Thank you so much for your post. I have Vegan YumYum and the 2 Friends of Animals cookbooks on my wishlist at amazon but haven't hit the order button yet. Why don't you like the--I think her name is Feral--cookbook? It got such rave reviews. What didn't you like about it? This way I can go and order at least the YumYum one but the others tempt me as well.
I know, I was really excited about Feral's cookbooks b/c the reviews on Amazon were so good. I have Dining with Friends and the Best of Vegan cooking. I bought these cookbooks online without being able to see them, which is my fault, and I got them because I needed recipes for dinner. Dining with Friends doesn't have a lot other than pasta and soup to pick from for a main entree. My husband is not a huge fan of soup for dinner, although he'll eat it if it's a really good one. I tried the cream of brooccoli soup, the vegetarian chili, cashew cream lasagna, and 2 other pasta dishes, and all of them were just bland to us. If I knew how to tweak dishes without overseasoning them, that would probably help. And I haven't given up on it yet. I am sure there are good recipes in it. We do love the pasta all'arrabbiata with olives (without the red pepper flakes and capers). That one is a favorite I make now every week (I eat it with spaghetti squash and it's still great). The desserts looks awesome, too, but I haven't made any.
From The Best of Vegan Cooking, I tried the broccoli rice salad with almonds and sesame-ginger dressing, manhattan vegetable chowder, aunt trish's pasta e fagioli, and a few more, and they were ok, but none of them were recipes I'd look forward to eating again. I do like this book better than the other one. There's a whole section on risotto, and those are good (the zucchini risotto is my favorite).
Sorry so long, but hope that helps!
My husband is also a dedicated carnivore, and he looks through the pages, points, and says, "Hey, can you make this one?"
