Old Fashioned Vegetarian Food

[Glitterbiscuits]

I ate at Good Earth in Leicester last week. It's a totally vegetarian restaurant. It's been open nearly 50 years.

The menu is great, so unpretentious. I'd love to recreate some of their style of dishes. They had things like parsnip loaf, bean bake. Much more of an emphasis on grains and pulses.

I used to make a great nut loaf and a veggie shepherd's pie.
We eat too much pasta, chilli, curry etc.

I want to move back to basics. Can anyone suggest some old ( I want to say hippy style) dishes they love or used to love?

@Xiaoxiong we are having my homemade, super chunky, piccalilli with our dinner tonight! Even my children love it.

@Xiaoxiong I wish I was coming to yours for lunch. Sounds amazing.

Homity pie with an oat flour crust tonight!! I think I'll make a range of salads like at a proper veggie restaurant, something involving beetroot definitely.

@Xiaoxiong if the school mum friend does not appreciate the quiche, I’ll have her share. 😆 Sounds fab!

@Shitlord you have to have the full range of proper salads that could constitute a main meal in order to make it a full old school veggie meal. None of your half-hearted garnishes. And beetroot! Yes. Also, a good three bean salad and a potato salad.

@Shitlord please tell me about your oat flour crust? Is it wheat/gluten free? 🙏🏼

I'm going ti try this one:

comfortablydomestic.com/2023/11/gluten-free-oat-flour-pie-crust/

It worked pretty well!! For 100g oats(made into a roughish flour in blender, cheaper than buying oat flour!), 3tbsp olive oil and approx that of water, salt. Press into tin and bake blind. I'm not sure if it would keep well or turn porridgey but it was nice and crispy eaten fresh.

Should be gluten-free but you might want to be a bit careful with the brand of oats as I think some aren't sold as GF due to cross contamination ☺️

Cauliflower and tahini, roasted beetroot and carrot, sunflower seed and dill pickle dressing and black bean and roast veg with vinaigrette, plenty of mustard so definitely meal in themselves type salads!! Loved it!

Thanks both.

I'm not sure it's very old fashioned, though maybe has vibes of the Hare Krishna veggie restaurants, but today I'm making vegetable biryani (BBC recipe).

Yum!

DD asked last night why we’d eaten so much brown rice this week. This thread is entirely to blame.

The crypt at St Martin in the Fields used to be great for the ‘lots of hearty salads’ approach to lunch. I think it focuses more on the Trafalgar Sq tourists now.

Roast carrot and red lentil soup for dinner! If it doesn't get me excommunicated from the old fashioned veggie community, I might be sprinkling some zata'ar over the top...

Red dragon pie. Though I say it myself, it was lovely.

Looks fantastic @Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g and here’s my effort in the name of Red Dragon Pie. Mr C consumed two helpings.

Red dragon pie snap!
They both look delicious.

Those red dragon pies look delicious.

@Craftycorvid, looks great! What was in yours? I looked at a few recipes and ended up doing a pick and mix version.

Base of onions (red and brown), celery, garlic, lots of carrot. Red peppers, mushrooms, aduki beans, tinned chopped tomatoes, vegetable stock, red wine, bayleaves, ground black pepper, paprika, sprinkling of chili flakes, tomato puree, soy sauce, Lea & Perrin's*, thyme.
Topping: potatoes mashed with sour cream and mustard and mixed with sauted leeks, lots of extra mature cheddar.

*We're not vegetarians, hence this is OK.

Haha I did a brown rice pilaf with cabbage in, it felt peak old school veggie and was actually absolutely delish!

@Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g sounds delicious! Mine had carrot, red onion, garlic, mushrooms, tinned toms plus brown rice (a la original recipe). I seasoned with a pinch of curry powder and soy sauce. The mash was 50/50 potato and swede. About 22 of our 5 a day!

I wondered about the rice. One recipe I looked at used quinoa as well as aduki beans, possibly also with a bit of rice. I imagine that would give a more mince-like texture. Another time! I made an enormous quantity so some will go in the freezer and we can have an effort-free meal another time, so win win.

I love The Vegetarian Epicure so much, it is so perfectly groovy-70s that it even includes a suggestion of a "two-hours-later course" if "grass is smoked socially" at your dinner parties, for when the munchies kick in. The illustrations are gorgeous as well.

This is my whole aesthetic to be fair.

@MsRinky My copy fell apart, I used it so often. I think I need to go search ebay for a replacement.

Another vote for smitten kitchen - try the tahini-garlic-miso dressing for veg and rice bowls. Great on anything.

Also Bad Manners vegan pumpkin chili - you can sub in butternut squash or sweet potato for the pumpkin, whatever you have.

MsRinky that looks brilliant 😝 I love Cookbook fashion. I raise you Nigella holding tongs cooking on a flaming bbq in the 00s in her pashmina loosely draped over her shoulders,(hope the stylists kept a fire extinguisher handy?) and Deliciously Ella ten years later trying to flog whole a lifestyle in her Bretons and skinny jeans and identical looking cast of friends. Cookbooks are so interesting and are about way more than food.