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?

Now that's a good idea. I have an enormous tub of smoked paprika to use up.

Which Cranks book would people recommend please?

The original Cranks paperback recipe book, written by founder David Canter which you can find on EBay for a few quid. They reissued it with a different cover and called it The vegetarian classics, but the content is the same.

Don’t bother with the New Cranks revamp version by Nadine Abendur, it’s a totally different style of cooking.

I've only been there once and I thought it was a gloomy and depressing place - very 'brown'. Am I misremembering it?

I’m still making my way down the thread but this is making me think of Maxine’s in Nottingham long ago

Probably not, vegetarian food was a thing in the seventies and that was a very brown decade.

Sweet smoked works best in “minestrone”, hot smoked for spicy dishes. Its brilliant stuff!

I love Hendersons in Edinburgh, it’s a must!

I’ve loved reading this thread and I’ve just a bought a modern copy of Rose Elliot’s New Complete Vegetarian and I wondered if anyone could possibly recommend which recipes to try first?

TIA

Are you already veggie? If so then spin the wheel and just pick out whatever appeals to you in season. I think the strength of a lot of the older books is that they make better use of nuts and pulses and traditional North European seasonal fruit and veg.

I still sometimes make her continental lentil and walnut loaf in Autumn (not sure if its in the new edition) - rich and hearty, especially with mushroomy sauces. I think that book also has a chestnut casserole and some nice Summery stuffed veg dishes The DC loved her tomato pie (which is basically mash, cheese and tomatoes - dead easy to make) and the croquettes (especially lentil/tomatoey recipes).

If new to veggie cooking, start with the most familiar ingredient based recipes and use canned beans. As you become used to the different way of putting meals together start using recipes with new ingredients.

I still spin the wheel to find new recipes and found when I was just cooking for myself after years of family catering it helped me back into eating properly after a period of feeling it wasn’t “worth” doing much when cooking for one.

@TheQuietDignityOfASandwich I recommend the lentil & mushroom au gratin (page 195) Boston baked beans (page 182) and lentil and spinach gratin (page 198) although with that last one I add a bit of red pesto to the lentils, and use a flavoured cheddar on the top!

Rose Elliot is a QUEEN!!

Glad I had a peek at this thread ! I loved Cranks waaaaay back in the day, hadn't thought to look up recipes now we have 'tinernet and google.
I LOVED Vegetarian Kitchen by Delia Smith, it got tons of use especially the Nut Loaf recipe which was my star turn, but I haven't found it online. Featured parsnips and had mushrooms on the bottom (so they sat on top in a nice pattern after baking)? My very old copy is in a box in a friend's attic waiting to be liberated...
So if anyone knows the recipe or HAS THE BOOK !! do let me know 🙏🤗😘

Checking out Rose Elliott now !

Do you mean Sarah Brown’s Vegetarian Kitchen? She has a lovely mushroom and cashew layered nut roast recipe that includes mashed parsnips.

Delia’s book is Vegetarian Collection, there are second hand ones available for a few quid.

WOW, that sounds exactly right ! thank you ! Maybe all this time I have been mixing up the chef ladies 😬 I was soo convinced it was Delia .....will have a ferret online.....
I really wanted to make one last Christmas...unfortunately parsnips are not available where I now live, as far as I know, but there must be some suitable option out of all the other gazillion veggies that grow here !

Ah well,,,,who would have thunk it of the humble parsnip ?

Low commercial availability: It is rarely found fresh in mass supermarket chains. Its use is almost exclusively limited to gourmet shops or fine dining restaurants.

otherwise growing conditions are perfect here, you could put a stick in the ground and it would sprout...but it is not part of the culinary landscape so....I'll be speaking to some chef friends next days !

@prelovedusername IT IS SARAH BROWN !! what a doofus I am....🙈checking to find out if I can get it delivered here now. Thank you 😘

Are you in the US, @Aintgointogoa ?

If you want to Google my mum had From a Monastry Kitchen which had good veggie recipes.

Mildred’s vegetarian cookbook is also good.

Here you go, @Aintgointogoa
https://www.food.com/recipe/layered-cashew-and-mushroom-nut-roast-244571

That Sarah Brown recipe is my absolute favourite.

And the restaurant is good too. Even my carnivore DH enjoyed his meal and forgot was vegetarian!

No, in Latin America......the quality of vegetables, fruits and food generally is incredible (I get an organic veg delivery weekly which is great, plus they have extras like gorgeous bread etc) And the demand for this service has really increased, probably on the back of migrants like me...which is good news for these small farmers. But never going to butter no parsnips it seems !

@prelovedusername THANK YOU SO MUCH ! Very unmumsnetty hug.
I have ordered a copy which will go to a friend in UK until such time as I can swing by - she remembers me making it, and the spattered pages of the cook book 😆 It has to have a really unctuous gravy.....mmmm....
Also, red dragon pie which was a fave of my son's. This country is big on beans but actually have never seen aduki.
I have a friend who runs a kitchen in one of the best local restaurants, lots of veg dishes on the menu, so I am going to run this past her.