Dinner with Amy, the Book

I’m starting 2010 by moving a major back burner project of mine to the front burner (and that pun is intentional, I’ll have you know). I have wanted to write a cookbook for ages. What inspired me to decide the time is now? Ron gave me Julia Child’s My Life in France for Christmas and I am loving every word of it. He also gave me her cookbook, Mastering the Art of French Cooking, but I returned that one to the bookstore. I’m sure it’s a brilliant cookbook and the food is undoubtedly sensational, but it’s not a useful cookbook for a vegetarian who is trying to lose weight, is lactose-intolerant, can’t eat onions, and cooks gluten-free food for a diabetic husband. It’s a book about butter, butter, meat, butter, oil, and fish, with plenty of gluten whisked into the bargain (particularly in the dessert section). I exchanged it for the Greens vegetarian restaurant cookbook, which has lots of wonderful soup recipes. So I’m getting into making vegetarian soup stock from scratch. Yum. I promise I’ll share soon. Here’s how.

I started a blog called Amy’s Recipe Project. I’m going to write up my recipes and post them there, hoping that some of my readers will try these recipes and send me their comments, suggestions, and corrections to improve the recipes. I’ll be sharing recipes that are vegetarian, vegan, lactose-free, and/or gluten-free. I’ll keep posting recipes until I think I have a cookbook’s worth, and then I’ll put a book together and publish it electronically through Amazon’s Booksurge, probably as an e-book, and mainly for friends and family to pick up. The fun is the process. Unlike my other book projects, I am not working as if pursued by wolves. I’m going to take my sweet time with this one and play. Swap recipes. Eat. Have fun. Come join me. Here’s the link to my brand new 2010 foodie blog: http://transformationalrecipes.blogspot.com/. Tell your friends to check in, especially if they are vegetarian or are being creative on special diets.