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Vegetarian Cooking - Three Basics

For any of the many reasons people choose to eat

vegetarian food - religion, politics, finances, or health -

one thing in common is that everyone prefers food that

tastes delicious and provides good nutrition. There are

some basic techniques to vegetarian cooking which will

accomplish that.

There is a range of vegetarianism. From the vegan to the

person who eats meat on rare occasions. Some people

consider themselves basically vegetarian if they never eat

red meat, but do eat fish and chicken once in a while.

Other vegetarians eat animal products like eggs and dairy,

but never the animal itself. A vegan is at the far end of

the continuum, rejecting animal products entirely. Vegans

won't eat mayonnaise because it's made using eggs, for

example.

Wherever you are on the continuum of vegetarianism, you

want your food to taste good, be satisfying, and provide

good nutrition. Here are some methods for cooking

vegetarian to meet those basic requirements.

To begin, if you are making some dish that is actually a

meat-based recipe, such as chili con carne, stop

substituting textured vegetable protein for the meat and

leaving the rest of the recipe unaltered. The result never

tastes quite right, and you've been robbed of the pleasure

of good food: it's neither meat nor properly vegetarian.

Furthermore, you haven't gained in terms of health or

economy. Soy is the primary ingredient of textured

vegetable protein, tofu, and tempeh. These are usually

high in fat, high in processing, and fairly high in cost.

Not much better than organically raised meat, if at all.

So if chili con carne is what you want, buy organic meat

and enjoy it! Otherwise, cook a delicious soup using red

beans that doesn't pretend it's chili con carne.

The key to good vegetarian soup is to use oil. Even if

you prefer low fat, your body does require fats for healthy

metabolism. And it definitely enhances the quality and

flavor of any vegetarian soup when some of the vegetables

(onions in particular) are saut~ed. Use an oil that's

liquid at room temperature, such as olive, vegetable, or

grape seed.

The next critical ingredient of vegetarian food that

tastes fabulous is really simple: use sea salt. Although

any kind of salt will enhance the flavor of most foods, sea

salt is best. It naturally contains minerals, while it

doesn't contain the nasty chemicals of regular processed

table salt. Important to note~ use salt *during* the

cooking instead of waiting until after serving the food.

This makes a difference in the final quality of the dish

because cooking is chemistry. Remember back to your high

school chemistry classes: the order of combining the

elements, and the application of heat to the mixture could

make a tremendous difference to the results of the

experiment!

The third tip for vegetarian cooking is obvious, yet needs

emphasis. Use lots of vegetables! You can't over-do

vegetables in your diet - the greater the range and color,

the better. Use leafy veg (lettuce, spinach, and chard),

root veg (yams, carrots, potatoes, turnips), and the stems

and seed carriers of veg (for example celery, eggplant,

peppers, zucchini). Buy organic veg if you can because

they really do taste better, and of course they provide

better nutrition because they are gown in healthy, 'clean'

dirt.

Take any vegetable and bean soup recipe, and follow these

three simple principles: saut~ the veg in the right oil,

cook the beans in sea-salted water, use a variety of

organic vegetables, and you'll have a rich delicious soup.

These simple tips make a big difference. Take my word for

it, or do a little test. Use the same list of ingredients,

but don't saut~ in oil, add the salt at the table, and use

conventionally grown veg. The result will be inferior -

still nutritious, but bland rather than satisfying, and

that's a shame because the few simple techniques described

here can make your vegetarian cooking consistently

terrific.

Articles by Nora Poulous on topics related to cooking are

published in Z Cooking

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