Quick Harvest: A Vegetarian's Guide to Microwave Cooking

Pat Baird, a nutritionist and health-care specialist, presents recipes for more than 150 varied and taste-tempting vegetarian dishes. Culled from American and ethnic cuisines, they will appeal to vegetarians and nonvegetarians alike. Add a list of do's and don'ts for the microwave novices, adn the result is an instructive and appetizing addition to the kitchen libraries of a wide variety of cooks.

Nutritionist and food writer Baird contributes many useful recipes and techniques to the burgeoning literature of the microwave. While labeling her book "vegetarian," the author leaves all proselytizing and theorizing behind, focusing instead on meatless recipes and dozens of ideas for quickly cooked, nutritious and original vegetable dishes (what she calls "the crowning glory of the microwave")--recipes that may stand alone or serve equally well as accompaniment to meat, fish or seafood dishes. Some of the best of these include chestnut soup, rosemary-scented spoon bread, herbed green and yellow squash, and Thai vegetable curry. While a substantial back-of-the-book index includes an overview of microwave techniques for a vast variety of vegetables, grains and cereals, along with menu ideas, Baird's recommended substitutions for (and explanations of) unusual ingredients in the recipes are spotty. Missing is the alternate term for chayotesic squash--called mirlitonsic in Southern states--or where to buy the norisic (seaweed) sheets essential for vegetarian sushi. Furthermore, for what it's worth, Baird's straightforward, at times clinical writing style makes this more of a reference volume than a good curl-up-by-the-fire read.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Enthusiasts tend to agree that vegetables do splendidly in the microwave, so Baird's vegetarian microwave guide seems like a sensible idea. And Baird is not a strict vegetarian, so her recipes are intended to appeal to vegetarians and nonvegetarians alike. Yet many are familiar, and most good general microwave cookbooks offer a number of vegetable recipes; the chapter on vegetarian entrees is the strongest part of the book. For special collections.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.