★★★★★ Enjoyable guide to vegan nutrition

Laurel's Kitchen

Laurel Robertson, Carol Lee Flinders, Bronwen Godfrey

I do not cook, I don't want to cook, I don't plan to cook. (Very happy to buy my whole wheat bread from the bakery at my big box grocery store thank-you-very-much.) I have never tried a recipe from Laurel's Kitchen, and I never will. So why, you ask, am I reviewing a cookbook? Because I read it with pleasure, and I am here to tell you that it is worth reading, even if you don't cook.

I was a grad student in Biochemistry at Stanford when I read Laurel's Kitchen, probably around 1980, not many years after it was published. Many of my friends were dance and drama students. This was very much the astrology and granola crowd. (I was the token hard scientist of the bunch.) They alerted me to the existence of Laurel's Kitchen.

Laurel's Kitchen was a surprisingly good read. It was as entertaining as a novel, indeed, more entertaining than many novels I have read (looking at you, Fifty Shades of Grey). Although it contains recipes, the core purpose of the book is to explain how to safely be a vegetarian or vegan. Robertson et al are very straightforward about telling their readers not to be idiots. For instance, you MUST have vitamin B12, animals are the ONLY natural sources of vitamin B12, so for God's sake PLEASE take B12 pills. (Now, some of you are lining up to tell me that soy milk contains B12. Yes, the soy milk you buy in your grocery store in 2023 probably does contain B12, because the manufacturers add it artificially. In 1976 when Laurel's Kitchen came out you couldn't rely on that. And even in 2023, you should check. And yes, if you insist, we can have the argument about yeast.)

Protein is the biggest issue for a vegan. Laurel's Kitchen explains clearly why no single plant-based protein source can satisfy your nutritional requirements, but a mixture can. They advocate a diet in which most of your protein comes from grain in the form of bread, while beans supply the essential amino acids you can't get from grain. This had a lasting effect on me. Laurel's Kitchen makes it clear that bread is not just an inert substrate used to carry peanut butter and jelly into your intestines, but that bread can and should taste good, and that whole wheat bread tastes MUCH better than white bread. I did the experiment, and it is true. Since then I eat by choice only whole wheat bread.

So, if I was a grad student in 1980, I must be an old person now, right? Right. I have now reached the age where cholesterol is something I have to think about. Cholesterol (like B12) comes exclusively from animal sources. Plants have sterols, but they are different from cholesterol, and your body doesn't take them up. (Biochemistry PhD here!) If you move towards a vegan diet, you will automatically reduce the amount of cholesterol you eat. That is why I suddenly renewed my interest in Laurel's Kitchen. The version I read in 1980 (and which I am reviewing here) is no longer in print. There is an updated version, The New Laurel's Kitchen, which I have ordered and hope to review before very long.

I want to end by emphasizing what I started with: Laurel's Kitchen is not just a cookbook or a nutrition handbook. It is also an entertaining book to read.

Amazon review

Goodreads review

Comments

LouisaJanuary 17, 2023 at 5:15 PM
Reading cookbooks as novels is my wheelhouse. Though I tend towards historical cookbook myself.
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LAJanuary 17, 2023 at 5:17 PM
Well, this one was published in 1976. Does that not count as historic?
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