The Reluctant Vegetarian Cookbook

Book excerpt: “Who in their right minds would ever want to be a vegetarian?” Sharalyn Pliler asked just months before she—accidentally—became one. A few days into a camping trip in the woods, she was amazed to experience that instead of getting weaker without meat, just the opposite happened—she felt more energetic, lighter and more clear-headed, needing to eat less than before while enjoying food even more, as if her taste buds had come alive. Reluctant to become a vegetarian but unable to argue with definitive direct experience, she had no choice but to begin the transition from familiar meat cookery to the unknown world of vegetarianism. Not many cookbooks are page-turners but with her light-hearted style, down-home sense of humor and master’s level writing skills, readers are carried effortlessly as she tells her story of awakening to the pleasures and techniques of vegetarianism. Once a cook in a vegetarian university kitchen, now with three decades of vegetarian experience, she seems to anticipate every question.