From the bestselling author of The Flavor Equation and Season and winner of the 2023 IACP Trailblazer Award: A fascinating exploration of the unique wonders of more than fifty vegetables through captivating research, stunning photography, and technique-focused recipes.
"Groundbreaking, inspiring, delicious: Nik Sharma's Veg-Table is everything I'd hoped for and more!"--Nigella Lawson, author of Cook, Eat, Repeat
Nik Sharma, blogger at A Brown Table, Serious Eats columnist, and bestselling cookbook author, brings us his most cookable collection of recipes yet in Veg-table. Here is a technique-focused repertoire for weeknight mains for cooks of all skill levels looking to add more delicious and satisfying vegetable dishes to their diet.
Combining the scientific underpinnings of The Flavor Equation with the inviting and personal recipes of Season, this book features more than fifty vegetables, revealing their origins, biology, and unique characteristics. Vegetable-focused recipes are organized into chapters by plant family, with storage, buying, and cooking methods for all. The result is a recipe collection of big flavors and techniques that are tried, true, and perfected by rigorous testing and a deep scientific lens.
Included here are Sharma's first-ever pasta recipes published in a cookbook: Pasta with Broccoli Miso Sauce, Shallot and Spicy Mushroom Pasta, and more. And vegetable-focused doesn't mean strictly vegetarian; bring plants and animal protein together with delicious recipes like Chicken Katsu with Poppy Seed Coleslaw and Crispy Salmon with Green Curry Spinach. A wide variety of hot and cold soups, salads, sides, sauces, and rice-, egg-, and bean-based dishes round out this collection.
Featuring more than 100 of Sharma's gorgeous and evocative photographs, as well as instructive illustrations, this cookbook perfectly balances beauty, intellect, and delicious, achievable recipes.
FOLLOW-UP TO TWO CRITICALLY ACCLAIMED BOOKS: Season was a finalist for a James Beard Award and an IACP award. It was on the most prominent cookbook best-of lists, including the New York Times Best Cookbooks, NPR's Favorite Cookbooks, and Bon Appetit's Best Cookbooks gift guide; it was also an Amazon Book of the Month. The Flavor Equation was named one of the best cookbooks of the year by the New York Times, Eater, Epicurious, Food & Wine, Forbes, Saveur, Serious Eats, Smithsonian magazine, the San Francisco Chronicle, the Los Angeles Times, the Boston Globe, the Chicago Tribune, CNN Travel, The Kitchn, Chowhound, NPR, The Art of Eating 2021 longlist and many more; plus it garnered international media attention including from the Financial Times, the Globe and Mail, The Telegraph, The Guardian, The Independent, The Times (U.K.), Delicious Magazine (U.K.), The Times (Ireland), and Vogue India. It was the winner of the Guild of U.K. Food Writers (General Cookbook). It was a finalist for the 2021 IACP Cookbook Award.
AN ESTABLISHED AUTHOR: Sharma is a regular contributor to the popular Serious Eats food platform, where his pieces on the science of flavor reach millions of readers nationwide.
UNIQUE YET ACCESSIBLE VEGGIE-FORWARD RECIPES: Not only does Sharma write recipes for every palate, but he writes them for every level of cook, from novices to seasoned chefs. This book melds his science-forward thinking with accessible yet delicious vegetable-based recipes for an engaging and unexpected combination.
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John Birdsall is an author and former restaurant critic.
I’m incredibly proud of my friend, on the release of his third book VEG-TABLE, which is beautiful and brilliant, and reflects an original and hard-won POV. It’s queer and transformational, without bombast or narcissism. Buy Nik’s books... cook along with this original talent. ❤️
Nik Sharma is a food writer.
I'm so excited to share my new cookbook; VEG-TABLE (Oct 31), with you. This is my most adventurous, approachable, and colorful collection of recipes, along with vegetable science that I’m so proud of, and I hope you will love them too. Pre-order https://t.co/1YK2jKiUjO https://t.co/T4lvKrSUCX
"Sharma's recipes, accompanied by his own beautiful photographs, demonstrate his gift for marrying the scientific with the sensual. [...] Sharma lists ingredients and their quantities within recipe steps, an approach that streamlines the instructions without sacrificing their clarity. Such clarity is one of his book's chief virtues and a boon for any cook guided as much by curiosity as appetite." - Eater
"If you've ever looked at an alien artichoke or spiky nopalito in fear, don't worry, because Veg-table is here for you! Everything you've ever wanted to know about produce is in Sharma's book, from their origins to the history of their cultivation, and, of course, all the ways to make them delicious. His cinematic photography and personal prose guide you through the veggie world, giving you so many tasty ways to turn plants into dinner (or lunch! or breakfast!)." --Sohla El-Waylly, author of Start Here and television personality on The Big Brunch and Ancient Recipes with Sohla
"Veg-table cements Sharma's status as one of the most important cookbook authors of our time. He always has his finger on the cultural pulse, and, with the recent uptick in interest in vegetable-forward cooking, this cookbook could not be more timely. Like his other books, this one is thoughtful, steeped in research, bold, and bursting with flavor."
--Bryant Terry, James Beard Award-winning author of Black Food and editor in chief of 4 Color Books
"Sharma is not only a talented recipe writer but a masterful food photographer. These pages will make you salivate and see vegetables in a new light. Veg-table is the perfect balance of the art and the science of good food."
--Padma Lakshmi, New York Times bestselling author and creator and host of Taste the Nation and Top Chef
"Phenomenal. The scope, the combining of flavors, the knowledge--both about technique and individual vegetables--the gorgeousness of the recipes: This is a must-have book."--Diana Henry, British food writer and author of the James Beard Award-winning A Bird in the Hand
"Nik Sharma weaves science and culinary creativity together beautifully in this collection of inspiring recipes that prove just how exciting and versatile vegetables can be."--Ixta Belfrage, author of Mezcla and coauthor of Ottolenghi Flavor
"Groundbreaking, inspiring, delicious: Nik Sharma's Veg-Table is everything I'd hoped for and more!"--Nigella Lawson, author of Cook, Eat, Repeat
"Helpful, succinct 'cook's notes' follow each recipe. The stunning photographs are by Sharma himself. This cookbook more than holds its own but is especially recommended where The Flavor Equation has found favor." - Booklist
"The chemist-turned-cookbook-author plucks from the best of both of those to craft a worthy successor to his bestselling The Flavor Equation and Season, using principles of science to maximize the potential pleasures of grocery store familiars like broccoli, shallots, and zucchini, as well as perhaps less ubiquitous -- and thoroughly delightful -- vegetables like nopalito, jicama, and sunchokes." - Food Wine Magazine
"Offering new takes on a wide variety of vegetable dishes, this cookbook is recommended for vegetarian and international collections." --Library Journal