Vegetable Simple: A Cookbook

Vegetable Simple by Eric Ripert exudes a love for flavorful, in-season vegetables. The recipes are straightforward and easily reproduced at home. There is a sprinkling of more complicated recipes for gourmet enthusiasts. I was a bit intimidated by the artistic presentation of the dishes in the book. However, when I read the recipes and realized that we already cook like this in my home, I was hooked!Nigel Parry photographed the dishes for Vegetable Simple. The photographs are absolutely stunning. I hope this sets the bar for cookbook photography everywhere. I pre-ordered the physical book. I cannot wait to hold it in my hands and look at the full-page photography!Some of the most interesting parts of Vegetable Simple are Eric Ripert’s personal stories. Food is a natural part of our lives. A taste or smell can evoke memories from childhood, a vacation, or time spent with family. These beautiful bits made it feel like I was having a conversation with Eric and sharing in his personal food journey.I am an average home cook who loves good food. My 14-year-old daughter is a pescetarian, and I adore exploring new recipes with her. We love growing our own produce and eating fresh from the garden. My finished dishes do not look as elegant as Eric Ripert’s works of art. I can live with that as long as they taste as good!Each recipe includes a personal note from the author, a full-page photograph of the finished product, equipment needed, and clear directions. I was intrigued to find recipes and techniques that I have never heard of—for example, Flash-Cured Cucumbers.I picked three recipes from the book to try: Roasted Cauliflower, Flash-Cured Cucumbers, and Aigo Boulido Broth (Garlic Soup).Recipes I Made:Flash-cured Cucumbers – I am a huge fan of cucumbers. This is a simple technique that adds just the right amount of salty flavor. One area where this cookbook shines is letting the home cook in on professional secrets to make our lives easier and tastier.Roasted Cauliflower – I usually think of cauliflower as rather bland, so I was really excited to try this dish. The cauliflower was moist and delicious. I didn’t get the charred bits on mine in the roasting process, and I see this as a great excuse to try again! I loved the shichimi togarashi seasoning. It was unexpected and flavorful. I will definitely make this dish again!Aigo Boulido Broth (Garlic Soup) – This is a dish I would have never thought of on my own. We put it into mugs and sipped it like a hot tea. Mmmmm! Delicious! It is best warm. Once it cooled, the taste was stronger and slightly bitter. Vegetable Simple describes it as a refreshing soup that French farmers enjoy after a long day in the fields. I can definitely see that, and I will surely be making this again. I may experiment with other combinations as well. I wonder what basil and garlic would taste like?I saved the garlic cloves and used them in a fish dish later that evening. Waste not, want not!More Recipes I want to try from Vegetable Simple:Grated Carrot SaladChickpea SaladCold Basil Pasta SaladSteamed Vegetable DumplingsGrilled Eggplant MisoSauteed Pea Shoots Hong Kong StyleBok Choy with Soy-Ginger VinaigretteCorn Cake with Blueberry CompoteFrozen Espresso SoufflesSticky Toffee Puddingsand so many more!How Does this Cookbook Measure Up?This is the checklist that I use to evaluate a cookbook. You can use this as a quick reference to see if this cookbook is right for you.Features I Look for in a Cookbook:Delicious Recipes - ✅Recipes are Easy to Follow - ✅Inspires Me to Cook - ✅Beautiful Photography - ✅ Gorgeous pictures!Pictures of Every Recipe - ✅Easy to Find Ingredients - MostlyNutritional Information for Every Recipe - NoneNumber of Servings for Every Recipe - ✅Personal Stories (share your heart) - ✅Recipe and Ingredient Index - ✅Metric Conversion Chart - NoneSubstitution Chart - NoneSource:I received a free digital copy of Vegetable Simple at my request in exchange for an honest review. I pre-ordered the physical book because I must own this book!

My husband and I cook daily, and we're a seeming rare breed these days as "non-allergic omnivores". Though by American standards we already eat a fair amount of vegetables, we wanted to incorporate more of them into our diet, so we've ordered a range of vegetable-focused cookbooks - and we already know this will be one of the most dog-eared in our extensive library.This is the yin to "Six Seasons" yang.These are the recipes Ripert cooks at home (keep in mind he's a practicing Buddhist for over 30 years), and recipes from his childhood summers in Provence - the definition of simplicity. This is a personal cookbook, which if the lengthy introduction doesn't make clear, the introductions to many recipes does.A soup of sliced garlic and sage with olive oil and crusty bread... a play on a potato gratin made with rutabaga... Asparagus with a simplified, less temperamental Hollandaise... rose granita for a hot summer's day... sticky toffee pudding for a chilly fall evening... There's popcorn with yuzu-citrus salt, and marinated olives, and coleslaw...But there's also stuffed zucchini flowers, stuffed savoy cabbage, and a potato foam that made with a whipped cream charger - recipes that are far from your everyday experience, but also oddly, surprisingly simple in the preparation.He's included a recipe for how to make a true Japanese matcha tea (i.e., with a whisk and hot water - not a smoothie, or matcha latte... just matcha, as the Japanese drink it). By the time you reach this point, you know: this is a very personal cookbook. (The dedication page says, "To the well-being of all".)This cookbook reminds me of Rosanne Gold's "1-2-3 Cooking", a book of deceptively simple dishes that all have only 3 ingredients (excepting water, salt, and pepper). Recipes are 1/2 to 2/3 of a page. "Special Equipment" with the exception of the potato foam recipe, means box grater, mandolin, pastry brush, or blender. In many cases, he provides recommendations for alternatives you will have at home (e.g., swapping a zip lock bag with the corner snipped off if you don't have a pastry bag).This would be a great cookbook for a young cooking enthusiast, a newlywed couple, or 'vegetable-curious' folks frustrated with the elaborate vegetable-centric cookbooks that abound in the era of "plant-based" diets.We are not intimidated by complex recipes - but we also don't feel like spending 2 hours prepping vegetables for a Six Seasons salad and making homemade hummus on a weeknight for a meal. These recipes are accessible, mix-and-match-able, and will work with proteins as a side dish, or as a main. You can easily put a burger or a rotisserie chicken you picked up from the local grocery store next to anything in this book.If you're looking for other vegetable-centric cookbooks with weeknight-friendly recipes (though not exclusively), we'd also recommend:- "Vegetables Unleashed" by chef Jose Andres- "Vegetables Illustrated" by America's Test KitchenFor a wide range of weeknight dishes, in addition to this one we'd recommend:- "1-2-3 Cooking", by Rosanne GoldCAUTION: this is not a cookbook of challenging, chef-driven dishes. This is not "Chef Ripert's" cookbook - this is "Eric Ripert's" cookbook - as in, a man who loves good food and cooks for his family each week, versus a catalog of award-winning avant-garde Le Bernardin-worthy dishes. The preview of the book clearly illustrates the simplicity of the dishes included, so it's surprising how many comments have complained that this cookbook is not up to the standard they expect of a Michelin-rated chef. However, nowhere in the description or preview does the Ripert or his publisher create an expectation that these are recipes Ripert cooks in his restaurant, or that they're Michelin-inspired recipes, or a comprehensive global encyclopedia of vegetable dishes. Look at the preview before buying to decide if it's what you want, rather than order it, feel disappointed, and give it a bad review for not being something it's not.

I love Chef Eric Ripert. He is such a refined, classy man, who just exudes positivity. I've seen him on several TV shows. You can tell that he takes pride in his work.This Vegetable Simple Book, each recipe includes Chef Eric's thoughts, a list of ingredients & equipment needed, if any, & how many servings it makes. Most aren't too lengthy, and a glorious photo, of the finished product. The full recipe is on one page, the photo is on the opposite page.Most of the recipes can be made by someone who isn't a master, very experienced chef.Chef Eric even included some dessert recipes. There are even a few pages devoted by season, to let you know what season is best, for a particular vegetable/fruit.This is a very well thought out, beautiful book. I would expect no less, from Chef Ripert.