Vegetarian Cookbook Review: Market Vegetarian

Call me shallow, but I was drawn to Ross Dobson's Market Vegetarian: Easy Organic Recipes for Every Occasion, by the lovely picture on the front. I had honestly never heard of Ross before, but he looked friendly enough smiling there with his heirloom tomatoes, so I thought I'd give it a read.

Flipping through the pages of Market Vegetarian, it is clear that Dobson has good grasp on flavour combinations and a genuine passion for food. The book's menu is predominantly Mediterranean with lots of aubergines, tomatoes and peppers in Italian, French and Spanish recipes. There are a few nods to his Australasian upbringing with some East Asian inspired noodle dishes, but the book clearly has western Europe's markets in mind.

Though Dobson himself is not vegetarian he has a clear passion for fresh fruit and veg. The book opens with a quick guide to market finds that will be useful for those who are looking to expand their knowledge of ingredients. And while he very often relies on cheese, eggs and yogurt to make up the content, vegans will be able to find a good deal here to appreciate.

The places where this book really works for me is when Dobson does dips and sauces. It is here where he walks the tightrope between the everyday ingredients and unique spices to entice you into trying things you had never previously considered. My go to flavourings are garlic, onions, soy sauce, balsamic vinegar, salt and pepper because they work for most things. But one of the reasons that I started blogging was to push myself and my vegetarian cooking skills. Dobson's dips are definitely about adding new spices into the mix. So you get pairings like beetroot and caraway seeds; carrots and fenugreek; aubergine and cumin; Thai pesto with peanuts, coriander, basil and lime...I'm salivating while I'm typing it. Recipes like the Red Pepper Tapenade - a revelation that is definitely going into regular rotation - are delicious and easy to incorporate in your repertoire.

Book review: Jonathan Safran Foer's Eating Animals

I picked up Jonathan Faran Foer's Eating Animals book about becoming vegetarian by accident really. I was in an airport looking for something to read and I grabbed this thinking that like everything else Jonathan Safran Foer has written that this would be fiction. What I got was the most affecting and effective discussion on vegetarianism that I'd ever encountered.

I say discussion because it really is just that. It's full of anecdotes, the letters and quotes collected in his journey from being a omnivore to deciding to give up meat all together. He interviews people from throughout the meat industry, organic and commercial. He encounters activists and traditionalists and explains the history behind how we got to the point where we as a society eat more meat than ever before.And his descriptions of the industry's processes, he is reminiscent of Upton Sinclair's The Jungle in his no hold bar approach to the horrors of the slaughter house.

It starts off harmless enough, with a beautiful anecdote about JSF's Jewish grandmother in war torn Russia. This humane approach to his human subjects is really what carries the book, setting it apart from a solely political treatise. He realises the importance of food for families, communities and individuals and brings it to the fore. His acknowledgement of the fact that we eat for more emotional, social, AND physical sustenance is key.

When I read this I was in the same place as the author when he started writing: someone who ate ethical meat and a lot of veggie food to appease a conscience that I occasionally ignored in favour of BLTs. By the end I felt certain that I could do what I'd considered doing for years - eat my greens.