Peckish Sister's Reviews
10 recipe(s) reviewed. Showing 1 to 10Sort by: Title 
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Vegetarian Epicure
By Anna Thomas
Vintage - 1972
Cauliflower Curry : page 255
A curry as visually appealing as it was satisfying. My children like cauliflower. With all the spices and the lovely yellow color it assumed during cooking, I was able to eat it and like it as well. The only change I made was to only use one very large cauliflower instead of two medium and the proportions seemed fine.
useful (1)
Cottage Pudding : page 274
This apple cake could use more precise directions. Three quarters of a cup of sugar is needed, 2/3 for the batter, the remainder for the top. I would rather have measured the 2/3 of a cup of sugar and then measure tablespoons or teaspoons of sugar for the topping. It did not say, so I did not peel the apple, but it would have been better if I had. Since my apples were so large, I should have cut the apple into eighths instead of quarters. The spices only go on the top of the cake with some sugar and are critical for the overall flavor of the cake, so some idea of how much of each of the cloves, nutmeg and allspice to add would have been helpful. As these spices can dominate, I went with a large pinch of each. The color of the topping sugar with these spices looked “weak”, but turned out perfect for my taste. There are so many choices in apple desserts that this one just did not stand out and I will not make it again. One advantage of it is that you should have all of the ingredients on hand, and it does not contain expensive ingredients like nuts.
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Kolokithya dolmades : page 152
The yellow squash reduced the proportion of brown rice in the filling of these stuffed grape leaves. The tomato sauce on the dark green leaves was very pretty. The filling had a less complex flavor of herbs than the Moosewood’s version, but contained more vegetables. The family was split in which of the two recipes they preferred.
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Leniwe Pierogi : page 204
These were very easy to make cottage cheese dumplings. I could have used more direction on how stiff a batter to make and what size to make the dumplings. Since only 3 were to cook at one time, I used large spoonfuls of batter. When one of the first three did not float up by the time the other two were done, I found out it was stuck to the bottom! Perhaps it was melted cottage cheese, but quite a few of the dumplings needed to be gently separated from the bottom. They came out very firm; a small portion was raw in the middle, but I probably did not time those as well. I followed the recipe with the buttered bread crumb topping and it was very delicious.
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Lentil Tomato Soup : page 63
This was a simple soup to make, though I had not realized when I started it that it had to cook for three hours. I was surprised at how the tomato paste gave it a rich fresh tomato taste. I had to add water at the end as it had really cooked down too much. It was nicely different than the usual lentil soup.
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Potato Souffle : page 181
The mashed potatoes and cheddar cheese in this recipe gave it more substance than the usual soufflé. The chives added lovely flecks of green to the golden orange soufflé. I had to cook it longer, but I used a narrow, tall dish. It tasted delicious, and the next day the warmed leftovers tasted almost as good as fresh out of the oven, surprising for a soufflé.
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Sesame Ring Bread : page 37
This plain white loaf of sesame studded bread brought back my days of cruising around Greece and eating bread like this. It made a large beautiful loaf. The egg yolk was going on so thickly that I thinned it with a few drops of water, but wondered as many of the sesame seeds came off while cutting the bread if more would have stuck on with undiluted egg yolk. It was a little too plain for my taste and probably will not be repeated.
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Sweet Oatmeal Raisin Bread : page 44
This dark hearty bread tastes very similar to Boston brown bread, but does not steam for hours. This is very satisfying for bread made with no fat or eggs. Do not use Greek yogurt; I did and I could not mix in all of the flour, nor could I “pour” the batter. I added water two TBLS at a time until it made a batter I could stir. This hearty quick bread has no eggs! The rolled oats gave it an interesting texture without adding nuts. I do not think it would have turned out as well with quick oats. Follow her advice to eat it with cream cheese on it; it is a nice contrast to the sourness of the rye, yogurt and molasses.
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Three - Cheese Ramequins : page 178
These Swiss, Romano and ricotta cheese individual soufflés cooked quickly. If you like those flavors and brandy, you may like these strong flavored ramequins. The texture was also very grainy and like cornmeal.
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White Oatmeal Bread : page 33
This turned out to be a coarse textured, very moist and delicious white bread. I tried to cut back on the overall volume of ingredients and make it in my bread machine and I did not cut it down enough. The next time I will make it just like the recipe. As it was too moist and I had added all the flour that would fit, I became inspired and added the strawberries I had dehydrated. They rehydrated enough to taste like strawberry jam in the finished bread, but completely retained their shape as they had been so hard to start with. With the dried strawberries the bread rates five stars. I will definitely make this again.
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