Product Description

Whether you're a strict vegetarian looking for new ideas or someone who still enjoys a steak now and then, here are over 200 robust, healthful alternatives. Readers will learn how to: compose a vegetarian plate by balancing color, texture, and flavor, use interesting seasonings and rich stock reductions in place of high-fat ingredients, discover the bold, substantial quality of mushrooms, root vegetables, grains, and more. Using fresh ingredients, The Occasional Vegetarian offers original, naturally low-fat recipes inspired by Italian, French, Chinese, regional American, and Latin American cuisines.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #280646 in Books
• Published on: 1998-10-01
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 272 pages

From Library Journal
Here are two good books for the increasing number of vegetarians or "almost" vegetarians among us. Lemlin, author of Vegetarian Pleasures: A Menu Cookbook (Knopf, 1986) and Quick Vegetarian Pleasures (LJ 2/15/92), realized that it's always hardest to come up with the centerpiece of a vegetarian meal, and she provides more than 100 recipes for meatless entrees. Quick recipes are highlighted, and there is also a chapter devoted to more elaborate dishes especially for entertaining. For most collections. Lee is a New York City caterer, cooking teacher, and author of several other cookbooks, including Chinese Cooking for the American Kitchen (1980). Her latest offers a wide variety of sophisticated but generally uncomplicated recipes, along with dozens of helpful sidebars and suggested menus. Like Diane Shaw's Almost Vegetarian (LJ 9/15/94), Lee's book is directed to those who haven't necessarily given up meat but who are no longer eating it every day; although stricter vegetarians will certainly enjoy her recipes, many include suggestions for nonvegetarian variations or accompaniments. An attractive collection from an enthusiastic and accomplished cook, this is highly recommended. [HomeStyle main selection and BOMC alternate.]
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
Lee aims to appeal to serious vegetarians and, moreover, to all omnivorous gourmands who are eating less red meat, poultry, and fish, although they have not entirely sworn off these foods. Stressing a cuisine based on the freshest ingredients, Lee favors a good measure of vegetarian fare, if not to the exclusion of certain foodstuffs. High-fat ingredients (butter, cream, and cheese) appear but are used in "judicious" amounts. Many recipes reflect Lee's personal style--an elegant melding of Chinese and Italian influences and tastes. She includes menu plans and ways to structure vegetarian meals, with appetizers (braised spiced leeks), great salads (mesculin, blue cheese, and pears), pasta dishes (penne with creamy basil tomato sauce), and sublime desserts (ricotta torte) among the choices. Alice Joyce

Customer Reviews

Sensible Book
I like this author's approach - she is not a die hard, rabid vegan type. Her recipes are simple enough and appealing enough that I can see myself actually making them which is not always true of cookbooks in general, let alone a vegetarian one. The layout of the pages is easy to follow although I would have liked to see only one recipe per page. It's distracting to me to have a recipe finish on the next page so that I have to flip the page to continue. The other problem I have with the book is the quality of the paper it was printed on - the dark boxes of information are very hard to read.

When It's Good, It's Very, Very Good
A really mixed bag--The book suffers from the usual vice of vegetarian cookbooks: too many old standards. Unless they're absolute beginners, cooks don't need more recipes for pistou, black bean soup, and hummus. But when the author aims for real originality, she often stumbles. I found some of the ersatz oriental dishes (particularly the charred rice and bizarre "Chino caponata")downright awful. But there is good news, too. The book has lots of fresh-but-not-strange recipes that are a pleasure to cook. The pasta risotto and baked tomatoes with goat cheese are sensational, as are the light tomato-y vegetable stock, and the southwestern-style polenta with fried garlic (less strange than it sounds). Also extremely useful how-to info abounds: how to prepare black-eyed peas, best methods of rice cookery, etc. The author has a rational approach to fat that I like a lot--minimizing but not banishing it. The recipes call for small quantities of oil and the occasional spoonful of half-and-half and dusting of parmesan cheese. Cream, butter, and eggs are absent except in a few dessert recipes recommended as special occasion treats.

I wish the authors would write another!
It's amazing that such simple recipes could produce such delicious food. I go mostly for the side dishes, due to a husband who does not believe a meal is complete unless there is a dead animal on his plate. The artichoke vinaigrette is indeed delicious. Other recipes that I turn to over and over are the green beans (or haricot verts) with slivered almonds and the shiitake mushrooms and snow peas (which takes about 10 seconds to make). I will definitely try the dishes recommended by the other readers as well.