any veggies and pair them with this sauce and soba noodles.

I had a disaster with the soba noodles, but that was all my own fault. I didn’t realize the noodles were tied up in bundles inside the box, so when I dumped the whole contents of the box into the boiling water, I immediately had to fish them out, untie them and put them back in the water. Not smooth, Sam. It was too late. Clump-o-soba-noodle it became. At least the miso maple glaze was delicious enough to make up for my noodle clumps!

The last dish I tried was Sweet + Sour Bok Choy. First off, let me say that Emily’s picture in the book is light years better than this not appetising photo… It was late, I was starving, and I had just gotten home from the gym, so forgive my ugly photo! It does not do this dish justice in any way.

The miso noodles were good, but the bok choy, that’s where this dish shone. The bok choy gets caramelized in a simple sauce that makes them sweet, tangy, and salty all at the same time. OMGSOGOOD.

MY OPINION

While The Rawsome Vegan Cookbook isn’t generally the kind of food I prepare (I’m more of a Tofu Bolognese type girl), it was a lovely, and refreshing break to cleanse my system a little and eat more raw veggies. (Especially after my trip to Jamaica where too many cocktails, was totally a daily thing). I fell in deep love with the Spicy Noodle Bowl recipe and know that this (and loose variations) will become part of my regular rotation. If you’re looking for some ideas to cram in more fresh veggies in your system, this would be a great book for you!

THE GIVEAWAY

Enter the giveaway below! There will be three winners, and those winners can choose which one of Emily’s books they would like! US and Canadian entries only.

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