Top five best vegan cookbooks for newbies

By Giselle Wedemire

Transitioning to a vegan lifestyle can seem daunting at first, especially if you take the leap of faith and immediately hoof it to the nearest bookstore in search of a vegan cookbook. With so many options blurring your vision – often brimming with recipes calling for mystery ingredients like TVP, nutritional yeast, and seitan – it’s easy to get discouraged.

Though there are many great cookbooks on the market – the numbers of which increase exponentially with every passing month – there are quite a few duds in the mix. To save you from heartache and a time-consuming trip to your local bookseller, here are my recommendations for the best user-friendly cookbooks ideal for the novice vegan (as well as some of the stand-out recipes you can find in each book).

A DIY solution to the cancelled CNF Stampede breakfast

By Giselle Wedemire

I love this city, but I have a hard time getting jazzed about Stampede. I mean, I’ve had some great fun at some of their concerts on the Coca Cola Stage (including seeing Rooney, The Dudes, k-os, and a chance sighting of Drake at the 2006 Nelly Furtado show), but other than that, Stampede really doesn’t matter to me.

But Stampede breakfasts? Now, that’s something I can get behind. Since going vegan five years ago, my favourite part of Stampede has been hitting up Community Natural Foods’ annual Stampede breakfast. Sure, I had to get up at the crack of dawn and be a complete zombie for the rest of the day, but there were free pancakes involved, so it was worth it!

This year, however, CNF has decided against putting on its annual breakfast. While this is definitely sad news, you can’t really blame ‘em, thanks to this not-so-hot economy of ours.

Screen shot via Community Natural Foods' Facebook