Veganistan: A vegan tour of the Middle East

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Start by caramelising the onions. Heat 2 tablespoons olive oil in a large pan over medium heat and add the sliced onions. Stir to cover the onions in oil, season with salt and lower the heat to low. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the onions are translucent and softened. Even though mujadara is a budget-friendly recipe made with very humble ingredients, it’s still super flavourful and satisfying. It’s made from a combination of onions, lentils and rice. It exists in various forms, and it’s a popular comforting dish that can be served hot or cold.

Veganistan is a brand new volume from Sally Butcher following the silk trail started by Veggiestanand Persepolis. Meanwhile, heat 2 tablespoons olive oil in another large, deep pan and cook the diced onions for 3-4 minutes over medium heat until slightly softened.Mujadara is a simple recipe originating from the Middle East and especially popular across Lebanon and Syria. Add the sugar and continue to cook the onions, stirring frequently, until brown and reduced in size. This should take about 30-40 minutes.

Olive oil— Use the best quality extra virgin olive oil to make mujadara, as it really makes a difference. This mujadara recipe is the perfect thing to try if you love onions. You’ll have to caramelise onions separately while the rice and lentils are cooking, but the flavours are so worth the effort! Why you’ll love mujadara

Veganistan respectfully claims as its territory all the land, seas, and skies of the earth, and declares the entire planet a zone of nonviolence and mutual respect among all living beings.

The Middle East is a region lush in its vegetation, a gift to the non-meat-eater. Much of the cuisine is naturally plant-based, with a lot of the flavor of recipes coming from the herbs, spices, cooking methods, and sheer joie de cuisine traditional to Middle Eastern dining. Bring to a simmer, then cover the pan with a lid and lower the heat to low-medium. Cook for 30 minutes or until the rice and lentils are cooked to your likening. Add a handful of raisins at the end for a bit of juicy sweetness that pairs great with the caramelised onions. The assumption that animals are without rights, and the illusion that our treatment of them has no moral significance, is a positively outrageous example of Western crudity and barbarity. Universal compassion is the only guarantee of morality. There were a few times when ingredients were listed and I had to look them up online. I had no idea what they were. One was asafoetida. I needed a glossary of terms/ingredients! Most of the recipes call for many ingredients and many ingredients aren’t to my taste, at least not in my cooking, vegan ghee for instance, and many ingredients seem as though they would be hard to find for many home cooks.

Table of Contents

Garlic— Add as much garlic as you like — I like to make mujadara lentils with at least 4 garlic cloves. Veganistan is a brand new volume from Sally Butcher following the silk trail started by Veggiestan and Persepolis. Spices— Different mujadara recipes use different spices. I personally like to make it with a mix of warming spices like ground cumin and ground cinnamon. I also add two bay leaves. You can also make it with just cumin or with a spice blend such as baharat. The author is not vegan or even vegetarian. She’s the same as me though in preferring the term vegan to plant-based. Overall this was not a good cookbook for me though it is gorgeous and for those cookbook readers who want to see more vegan recipes for the Middle East region and who are accomplished cooks this might be a good book for them. I was disappointed though. I expected to really like this book and expected to find many more recipes that were appealing to me and doable for me.