Divided into five chapters – breakfast, snacks, light lunches, main dishes, and sweet treats – readers can expect bright, fresh flavours with recipes like Green smoothie, Pistachio and kale hummus, Quinoa pizza, and vegan Vanilla ice cream. It was easy and fast enough that I made it during the before-school rush on a weekday morning, and it was so good that I made a second, larger batch the same day to have it on hand. Pant's recipes are a world away from your average takeaway curry and reflect the diversity of India's cuisines.

Madhur Jaffrey offers lots of ways to cook these, and many of these recipes are no more difficult than what you’d find in, say, Deborah Madison’s "Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone" (another of my favorite cookbooks). The "queen of Indian cooking" ( Saveur ) and seven-time James Beard Award-winning author shares the delectable, healthful, vegetable- and grain-based foods enjoyed around the Indian subcontinent.In fact, she’s continuing her long-standing tendency towards producing modest but thorough Indian cookbooks that forgo showmanship in favour of authentic regional expertise. We tried the Bombay Potatoes and Peas last night… I have renamed them Deconstructed Samosas (we had it with fried naan bread).

Ever wondered what’s in that dreamy sauce at the Indian restaurant, that you could pour on everythingand eat every day. This book is an exploration of the entire Asian continent and shows how spice and culture have become interwoven over the centuries. In the past when I’ve made Indian-inspired dishes at home they tasted good, but nothing like “real” Indian food. By using the Web site, you confirm that you have read, understood, and agreed to be bound by the Terms and Conditions. The shape of your slab of paneer will dictate the actual shape, but make the slices no thicker than 1/2 inch.We love Indian food but making a curry can sometimes be a lengthy affair with grinding spices, prepping ingredients and marinating, so we were very happy to see this book from former The Great British Bake Off contestant Chetna Makan. Some of the recipes are vegan versions of restaurant favorites, and some are for foods I have never heard of before, but quickly became favorites. I love variety and try to cook multiple brand-new recipes every week, interspersing them with dishes from a very large collection of known favorites. These cookbooks put flavour-packed veg at the centre of the plate, with curries, rice dishes, sides, salads, pickles and soups from Madhur Jaffrey, Meera Sodha, and more.

Elsewhere the Batter-fried Spinach Leaves bring an echo of tempura to proceedings, and the Cinnamon and Clove Cheese Curry is a stand-out that combines some unexpected flavours in a very satisfying way. Okra with onions and green chilis: Another good okra dish, quite straightforward, works fine on a weeknight. Dals make beautiful leftovers, too, which just improve with time, so I can make a double recipe and serve it intermittently for a week, and it can be sent in thermoses for school lunches, too.

These are a little more labor intensive than some of the other dishes in this book, because they need to be made one at a time. In that area the leftover dal is used to make a curry (sambar), but I have used it later to make a risotto.

It would be great to start your day with the spicy tofu scramble, get some quinoa patties at lunchtime, and round off the day with the Goan tempeh curry. These range from black-eyed peas with cilantro and green chili to chana dal with spinach and tomato, to dals that use multiple types of lentils. The recipes might seem intimidating, but that’s just because there are many spices – once everything is assembled, they are a breeze to prepare.

For those living their lives out of vegan and vegetarian cookbooks, this could prove a definitive volume on their shelves. My husband decided to go vegan right after I had my son in 2011 and Richa’s recipe for Tempeh Tikka Masala was what turned me on to tempeh. Admittedly I was a little intimidated by the long ingredients lists but let me be the first to assure you, don’t be! I would really like to purchase a digital copy there but it says the book is not made available for my country (and only the German version can be purchased). Jaffrey travels from north to south, and from the Arabian Sea to the Bay of Bengal, collecting recipes for the very tastiest dishes along the way.