I Can Cook Vegan: A Plant-Based Cookbook

This book has huge, easy-to-read fonts everywhere. Some parts are so huge, that you're not sure if the intended audience is the very young just learning to read, or perhaps simply for those with poor eyesight. Both groups certainly could use more amazing accessible cookbooks. This aforementioned easy-on-the-eyes font can be found everywhere, that is, except for the ingredients! The ingredient lists are not only in a teeny tiny font, they are also colored (different color for each section) making them that much more difficult to read. Truly an awful design decision.

I'm so disappointed in this book. Not in Isa or the recipes, which look wonderful. The problem is that it's almost impossible for me to see the list of ingredients for each recipe. The publisher chose a font color that has very low contrast, and a font size that is super small, making it even harder to read. Such a shame. If I had known this, I would have bought the Kindle version. At least I have a book of gorgeous photos.

UPDATE:I have since made a couple more recipes - the brussels pad thai and the lentil burgers and both have issues. I'll start with the pad thai. It's OKAY, but the sauce was really not that great. Actually, it was pretty bad, but once I added all of the rice noodles (14oz vs. 8oz suggested) the taste spread out and was fine. My issue was that she has you make a big batch of the sauce, and doesn't key you in until the end that you are only going to use half of the sauce. She doesn't even tell you what to do with the other half (typically a recipe would note save the other half for "x" and it keeps for "y" days in the fridge). Isa just says to pour half in the pan and that's it. Literally no clue on how long it keeps, etc. I tossed it, because IMO it wasn't great tasting.For the lentil burgers, I am cooking them as I type, so I can only comment on the recipe. Isa notes that you need 2 cups of breadcrumbs, then tells you to put in half (that's 1 cup)...then later tells you to put in the remaining 1/2 cup breadcrumbs. This is just a typo I'm sure, because I'm positive Isa knows half of 2 is 1...but she even included the weight, so it's an unfortunate miss from her editors. Another issue is in the last step it doesn't tell you the cooking temperature for the burgers. At all. Tells you how to prep the skillet with oil, but then...you're on your own. I've made enough veggie burgers to figure it out, but again, this was supposed to be a BEGINNER friendly book. I can't believe I'm actually raggin' on Isa. Like I mention below, I love her and her food...this cookbook just needs to be a bit redone.(Demoted it from 3 to 2 stars because of the above issues)First, the good stuff. I love Isa. I love her food. She has a kick butt broccoli mac recipe in here that is super easy and delicious (I use frozen broccoli chopped up in a food processor) that my whole family has been enjoying for months (it was free on her blog) - even my broccoli hating 10 year old will eat it. I also love that there is a picture for every recipe! Amazing!Now for the not good.This is NOT a beginner/easy cookbook. I am not a beginner cook, so for me, that's not a huge deal, but I had intended on using it with my teen (now, probably not, at least - not *alone*). Isa is the one who announced this would be a book full of easy recipes for beginners and beyond - so that's where I got the idea that it would, well, be a cookbook for beginners. More like "beyond". It's definitely not living up to what I'd thought it would be - a cookbook I could suggest to those who want to dabble in a plant based diet without all the difficulty. I'm all for exciting, fun and colorful recipes, but most newbies aren't going to want to buy radicchio or dandelion greens? How 'bout spinach? A little more beginner friendly.As for the font - my husband thinks it's a really cool, fun cookbook. I think it's a bit silly with the giant print, but meh. Whatever. I'm here for the recipes. I find it strange though that people are complaining about font size of ingredients. It's literally an average size font (12?) and very legible. However, I guess I could see how the recipes printed in the gold color could be hard for someone who has poor eye sight to read (I have crap eyesight - but not up close). If your eyes are normal ol' eyes, you shouldn't have a problem.Now, for the WORST part.***DO NOT MAKE THE CHICKPEA EGG SALAD SANDWICHES*** (pg. 110)SO bad. SO SO SOOOOOOO bad.I was beyond excited to see this recipe. I had just purchased some kala namak (a very reputable brand with 5 star reviews from Amazon) and was eager to use it again (only tried it once in tofu scramble). I have "Isa Does It" (a *great* cookbook, btw!) and have made her chickpea sammich from there - which we all love, so I was expecting another fabulous recipe. Wrong. What I got was so insanely salty, it was absolutely unbearable! I guess the fact that it said to use 2 tsp should have tipped me off, but I was trusting Isa, whose recipes I've loved for well over a decade now.So I tried to fix it. I ended up adding THREE EXTRA CANS of chickpeas (low sodium, btw!), which was all I had, and it was edible, but still way saltier than we like. I also added more carrots and onions, sunflower seeds, mayo (homemade and not salty!), a touch of mustard - ANYTHING I could think of to downplay the salt. My husband and I ate the now quadrupled recipe on plain wheat bread with tomato and avocado, and it seemed to have gotten saltier in the 10 minutes it took to serve it. I'll be tossing the leftovers. What a waste of money.I'd love to know who the tasters were for this recipe? I can't imagine my tastebuds are so off that it's me (and my daughter...and my husband). Perhaps it's a typo? All I know is that if you do try this recipe, start with about 1/4 tsp kala namak and work your way up slooooowly.I am going to try more recipes and hope this one is just a fluke. Like I said, the Mac recipe is great, so I'm sure there are other gems to be found. I'd just hate for some beginner vegan to buy this book, try the chickpea egg salad first, and think vegan cooking is wretched.

I consider myself a die-hard Isa fan. I wasn't planning on buying this cookbook because I have been eating and cooking vegan for 20 years, and I have lost interest in owning cookbooks. TBH, I bought this one 100% because of the aesthetics, which I love. It's a little bit retro, a little bit modern, and I guess I am shallow enough to purchase for that reason alone.By the way, I have bad 40 something eyes, and I don't think this cookbook is hard to read. I am not denying the experience of others.A lot of the recipes in this cookbook are very similar to other Isa recipes, with small tweaks, which is not an insult but if you own every cookbook Isa has ever written -- cough, cough -- you probably don't need this one. But this would be a fantastic FIRST Isa cookbook. I would especially recommend this to give as a gift to a new vegan. Many recipes are geared towards those people who spend their lives looking at heavily filtered and staged vegan food photos on Instagram, which is to say there is a section of "bowls," which is one food fad I actually happen to embrace and love. Sue me.My two favorite Isa cookbooks are Vegan With a Vengeance (her first one, and I love it for sentimental reasons, because it is the first GOOD vegan cookbook I bought & I do still make the carrot bisque religiously in cold weather; Isa Does It, in my opinion, has the best recipes; there are some I am completely obsessed with even though I have eaten them dozens of times).But I digress.This is a very good, very aesthetically appealing, easy-ish cookbook that will appeal to a lot of different types of people and food preferences. Sadly, there are a LOT of terrible vegan cookbooks/cookbook authors, but Isa is not one of them.

I don’t get the enormous font in the beginning that seems like a waste of pages which then goes into tiny, difficult to read font color for the recipe. Why is the story behind the recipe SO much larger than the actual recipe? I do love that there are photos but it seems like there are a lot of repeats. In all fairness we have made two recipes and they were good.

I’ve bought just about every vegan cook book going. My struggle is having a mix of meat-eaters, vegans and vegetarians in the family and the non-vegans have always shuddered when I’m cooking vegan. I have made multiple meals from this incredibly easy-to-follow recipe book and even the meat-eaters are impressed! It’s beautifully written, beautifully illustrated, easy to follow and the recipes are fail safe! A big recommendation from me.

Most recipes are quite complicated and need many ingredients, some of which you can’t get at your usual supermarket. Definitely not to be used for quick mid week dinners! Also, many of the recipes are trying to replicate meat products/flavours whereas I prefer using simple ingredients to bring out their own flavours with combinations that compliment each other. I wouldn’t recommend this book.

I love Isa - I've gotten good use out of quite a few of her earlier books, and I was so excited to buy this one. I've made a few recipes so far from this one and they have all been winners. The angel hair tapenade and oatmeal-walnut chocolate chip cookies in particular are great!

Has photos of every meal and easy to follow. You can buy most ingredients from normal supermarkets which is convenient. A variety of meals, all of which so far taste delicious! However, most recipes require you to have a blender/food processor so keep this in mind when buying.

First, I have to say that I have all of Isa Chandra Moskowitz's cookbooks and I love them all. Until now......The first issue I have is the colour of the font in some of the recipes. Too light and difficult to read.Kind of funky when you first look at it but really not good functionality. The font needs to be clear and easy to read while cooking. Coloured font is too distracting when one is concentrating on cooking.I have had more misses than hits with this cookbook, something that has never happened before. Isa's recipes are usually totally rock solid and dependable. You can count on her like clockwork. So far I've had more disappointments than with any of her other books. If this keeps up,sadly, I'll be getting rid of this book.