Ten Best Vegan and Vegetarian Cookbooks
Published 2015 & 2016, or earlier!
The Year’s Ten Best Vegan & Vegetarian Cookbooks for 2016 is a selection I’ve made based on content and originality. The authors shown here envision food in a new and modern way of preparing and dining that excludes animals and animal products (milk and cream are included in vegetarian, but not eggs). Entries are not in any particular order. There is something for everyone here–be they novice or experienced, as long as they are looking for inspiration to end 2016 and begin 2017 with a fantastic dish!
Bon appetit—a Votre Sante!
For a description of a great cookbook, see my 10 Attributes of a Great Vegan and Vegetarian Cookbooks.
1. Food 52: Vegan by Gena Hamshaw
Gena Hamshaw’s Vegan is your companion meal planner for tastefully crafted and elegantly simple vegetable, fruit and grain-based dishes, snacks, salads, soups, breakfasts and desserts.
See my review of the book at Classic Vegan
2. The Chakra Kitchen: Feed Your Body to Nourish Your Spirit by Sara Wilkinson
A different way to look at the complexity of the body and its reactions to life is to see the colors of the body’s energy nodes called “chakras” and how they are influenced by the colors of food…
See my review of the book at Colors of Jewels
3. Ani’s Raw Food Kitchen by Ani Phyo
Author Ani Phyo’s Ani’s Raw Food Kitchen gets my top vote for a raw food lifestyle and un-cookbook. And, you don’t have to be a raw-foodist to benefit…
See my review of the book at Eat Local–Live a Beautiful Life
4. Vegetarian Dinner Parties by Bruce Weinstein and Mark Scarborough
For both vegetarian and vegan readers—if your urban lifestyle borrows heavily from rustic elegance, the featured fresh and in-season, even occasionally frozen or canned, fruits and vegetables offer even the most sophisticated guest an unexpected treat. In the interests of full disclosure, the authors do use dairy in some recipes.
See my review of the book at Vegetarian Dinner Parties
5. The Homemade Vegan Pantry by Miyoko Schinner
I wanted to see this book before I knew of its existance! Every vegan and vegetarian wants the know-how to create staples for their kitchen. Items like dairy-free milks, creams, cheeses and sauces are just the beginning of a long-long list of must-haves.
See my review of the book at Vegan and Fancy
6. The Vegetable Butcher by Cara Mangini
Delightfully written and photographed, this book is a well put-together manual on choosing vegetables, their varieties and how to store them properly. Each vegetable is featured as the object of cutting and preparing for vegetarian (sometimes vegan) recipes. Cara Mangini is a young, creative cook from the San Francisco Bay area and Columbus, Ohio where she founded Little Eater (a restaurant) and Little Eater Produce and Provisions.
7. Oh She Glows Every Day: Quick and Simply Satisfying Plant-Based Recipes. / Angela Liddon, 2016. Avery an Imprint of Penguin Random House. 333 p., illustrations in color.
Vegan glow is a state of health and a state of mind about food. Built on the premise that whole foods, minimally prepared, is the healthiest way to energize our busy lives, Oh She Glows Every Day presents sweets, well-known vegetables, and fruits, both raw and cooked as easy, every day vegan meals, snacks and desserts.
See my review of the book at Vegan Glow
8. Minimalist Baker’s Everyday Cooking: 101 Entirely plant-based, Mostly Gluten-Free, Easy and Delicious Recipes. / Dana Schultz, 2016. Published by Avery, an imprint of Penguin Random House. 293 p., illustrations in color.
Dana Schultz’s Minimalist Baker is a go-to for imaginative and fully delectable vegan baking. Better yet, if you are food-photographer-wanna-be, check out her site as she offers a course in the art of taking fantastic food pictures online.
9. The Fully Raw Diet: 21 Days to Better Health, with Meal and Exercise Plans, Tips and 75 Recipes / Kristina Carrillo-Bucaram, 2016. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. 272 p., illustrations in color.
In this very well-illustrated book a wide variety of information is assembled all about the vegetables and fruits you need to sustain a raw diet and exercise to regain radiance. Carrillo-Bucaram’s substantiation for healthy eating comes from personal experience and shared data about the nutritional values of raw food.
10. Cut the Sugar: You’re Sweet Enough Cookbook. / Ella Leche, 2016. Published by Andrews McMeel Publishing. 211 p., illustrations in color.
“Cut the Sugar” has got to be my favorite refrain—I love natural sweets, the ones with plump and moist dates, spicey maple syrup, raw honey—but it can be hard on the body to constantly “throw down” on even these innocents. Author Leche has come to terms with a host of psychological, digestive, and neurological problems by setting forth a menu of choices that are not sugar-laden. Cheers! to all of us who like to savor the whole sweetness without additives! Make your New Year’s determinations now!
See my review of the book at To Get Sweeter Taste, Minimize Sugar
