The top 5 vegan cookbooks of 2014, plus 5 great recipes to try: Going Vegan (2024)

What a fun year of cooking.

In 2014, there was no excuse for humdrum vegan food, thanks to a bumper crop of new cookbooks filled with creative and irresistible recipes aimed at people from all walks of life. Those cookbooks inspired a lot of great meals, proving that plant-based fare is anything but unsatisfying and blah.

So which cookbooks were the best of the best? After a bit of hand wringing, I've culled through the best of 2014's vegan cookbooks, narrowing it down to this list of five favorites. Any of these books would make an excellent Christmas gift for someone on your list – or a lovely gift to give yourself. And to tantalize you, here are recipes from each book, featuring a range of bold flavors that should appeal to everyone.

5."Straight From the Earth" by Myra Goodman and Marea Goodman ($27.50, Chronicle Books): This mother-daughter team created a collection of 90 vegan recipes designed to bring plant-based dishes to mainstream eaters. Myra isn't vegan herself, but as the co-founder of Earthbound Farm Organic, the national organic food powerhouse, creating a plant-focused cookbook isn't surprising. In the course of developing recipes with Marea, who leans vegan, she transformed her own way of eating, changing her mind about what it means to eat a plant-based diet. That sense of discovery echoes through the book, starting with breakfast and ending with dessert, while highlighting specific foods like legumes, grains and coconuts that are especially relevant to plant-based eating. And there's something for all levels of cooks, from a Tofu-Veggie Scramble that comes together in minutes, to an elaborate Banana-Coconut Cake that's a worthy afternoon project.

Recipe to try:Seared Polenta With Spicy Heirloom Tomato Sauce, featuring crispy pan-fried polenta cakes topped with a sauce that can turn mid-week pasta nights into a gourmet dinner.

4."The Blender Girl" byTess Masters ($19.99, Ten Speed Press): No, this isn't a smoothie cookbook, though it's easy to think that given the title and the cover photo. Instead, this collection of 100 vegan and gluten-free recipes shows how a high-speed blender can be the most-useful tool in the kitchen, essential for creating core elements of salads, soups, snacks and entrees (and yes, smoothies). Masters' style is playful: A recipe titled "The World Is Not Right Without Pizza" not only speaks a universal truth, it invites you in to see how a blender can turn olive oil, balsamic vinegar, fresh rosemary and garlic into a sauce that will make you forget about tomato-based pies. The world is not right without co*cktails, either, and she puts her unique spin on blender classics like margaritas and pina coladas, along with a brandy-spiked Holiday Eggnog that's perfect at this time of year. OK, who am I kidding? This would be great in July, too.

Recipe to try: Creamy Mushroom Stroganoff, which cuts back the fat of traditional stroganoff, while ramping up the flavor with exotic mushrooms.

3."Vegan Without Borders" byRobin Robertson ($40, Andrews McMeel Publishing): Talk about prolific authors! Robin Robertson cooks up one or two new cookbooks every year, spanning so many different styles of cooking that overused words like "virtuoso" and "chameleon" are actually apropos. This cookbook is her most-lavish so far, with 150 recipes that crisscross the globe, showing how vegan cooking can capture the essence of more than 20 countries, from an intense Eastern European goulash to spicy Ethiopian berbere stews to sop up with spongy injera flatbread. And you won't have to run all over town hitting specialty markets to make these dishes, since most ingredients can be found in any grocery store. This is ideal for adventurous eaters looking to expand their horizons.

Recipe to try: Vegetable Paella, a riff on the Spanish rice dish loaded with flavors of saffron and smoked paprika.

2."Plant Power" byNava Atlas ($29.99, HarperOne): Nava Atlas' 2012 cookbook"Wild About Greens" set the gold standard for showcasing the versatility of kale, collards and all manner of leafy greens. She topped that achievement with this landmark collection of 150 recipes that show how flavorful and colorful vegan food can be. Beginning with tips on how to stock the kitchen with pantry essentials, she shows how to sneak more healthy ingredients into your diet, and deftly dispels the top myths about plant-based diets (Yes, you can get enough protein; and no, vegan doesn't necessarily mean "healthy" if you load up on snacks and junk food). Here chapter on Asian cooking is a real revelation, offering a master class in how to correctly stir-fry vegetables without making them mushy, and showing how to recreate popular take-out fare at home with a lot less oil and salt.

Recipe to try: Thai-Style Pineapple-Coconut Rice, a hearty rice dish that's both refreshing and complex.

1."Salad Samurai" byTerry Hope Romero ($19.99, Lifelong Books): Yeah, yeah, it's a salad book. How can a salad book possibly be my favorite vegan cookbook of the year? Because it's from Terry Hope Romero, who made my list of top cookbooks in 2012 with her spice-fueled "Vegan Eats World." In her hands, you won't get boring bowls of iceberg lettuce topped with bottled dressing. In fact, those wretched salads are what inspired this book, which offers real salads designed to be eaten as hearty meals, packed with plant-based proteins and topped with homemade dressings and things like "bacon" bits made out of coconut that are so addictive you'll also want to toss them on everything from pasta to ice cream. We're not talking dainty salads, either – you'll need dinner plates for Romero's creations, like The BKT, a bowl of tempeh bacon, kale and tomatoes in a tangy vinaigrette, which makes two servings that a linebacker would love. And Romero shows that salads can be year-round affairs. Even in the dead of winter, when produce is anything but dreamy, she shows how to combine cabbage, apples and sweet potatoes with kale and tropical fruits for salads that are somehow clean and comforting at the same time.

Recipe to try: Sesame Noodles in the Dojo, a recreation of a dish from a beloved New York City Asian restaurant, featuring a sesame-peanut sauce that could be habit-forming.

-- Grant Butler

Read more:

-- The top 5 vegan cookbooks of 2013.

-- The top 5 vegan cookbooks of 2012.

-- The top 5 vegan cookbooks of 2011.