All of you lot who rave over Rose Elliot's Complete Vegetarian, over here please.

[neolara]

I bought the book because I keep seeing lots of people on here raving about it but I've been completely underwhelmed by it. When I look through it I can barely see anything tempting enough to try. To me it looks like a 70's throwback - very "worthy". So I reckon I must be missing something and there must be hidden depths to the book that I've yet to discover. With that in mind, could you give me your favourite recipes from the book please, and I'll give them a go.

Many thanks

Oh it is VERY worthy. I must admit, I don't tend to cook anything out of it except the leek and potato soup, but I do like reading it. The lentil soup is good too.

It's very worthy, but it has some good stuff. There's a three bean thing (I can't remember the name) which is superfast and very tasty. The veggie chilli's good, as is the tomato, aubergine and mozzarella bake.

The stuffed aubergine in tomato sauce is one of my faves. The chana dal, which is made entirely from stuff in the cupboard, is a brill standby. I made the stuffed cabbage, too - proper comfort food...

Thanks for your ideas.

I'm going to try the stuffed aubergines in tomato sauce tonight and others over next few days.

Anyone else?

I love it for it's 70s throwback and worthiness!

Two recipes I use a lot are the Cheese and Lentil Slice (DS loves it!) and dhal (I think it's called "Dhal with fresh coriander)

The nut mince is also quite nice though a bit carb-heavy as it has tons of breadcrumbs.

I made a chestnut and red wine loaf for Christmas that was OK, nothing too special.

Yes, the dds liked the cheese and lentil slice when they were little.

Tried out lentil rissoles for kids supper tonight. Massive faff and ended up chucking it away as it disintegrated into a yellow sludge at the bottom of the frying pan. Couldn't face the stuffed aubergine after that. Surely life's too short to stuff a vegetable? Can't I just chop it all up and stick it in roasting dish instead?

Right, Rose has got one more chance or the book gets given a one way ticket to Oxfam. What's the one star recipe that's going to turn me into a groupie? (Not sure cheese and lentil slice is going to be the one to do it. Sorry! And have to avoid nuts also because of allergies.)

Do you like quiche? The one that uses little squares of gouda is a decent, basic recipe. Or one of the nutmeat recipes, the one with a layer of 'stuffing' in it, is nice iirc but it's years since I made it.

I was about 19 when my mum gave me this book iirc (am 43 now!), and it was really useful then as being vegetarian was still a bit 'out there' in our neck of the woods, and this book helped me a lot when first setting up home. Tastes, and indeed vegetarianism, have moved on quite a lot since then though. But for basic, simple recipes I do still think it has its uses.

Oh bugger, sorry - missed the allergy line.