American Wholefoods Cuisine

If you only buy one vegetarian cookbook, then this should be it. American Wholefoods Cuisine by Nikki and David Goldbeck is packed with 1,300 meatless recipes, and is the most comprehensive vegetarian cookbook I've ever seen. No, it doesn't have glossy photographs of food that you will never get to look like the picture. And it certainly doesn't have one of my biggest pet peeves about vegetarian cookbooks: exotic and hard to find ingredients. What is does have is recipes that are made of wholesome, easy to find ingredients, with simple to follow directions for preparation. The recipe section is divided into helpful sections, with my favorite being "Short-Order Cooking". This section is packed with quick delicious recipes that can take mere minutes to bring from the kitchen to the table. For me, this is worth the whole book! In each section as well, within different food types, there is a short description of each with helpful cooking tips. This is very helpful if you've never made a crepe before, for example. Aside from the voluminous recipes, there is loads of other information in this book. There are sections on wholefoods philosophy and nutrition, and at the end there is a section called "The Food Reader", which goes into extensive detail about how to create a well stocked pantry, how to handle and store food, tips on cooking, kitchen math, and tips for eating out. Like I said, this book is several other books packed into one. It is a cookbook, whole food nutrition guide, cooking instruction manual, and general vegetarian lifestyle guide. No wonder it took the Goldbeck's five years and endless hours of testing recipes to write this book! -Katy Farber

This is mainly in response to the member who rated this book one star. I have been thoroughly happy with this book, and also am on my second copy. My wife, I and the rest of my family, as well as the many guests we have entertained with the recipes have nothing but good to say about it. If you want recipes for real food, not just gourmet vegetarian recipes with over=priced ingredients, this is the book for you. I feel the Goldbecks went out of their way to write this book and helped many of us in doing so. I am sorry the person who rated the book 1 star had such a bad experience with the book. If she wants to get rid of it, I'll send her my address to take it off her hands.

This is a fantastic reference cookbook for vegetarians and others interested in healthy cooking and eating. Recipes are organized into chapters including short-order cooking, appetizers, soups, main courses, side dishes, condiments, sauces, breads, snacks, desserts, and beverages as well as a chapter on making your own yogurt, spouts, and convenience mixes from scratch and putting up produce. The authors also include chapters on vegetarian nutrition, meal planning, stocking your pantry, food handling, cooking habits, kitchen math, and healthy habits for eating out. In order to cram as many recipes as possible into a small space, there are no pictures, and there are 2 columns of recipes on every page, with over 1300 recipes in total.The recipes are gathered from throughout the world, as well as created in the Goldbeck's own kitchen. A typical chapter includes Kisheri (India), Kedegree (Egypt), and Arroz Con Queso, followed by Rice with Cabbage and Cheese (Italy), and Paella (Spain). Vegetarian versions of all the standard American dishes are also included, like Mac & Cheese, Sloppy Joes, and Apple Pie. One of the great strengths of this book is that the authors provide instructions for making just about any food from scratch, from French onion dip to quick cornbread mix. Such recipes will not only save you money, but they will also introduce you to the delicious flavors of what food should taste like without all those yucky chemical additives.Having been a vegetarian for 20 years, I have dozens of vegetarian cookbooks, including most of the Moosewood cookbooks, Horn of the Moon, etc. But when it comes down to it, if I needed to choose just one vegetarian cookbook to get by on, this would be the one. The comprehensiveness, variety, and creativity in this book just can't be beat.

This IS the only cookbook you'll ever need. I got it when I first began to cook and it is full of simple recipes and good cooking and nutrition tips. 15 years later, I make the more complex recipes as well, still refer to the tips, and often use the recipes as a base for my own experiments. It includes recipes for almost anything you could ever want to cook and even meat-eaters will appreciate the soups, breads, side dishes, salads, sauces, dressings, drinks, desserts, etc. I buy new cookbooks all the time but I always rely on this one.