One-Dish Vegetarian: 100 Recipes for Quick and Easy Vegetarian Meals

From Publishers Weekly
Declaring herself to be "a part-time vegetarian," Robbins (Biscotti and Other Low Fat Cookies) draws from diverse cuisines?traditional American, Latin, Asian and Mediterranean?for these 100 meatless dishes that can be cooked in a single pot or pan. Home cooks pressed for time will appreciate these quick-assembly (and easy clean-up) recipes. Salads are hearty (Wild Rice Waldorf Salad; Brown Rice and Lentil Salad). Full-meal soups include Barley Vegetable Soup and Very Hearty Corn Chowder. Pasta and rice dishes figure heavily into Robbins's one-pot scheme: Spaghetti with Roasted Fennel and Tomatoes; Penne with Broccoli, Red Pepper and Garlic; Risotto with Butternut Squash and Sage; Buckwheat Pasta with Cabbage and Sage. Adventurous palates may appreciate the likes of Tofu in Red Chili Sauce with pumpkin seeds and Caribbean Vegetable Stew, starring tomatoes, white cabbage, okra, sweet potatoes, lime juice and peanuts; and Six Vegetable Curry (yellow peas, eggplant, potatoes, yams, tomatoes and string beans), flavored with chilies, ginger, cumin and tamarind. Such basics as Light Vegetable Stock and Vegetable Broth are also included. Nutritional analyses of the recipes are not provided, but there is a short list of mail-order sources. Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Booklist
Casseroles and vegetarianism often seem mutually exclusive. One does not find "tofu helper" in many supermarkets. But it is possible, as Robbins points out, to produce one-dish meals without any meats or fish. Her one-dish meals rely on pastas, beans, and grains, but she shows how, by using a vegetable broth in place of the usual chicken broth, the home cook can produce elegant, flavorful risotto. This includes both a classic Venetian-inspired rice-and-peas version and a trendy squash-and-sage risotto sure to be a dinner-party hit. Robbins even comes up with a way to take the classic Spanish paella, with its wealth of meats and seafoods, and to turn it into a vegetarian treat by adding reconstituted dried chestnuts for texture. Other recipes use brown rice mixed with cut-up vegetables for more traditional vegetarian fare. Mark Knoblauch


Book Description
In this expert and one-of-a-kind collection, veteran cookbook author Maria Robbins lifts the lid off healthy, hearty vegetarian cooking. Anyone who longs for something new on the table will find plenty to choose from, with recipes that use techniques and flavors from Creole, Chinese, Mexican, Italian, Moroccan, and other cuisines--each one a well-rounded meal in itself. A colorful cookbook that celebrates whole grains, fresh vegetables, and spices from around the world, The One-Dish Vegetarian is just right for part-time, full-time, and first-time vegetarians-and anyone else with a taste for fast, flavorful meals that come all in one dish.

Whether you're a card-carrying vegetarian or one of millions of people looking for lighter, healthier alternatives to traditional meat-as-main-course meals, The One-Dish Vegetarian will bring an irresistible feast of fresh ideas to your kitchen. Veteran cookbook author Maria Robbins presents one hundred new soups, stews, chilis, pasta and rice dishes, casseroles, sautes, curries, and salads-each in its own pot, and each a healthful, flavorful delight.

Using the freshest ingredients of each season and vibrant spices from around the world, the recipes include Fusilli with Broccoli and Peanut Sauce; Moroccan Eggplant, Tomato, and Chick-Pea Stew; Soba Noodles with Mushrooms and Peas; Sag Harbor's Vegetarian Chili; Risotto with Butternut Squash and Sage; Vegetarian Paella; Saute of Summer Vegetables with Corn; Green Chili with White Beans; and many more.

For anyone who's ever thought, "I'd love to cook vegetarian meals-but what's the entrée?" the answer comes in one delicious dish!



About the Author
Maria Robbins is the author of fourteen cookbooks, including Biscotti and Other Low-Fat Cookies, Baking for Christmas, and The Dumpling Cookbook. She lives in East Hampton, New York, with her husband, photographer Ken Robbins, and their red standard poodle, Misha.



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Robbins's 14th effort (after Biscotti and Other Low-Fat Cookies) performs a valuable service by collecting familiar one-dish meatless meals in a single volume. While she doesn't break new ground, her recipes are solid. Main-dish salads include Potato Salad with Green Beans and Tomatoes, Black Bean Confetti Salad and Wild Rice and Corn Salad. Soups such as White Bean and Roasted Vegetable Soup and Black Bean Soup show hints of innovation (roasting the vegetables in the first and serving salsa alongside in the second) but on the whole are widely known. Additional chapters on pasta (Spaghetti with Caramelized Onions and Spaghetti with Roasted Fennel and Tomatoes) and rice (Vegetarian Paella and Thai Fried Rice with Pineapple) offer a few surprises along with familiar fare (Wagon Wheels with Zucchini, Beans, and Tomatoes and Risotto with Zucchini, Corn, and Red Pepper). Disappointingly, all six of the chili recipes offered in the chapter on stews appeared previously in the author's Chili!. Robbins scatters interesting quotes throughout, and she has a cheery, informal writing style well suited to this material. A chapter on basics and a list of mail-order sources are useful perks. (Feb.) Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.


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