Angela Liddon

Between this one and Liddon's first book, (The Oh She Glows Cookbook: Over 100 Vegan Recipes to Glow from the Inside Out), it is this one I reach for more often. Having given a basic primer of pantry ingredients and techniques in the first one, she basically cuts to the chase and gets right to the recipes. The book has a more modern feel to it -- probably the lack of orange and green on the cover and the more elegant font. The cutesy titles persist, but I will tell you that the Green-Orange Creamsicle Smoothie does actually taste like a Creamsicle. My favorite recipe here is the Curried Chickpea Salad, which I could basically eat every day (and frankly, you'll skip the more boring chickpea salad in her first book once you try it). The Best Marinated Lentils are actually pretty spectacular and quite miraculously are single-handedly responsible for making me enjoy lentils. I was not that excited about the "Go-To Gazpacho". The Cast-Iron Tofu is very good, but a bit tedious to prepare. The Oh Em Gee Burgers were a lot of work without the return on investment that I would expect--stick with the burger recipe in the first book. The Comforting Red Lentil and Chickpea Curry is a showstopper and I recommend using the lentil-walnut filling for her "Green Taco Wraps" in actual tortillas, rather than lettuce leafs. I'm not much of a dessert person, so I haven't explored that section.

Overall the book is really useful and a lot of the recipes can be de-veganized (e.g. real cheese) if so desired. I think that smoothies take up too many pages because once you have an inspiration, you can really just improvise a smoothie, but that's a small complaint.… (more)

If you had told me a few years ago that I'd ever own a vegan cookbook, I might have laughed. It isn't that I have anything against veganism, but I am a fairly committed omnivore. But my best friend had been exploring moving increasingly toward a plant-based diet, so she got me this book for Christmas. As someone who actually does READ cookbooks, I feel confident in reviewing it here. Liddon has a very approachable, non-preachy style. She gives an overview to different types of oils, flours, and nuts, etc as well as techniques. I could do without some of the cutesy names for the recipes, but Liddon is also fairly self-aware of her tone: "I'm sure it sounds cliché coming from a vegan..." she tells us when she tells us how excited she is about the "Salads" section. The recipes are divided into sections: breakfast; smoothies, juice & tea; appetizers; salads; soup; entrées; sides; power snacks; desserts; and homemade staples. Very useful is the "basic cooking chart" which gives basic cooking times for lentils, quinoa and the like. The food photography is quite nice, and there are photos of Liddon and her husband peppered throughout the book. She does, in fact, seem to glow.

Of the recipes, strong standouts (that I tried) are: Healing rooibos tea, Sweet potato & Black bean enchiladas with avocado-cilantro "cream" sauce (scare quotes mine); Crowd-pleasing Tex Mex casserole, Our Favorite Veggie Burger. The Lentil Walnut loaf that some folks claim is "better than traditional meat loaf" is well...not better or worse, but definitely different. I felt it could have had better flavor, and I think I'd make the lentils in curry next time. I prefer more of the recipes in Oh She Glows Every Day: Simply Satisfying Plant-Based Recipes to Keep You Glowing from the Inside Out, Liddon's second book, but this is a solid cookbook for anyone looking to get into plant-based cooking.… (more)