In Praise of Plants:

A reading list for eating plants, and thinking about plant-based food

Plus, my recipe for grilled veggie salsa!

For many years, I was a vegetarian: Though technically never vegan, at times my diet would tend almost towards that end of the scale. But it turns out I love cheese just a little too much. Even as a kid, I dabbled in vegetarianism, and have never really felt drawn to big slabs of meat as a go to meal option, save for the very occasional exception.

These days, I'm an omnivore, though I still eat mostly a vegetarian diet. There are a number of environmental and ethical reasons I could cite, but ultimately and perhaps selfishly, what makes it easy to stick with those convictions is that I really enjoy eating plant-based foods.

I find such delight in cooking with fruits and vegetables, and feel like they offer me so much more variety and possibility than when I cook with meat at the center of the plate.

We tend to treat building more vegetables into our diets as a chore, perhaps a leftover tendency from many folks' childhoods where vegetables were tagged as healthy and as such, something kids had to be forced to eat (my parents never really did this, from what I recall: The vegetables were just there, as part of the meal, so I didn't feel any reason to resent or resist their presence).

But I love Mollie Katzen's approach to vegetarian eating that she weaves throughout her career as an author: Essentially, to celebrate vegetables as they are.

Rather than masking them or treating them as a substitute to meat, why not let vegetables be vegetables?

This list includes some of my very favorite books from the world of plant-based eating and thinking. I'd love to hear yours in the comments, too!

In Praise of Plants: A Reading List

• Joe Yonan is a prolific author of some of my most beloved veg-focused cookbooks (like Cool Beans), and also one of the genuinely kindest people you will ever meet.

  
  Be sure to preorder his latest, Mastering the Art of Plant-Based Cooking, which is an absolute treasure trove of recipes and information, and includes my recipes for tempeh and white miso.

• Mollie Katzen's books were my first exposure to cookbook writing that was explicitly, and unapologetically, plant-based. The beautiful illustrations in tandem with the very intimate, familiar recipes is the format that inspired my design decisions for Rooted in Place.

  
  Katzen's writing has always had an air of comfort about it for me: The food tastes like foods I grew up eating, the recipes feel like I naturally tend to cook, and she strikes a good balance of clear guidance and intuitive creation.

  
  My first Katzen book was The Enchanted Broccoli Forest, gifted to me by my dear friend Justin almost 2 decades ago and still a (now somewhat worse for wear) regular fixture in my kitchen.

  
  She also wrote the iconic, beautiful The Moosewood Cookbook which I strongly, strongly recommend as a starting point for falling in love with vegetable-forward cooking and eating.

• Alicia Kennedy's No Meat Required came out last year, and her thoughtful critique of modern food systems is a great complement to the practice of cooking and eating plant-based food. I also appreciate that she structures her book in a way familiar and dear to me: By exploring both the history, and future, of her subject.
  

• Dr. Sarah Ballantyne's Nutrivore is one of the few dietary books that has actually resonated with me. I despise diet culture with a deep and burning passion, and find most books about eating healthy contain some of that language, even if its subtle. Most books that explain why eating more vegetables supports health also tend to fall into diet culture traps, but Ballantyne's whole approach is about education and offering nutritional information about different types of food: But rather than giving specific advice for what to eat, she just encourages folks to start shifting towards more dietary diversity and healthier options. Very low key, doable, and nonjudgmental.

  Note that this isn't purely a vegetable-focused book, but if you're curious about the nutritional profile of your favorite vegetables, it's a great pick.
  

Some other favorite books for sparking your vegetable-loving curiosity:

Jess Starwood's Mushroom Wanderland features some really beautiful ways to prepare and serve foraged and cultivated mushrooms, and I love that the mushroom occupies a place in Starwood's world as a source of wonder and delight.

Some favorite fermented vegetable books include: Kirsten and Christopher Shockey's Fermented Vegetables and Fiery Ferments, and Pascal Baudar's books including The New Wildcrafted Cuisine.

Most fermentation books have some veg-focused recipes in them, as vegetable fermentation is so widespread and so easy to do, so be sure to leaf through the ones in your collection. I'll also be talking about a special sub-set of these (books on koji) in a future reading list.

I also love Preserved: Condiments and Preserved: Fruit, both by Darra Goldstein, Cortney Burns, and Richard Martin, Nigel Slater's Greenfeast (both autumn/winter and spring/summer), and Joanne Lee Molinaro's Korean Vegan.

And finally, some of my old standby favorites, which have lived on my shelves since my 20s: Veganimocon, Vegan Cupcakes take over the World (try the margarita cupcakes and thank me later), Vegan with a Vengeance, and Food for the Vegetarian: Traditional Lebanese Recipes (this is where I learned to make labneh!).

What are your favorite plant-based books?

Recipe: Grilled veggie salsa

This versatile, delicious sauce responds to what you have to hand from your summer garden or market, and is to me the pinnacle of summer eating. Swap out what you have (peaches are one of my favorites), allow yourself to travel down new paths by using ingredients you maybe didn't think of before. This recipe is more template than hard and fast rule: And like with all recipes I encourage you to make it your own.

I adore this salsa as is eaten as a dip, but I especially love it on fish or alongside hearty main dishes like rice and beans.