You Can Cook This!

Book excerpt: 135 super-simple plant-based recipes that celebrate your favorite vegetables and save time, money, and waste, from social media star chef Max La Manna Discover brilliantly simple and flavor-packed recipes that embrace the power of plants—and help you fight food waste. For one year, Max La Manna asked his social media audience which foods they threw away the most, and using the tens of thousands of responses, he narrowed down a list of thirty of the most commonly wasted ingredients, which serve as the foundation of this cookbook. Using his innovative approach to transforming these components into delicious dishes with big flavor, You Can Cook This! offers 135 no-fuss, plant-based recipes that anyone can get on the table with joy and ease, including: • Crispy Smashed Potatoes with Spicy Lemon Mayo • Cauliflower Ragu • Tofu Butter “Chicken” • Stems and Herbs Pesto Pasta • Coffee Ground Pancakes • Triple Chocolate Birthday Cake Covering everything from weeknight dinners and comforting one-pot meals to sweet treats and instant crowd-pleasers, this book is also a solutions-based guide, with practical ideas for using up the whole vegetable, transforming leftovers, and storing food to maximize freshness. And with the recipes organized by ingredient, you can quickly and easily find a meal that uses what you already have on hand, whether it’s the bag of salad in the back of your fridge, the bread sitting on your counter, or the broccoli stems you’re not sure how to use. Max’s few-ingredient, low-waste recipes will inspire, excite, and transform the way you cook, eat, and save food. Some of the recipes in this book include dairy products, but please know that you can use your favorite plant-based substitution for an equally delicious dish.