Vegan Beans from Around the World is a cookbook by Kelsey Kinser. This is a great recipe book for vegans and non-vegans alike. I recently found out that I'm allergic to dairy so I've been trying to watch what I eat. Plus, I'm always looking for new vegetarian dishes to mix up meals during the week. This book has a little bit of something for everyone.
First I tried the black bean & sweet potato queso-less-dilla with tofu
sour cream and really enjoyed it. I will admit that I was missing the
cheese in it, but the sweet potato does add a density and slight
creaminess to it that imitates cheese pretty well. The tofu sour cream,
although a little funky tasting by itself, was awesome when mixed with
homemade salsa. I didn't really notice that it wasn't real sour cream.
The
next recipe I tried was the Italian "meat" balls. The meatballs smelled
and tasted really good in all their white bean glory. You mix a lot of
ingredients into the white beans like you would a real meatball. Now,
they definitely didn't taste like meatballs but they did have a lot of
great flavor and in the end were delicious with the pasta. My one and
only complaint was that my meatballs fell apart and were pretty mushy
even though I left them in the oven another 15 minutes. They just didn't
hold up like they should've.
The
last recipe I tried, and by far my favorite, was the lentil loaf. I
grew up on my grandpa's meatloaf. So this was the true test for me. I
will admit I was pretty skeptical about the recipe. It seemed legit with
all the ingredients put in. There's seasonings, onion, bell pepper,
bread crumbs, ketchup, just about everything goes into this. No where in
the recipe does it say to mash the lentils but I did. I found that I
wanted more of "ground meat" appearance and consistency, and that was
the best decision I made. Not only did the loaf, at quick glance, look
like meatloaf but it was delicious. I paired it with mashed potatoes and
corn, Just like my grandpa would, and I was taken back in time to my
childhood. Sure, I could tell it wasn't ground beef, however, it was so
darn close to it and so amazingly delicious that the slight taste
difference didn't even register. If I had someone who was looking to take a step away from meat and dairy, I would definitely recommend this book to them. Even though I haven't tried the dessert recipes yet, I do plan on continuing my journey through this book. I just couldn't wait anymore to share my review.
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