I've already admitted in this forum that as a vegetarian I have rather flexible ethics. It's my own hangup and I'm looking neither for approval nor opprobrium.

That being said, there's a lotta really good vegetarian food in the world. I realize you're in a place where the following may not be readily available, but I'm sure the network in here could get them to you.

My all-time favourite vegetarian cookbooks are all written by Isa Chandra Moskowitz (sometimes with Terry Hope Romero). I generally have at least one of them open on the counter on any given day:

Vegan With A Vengeance
Veganomicon
Vegan Brunch

Don't let the "vegan" thing disturb you. You darn sure won't let it disturb you after you've tried the recipes, even if your notion of heaven is "where bacon comes from."

My oldest daughter came in and out of our lives during a period when we were not overtly vegetarian, so she was a little shocked/horrified/frightened/curious when we went back to it. Apparently Mum and Dad are never supposed to change...

I sent her copies of:

Vegan Cupcakes Take Over The World, and
Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar

because she's all about cake and other sweets and the cookies in particular are some of the best cookies I ever ate. (I'm not much of a cake person, myself, but I will cheerfully maim the person who takes the last cookie in the house.) She's now "trying it on" to see how it fits.

Just lately I was in a bookstore and saw that Isa has a new one out:

Appetite for Reduction

which is basically a vegan weight-loss book with recipes. I bought it just on the strength of knowing the author's work and it is of similar high quality. Made a few recipes out of it already.

Other favourites include:

Biker Billy Cooks With Fire, and
Biker Billy's Freeway-A-Fire

which are both vegetarian (not vegan) cookbooks featuring hot pepper recipes, and the old classics

The Book of Miso
The Book of Tofu
The Book of Tempeh

by William Shurtleff and Akiko Aoyagi. I think the only reason I would undertake a journey to Japan would be to search out every variety of rare miso still available. (Well, and drink sake...)

That's the nucleus of a good library of vegetarian cooking, anyway -- relatively non-specific to any particular culture. Am I the only freak with a kitchen library? Not only that, but our kitchen library has sections: Chinese, Japanese, Other Asian, Indian, New Mexican, Northern European, Eastern European, North American...

:ootd: