There is a new version of Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone by Deborah Madison, The New Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone. It has an additional 200 recipes and was published in 2014. However, I got my very beat-up copy in 2001 (when it was shiny and new), so this is a review using the old version, but I am certain will hold up for both versions. I have seen the new one, thumbed through it. They are very, very similar.

Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone is hands-down one of my favorite and most-used cookbooks. It is also the book that taught me—fresh out of college and in marriage and newly vegetarian—how to cook. It opened my eyes to so much cuisine that I had never imagined during my Midwestern upbringing. I was ushered into the magic that happens in the kitchen, watching oil and egg fuse and fluff into Mayonnaise, hiding red lentils under a lid and removing it later to yellow Dal, slow-simmering alliums until they became the sweetest and deepest Caramelized Onions. I managed my first pot of beans, my first broth. I did not know how simple, homemade things could blow the pre-packaged foods of my childhood out of the water: Guacamole, Pesto, Oat Scones. We built a marriage around picnic baskets full of Vegetarian Classic sandwiches, cookouts arriving with Coleslaw with Buttermilk-Horseradish Dressing, and dinner tables laden with Eggplant Rollatine and Winter Vegetable Chowder. We took Carrot Soup with Onion Relish to a family with a new baby, impressed my in-laws with a Tomato and Red Pepper Tart, moved to the South and made my first batch of Fried Green Tomatoes, and whipped up Herb Focaccia for huge, family gatherings. Our little ones were raised on Glazed Carrots with Mustard and Honey, fried Firm Polenta, Buttermilk Pancakes and Multigrain Waffles. I encountered quinoa and asparagus, sometimes graduated to similar recipes in other cookbooks (Granola to honey-maple granola, Pizza Crust to grilled yogurt pizza crust). Sometimes I even missed a recipe because I didn’t yet have the capacity to understand what it might offer (Corn Pudding Souffle, Goat Cheese Flan, anyone?). Who else was going to show me what to do with tofu and tempeh, with Jerusalem artichoke and Delicata squash (especially in 2001)? Flipping through my copy now, I encounter so many notes, but also stickers, old lists, food stains, newer recipes scratched into the margins, and even dried leaves. Each one of these recipes is a memory that I can taste as well as feel.

Some people like cookbooks because they like coffee table books, pretty things for evoking appetite and for admiring. Personally, I have some of those types of cookbooks, but I much prefer the ones chock full of actual recipes, nevermind the photos or stories. This is one of the latter. There are occasional sketches and a few ten-page inserts of photos, but mostly the pages contain a few recipes per page, no nonsense, variations abounding. And since the recipes can be trusted, this is great practicality in a 700-page brick.

We are no longer vegetarian. We were for something like eight years (during which we had two babies), but changed diets when we realized we could eat meat in a way (and sourced in a way) that continued to honor our principles. We still eat vegetarian dinners more than once a week. Habit. Cost. Health. And principles. Obviously, this is a vegetarian cookbook. There are also plenty of vegan recipes. And an entire section devoted to vegetables. (This is something you see more often now, but at the time it was fairly unique, celebrating actual vegetables.) I also much prefer cookbooks that don’t pretend veggies, legumes, and soy products are meat or substitute them in for “normal” recipes. Vegetarian Cooking almost never does that. The attitude is not lack or substitution, but plenty and celebration.

Vegetarian or not, there are a lot of basics in this book, thrown together with some more curated, composed dishes. Some of the recipes are easy and quick, while others take more time and effort, mostly time and patience, really. The recipes are written simply, but it takes practice and a few hours to home-make bread, for example. A pasta dish with a few ingredients, on the other hand? Goes together in minutes and anyone can do it.

Vegetarian Cooking is considered Deborah Madison’s magnus opus, but she has other cookbooks. I also have her Local Flavors, and for cooking straight from your farmer’s market, there isn’t a better book. She is an award-winning (four James Beards!) writer, chef, teacher and restaurant owner. Besides Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone (and The New Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone), her other cookbooks are:

• Local Flavors
• Seasonal Fruit Desserts
• Vegetable Literacy
• An Onion in My Pocket
• In My Kitchen
• Vegetable Soups
• Vegetarian Suppers
• This Can’t Be Tofu!
• The Greens Cookbook
• The Savory Way
• The Vegetarian Table
• What We Eat When We Eat Alone

Some of my very favorite recipes through the years of using this book:

• Fried Green Olives
• Baked Olives
• Basil-Walnut Dressing
• Peruvian Potatoes with Peanut Sauce and Garnishes
• Greek Salad
• Curry Vinaigrette
• Cream of Leek Soup with Fresh Herbs and Cheese Croutons
• Fideos—A Mexican Dry Soup
• Barley Soup with Caramelized Onions and Pecorino Cheese
• Chickpea Soup with Condiments (Leblebi)
• All-Bean Chili
• Spaghetti with Garlic, Parsley, and Bread Crumbs
• Penne with Eggplant and Mozzarella
• Noodles in Thai Curry Sauce
• Barley Risotto
• Curried Quinoa with Peas and Cashews
• Rice and Winter Squash Gratin
• Cream and Ginger Scones
• Sandwich Focaccia with Rosemary

Obviously, I love this book and highly recommend it. It is not a coffee table book, but it is a staple for any kitchen. It’s also not a diet book; she’s not going to show you how to live as a vegetarian or give you theory about combining proteins. You don’t have to be vegetarian to appreciate or use the hundreds of recipes for salads, sides, breads, desserts, dressings, sauces, etc. But when you do have a vegetarian over for dinner (or your kid decides they’re vegetarian), it would be a great source for that, too. For real: every self-respecting kitchen library should have a copy of this book.