The New Vegan: Fresh, Fabulous and Fun

by Janet Hudson

The New Vegan is an exciting new Vegan cookbook. It provides a comprehensive guide to creating everything from starters to main courses to deserts and includes information on the nutritional principles of the vegan diet. Veganism is an increasingly popular dietary choice – as more people recognise the now widely accepted health benefits of foregoing meat and dairy products at least some of the time. This book covers everything from starters to main courses to desserts and Polenta Square with Seared Portobello Mushrooms; Pizza, Quesadilla; Lasagna; Pumpkin Ravioli with nut sauce; Shepherd’s pie; Apple Turnover, vegetable drinks, and plenty more! The author also discusses the nutritional concerns for both children and adults and shows that vegan cooking is super-healthy and
- very low cholesterol
- low fat
- high in antioxidants (anti-ageing)
- high in vitamins & minerals
- low in toxins – the basis of any ‘detox’

Genres: Cookbooks

432 pages, Paperback

First published February 15, 2005

Reviews

[chris]

To be fair, I haven't given this book a fair shake. I thumbed, and skimmed, and glanced through all the recipes, and there are a lot. But I never tried one single recipe in the book. And there are a lot of them, over 440, or so says the cover. So I'm only rating the book, not the recipes.

But I think a cookbook should teach me something or make me want to try the recipes in it.

This book did neither.

The book is more like a collection of recipe cards you have stashed away than a cookbook. Each page has a recipe name, an ingredients list, and then sparse cooking instructions. It's functional, but I learned nothing from it.

Not telling me what a recipe tastes like turned me off. Don's Orange Sauce? I hope it doesn't taste like Don. And what should I put the orange sauce on? Will it be subtle? Sweet? I just don't know. Well, I could figure it out, but then I wouldn't be looking in a cookbook instead of making it up myself.

Recipes loaded with multiple meat analogues turned me off on this book (veggie scallops, veggie shrimp, etc.). This book seems really heavy on them.

Veggie lobster? I couldn't make shit like that up.

I'll probably use it for a reference sometime. Maybe. If the internet is down...
And all my other cookbooks are loaned out...
And I have a fully stocked fridge.

[Josephine]

I can see this book appealing to people who wanted to become vegan but didn't want to give up the European meat-based diet; many of the entrees here rely on vegan products made to look like their animal-based equivalents--tempeh turkey and wheat gluten cutlets and so on. Unfortunately, the author relies a great deal on processed ingredients of this sort without explaining to tyros what exactly they are, referring simply to veggie shrimp, veggie cheese and so on.

It's not a terribly adventurous cookbook in this regard, though I can see it being useful for people with egg and dairy intolerances and allergies. As an inspiring vegan cookbook, no. It fails.

[Tamara]

This was okay. A lot of reliance on an elusive ingredient called "hickory syrup." Not sure where I would buy such an ingredient, but makes sense to try to get that smoky flavor to mimic meat.

No pics, and many references to other hard-to-find ingredients such as vegan fake shrimp, but the recipes were fairly simple with easy instructions.

[Beks]

This cookbook skipped around alot - I didn't think it flowed well at all. The author also assumed access to a wide variety of processed foods - like vegan pork, veggie prawns, veggie lobster, veggie crab, etc. This is the first veg cookbook that I've ever not bothered to finish looking through because I just was not interested. The recipes weren't anything special either...