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36 of 37 found the following review helpful:
 Some of the best vegan recipes to date Mar 29, 2009
By Michele B. Perez
"clunkygirl"
I have had this book for just three days but I jumped at the chance to try it out yesterday and what a find! I made the black eyed peas fritters with the recommended hot sauce, the succotash soup with garlicky cornbread croutons, and molasses ice cream with candied walnuts. While, admittedly, it took all night since each ingredient requires from-scratch making (I cheated with canned black-eyed peas), it was well worth it. Everything was just perfect. I would like to clarify something in case others have some confusion regarding the succotash soup, I didn't see the step where you drain the bean mixture after cooking and before pureeing but I am sure that is what is meant. I think most people would notice that 10 cups of water would make for a very liquid-y soup, but some wouldn't know this until it was too late and I would hate for that to happen! Also, I only used a couple of tablespoons of coconut "oil" because it was so expensive ($9 for a small jar), and make my fritters in the shape of small medallions so that I could flip them in the shallow oil and it worked just fine. This is a collection I'd recommend to vegans and non-vegans alike.
29 of 29 found the following review helpful:
Yummy Soul Kitchen Mar 07, 2009
By L. Han
I bought this book because of his previous work Grub: Ideas for an Urban Organic Kitchen, which is a groundbreaking green 'lifestyle' book for city dwellers. Vegan Soul Kitchen could just as easily be called Yummy Soul Kitchen- I'm not a vegan but the way the author shows how to build flavors I think will be a benefit to any cook. I highly recommend VSK to anyone who likes southern food, strives to be healthy, and wants to incorporate a spirit of sharing, joy, and community in their cooking. Includes several features (music, book, art recommendations) that make his book stand out from the typical cookbook.
88 of 98 found the following review helpful:
 "Vegan Soul Food" - for the Food Lover with a Heart!!! Feb 25, 2009
By Val Pavlik
"VeganVal"
As a cook and food lover with a heart, my choice not to eat animals is the reason I became vegan. "Vegan Soul Kitchen" by Bryant Terry caught my eye for a couple reasons, the main one being that after moving to the South about 3 months ago, I decided that I'd learn to cook southern food. I was raised in Asia, and had absolutely no exposure to either Southern Food nor "soul food", however I loved the vegan soul food that I've had in Seattle over the past year. I was therefore, thrilled to see a recipe for "Open Faced BBQ Tempeh Sandwich with carrot-cayenne coleslaw" on page 12. The ingredients were readily available even here in the South (at Whole Foods and Trader Joe's) and the BBQ tempeh sandwich was absolutely delicious! The only thing that I did differently was to bake my own Focaccia bread, instead of buying it already prepared. The "Minimalist Survival Snack Mix" on page 44 is a great snack when you don't have time for a sit down breakfast, or as an alternative to "not so healthful" snacks sold at the grocery store. My favorite recipe so far is the "Sweet Cornmeal Coconut Butter Drop Biscuits" on page 158. And yes, the recipe is vegan and no "real butter" is used. It's still delicious though!! I can't wait to try the rest of the recipes in this amazing book.
Terry doesn't appear to be vegan anymore but he does know what he's talking about as he was vegan in college and knows all about the health benefits as well as compassionate reasons for being vegan, and this guy can cook! If not for the Gumbo poem on page 92 about sea creatures in a meal "... a mound of sea creatures, a crab leg reached over the lip ...", I'd have given this book 5 stars. I just thought it was an inappropriate poem for a vegan cookbook. You wouldn't throw in a poem about pork in a Muslim or Jewish cookbook now, would you ? Vegans and vegetarians, don't let that poem stop you from buying this book though. It's still a great cookbook for anyone who loves soul food, or anyone like me who now calls the south their home.
25 of 25 found the following review helpful:
liked it Jun 20, 2009
By A.C.
"inferiornarcissist"
I checked this book out from the library to see how I liked it before buying it. I've tried nine recipes, with mixed (but mostly positive) results.
The first three recipes were outstanding. I made a meal out of the collard greens, mashed potatoes with cumin and caramelized onions, and rosemary tofu cubes. They were all very straightforward, easy-to-follow recipes (in a world in which vegan cookbooks seem to be taking a turn toward the futzy). I especially liked the collard greens -- the raisins were a nice addition, but I'm not sure the orange juice added anything. Nevertheless, it's my new favorite way to enjoy collard greens. The tofu was great, and really simple to make after the initial investment of dealing with fresh rosemary. The mashed potatoes were delicious (especially with the tofu), although next time I might try throwing a bunch of garlic in there.
The next meal I made was quinoa cornbread and succotash soup. I made the cornbread with whole-wheat pastry flour instead of the expensive quinoa flour that was called for, and it came out nice, although I definitely prefer maple-sweetened cornbread as opposed to agave-sweetened. The recipe was adapted from the amaranth cornbread recipe in The Voluptuous Vegan, and the original recipe will remain my go-to cornbread recipe. However, I did like Terry's idea to include toasted quinoa in the batter, and I think my future cornbread will benefit from this addition as it's the first time I had an enjoyable experience eating quinoa. I made the succotash soup to go with the bread (instead of making the cornbread croutons that the soup recipe called for). It was delicious but next time I'll only puree half of it, as I like a chunkier texture to my soup.
I was disappointed that the banana-corn-pecan mini-muffins didn't include instructions for those of us who neither own nor desire mini-muffin pans. I was able to make 15 regular-sized muffins with the recipe, which I cooked for 20 minutes at 400 degrees. The result was a very dense but tasty muffin. While it didn't turn out to be my personal favorite banana-nut muffin recipe, the person I share my food with thought this was the superior muffin.
The penultimate recipe I prepared was the citrus broccoli salad, which tasted like steamed broccoli with orange juice poured on top, plus a hit of basil. I had mixed feelings about it -- it wasn't exactly bad, but it did seem like way too much effort considering the end product. Then again, I liked steamed broccoli just fine on its own.
The last recipe I tried was the chocolate pecan pie. It was a huge disappointment, as the 1/2 cup of coconut oil in the filling caused an overpowering and extremely unpleasant aftertaste that rendered the entire pie inedible. I have since discovered that the recipe suffered from a typo -- in future print runs, the recipe will call for 1/4 cup coconut oil. I might try it again, taking into account this new information, but I am still a little gunshy.
I think there were enough good recipes in here to redeem the cookbook as a whole. I would like to find an errata for it, though, but couldn't locate one on the publisher's website. There are still recipes I'd like to try (potato salad, Jamaican vegetable patties, and the sweet-potato fries), but after the pie experience I'm concerned that there might be other food-ruining typos. I think I will eventually buy this, but I'll wait until the next print run when any other typos might have been corrected.
22 of 24 found the following review helpful:
this'll make you wanna be vegan Feb 22, 2009
By j star
these recipes are incredible! i've been a meat eater most of my life, interspersed with periods of vegetarianism and raw food. right now i eat mostly veggie and seafood. while i've lived with an incredible vegan cook before, i've always thought of veganism as intimidating and hard to do well. the food in vegan soul kitchen is delicious, simple to make, and...well, delicious (again). while i'm not going to switch my diet to vegan, i'll definitely be eating vegan more often. some of my favorites include cajun-creole spiced tempeh with grits, double watermelon strawberry slushee, cold and creamy cucumber watermelon soup (great for hot days and raw eating), and crispy okra strips with lime-thyme sauce. just writing that makes me salivate....
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