Gourmet Vegetarian Kitchen

Healthy Vegetarian & Plant-Based Foods

Recipes

After day 7th in the fridge, the vegetables should be ready to be eaten

For sentimental reasons, what I’m going to write in this post reminds me so much of my childhood and what my mom did raising us. It’s been so long since I left my Thai home. Thinking about my memories gives me a lump in my throat–oh how I miss those days!!

I remember seeing my mom’s joy of growing vegetables in our garden. I also remember her pride in cooking and fermenting vegetables in our kitchen. We had a great garden by a river in our backyard, and my mom would plant everything she could think of in it all year round. I can still hear my mom’s voice asking me and my sister to stop playing and go to the garden and get what she needed for her.

Vegetables such as lemongrass, Thai chilies, or limes were typical things for us then. Back in those days, seeing my mom work so hard to get simple food, that at the same time was sold everywhere, I wished she would go to the supermarket and buy everything just like other “modern families” did. I’m so glad she didn’t do that now, and instead she went the extra mile to feed us well….

Read More

 

The easiest dish I ever prepared was the dish for my daughter when she started to eat solid food. At the time, I didn’t have to do anything besides giving her plain steamed vegetables. I gave her one cooked vegetable at a time to observe her reactions with each type. I tasted everything before I fed her first, and was surprised they actually tasted good the way they were–plain. When I was finally sure that she wasn’t allergic to anything, I started to add some seasoning to her vegetables and thought she would love to eat them even more. Hmm. . . no, she didn’t like them any better than the plain ones. So, I adjusted how I cook vegetables to the way my daughter liked to eat, which was incredibly simple.

That made me realize that we are actually born to eat food close to its original form. Ever since, I have kept this idea in mind and tried to keep my food as simple as possible. I love how I can tell what each vegetable tastes like just by looking at it.

Here is one of my many plain vegetable dishes. With just broccoli, garlic & coconut oil, a pinch of salt, and lemon juice, it’s so plain yet very tasty:…

Read More

Big Vegetarian Breakfast

Being vegetarian and raising my daughter, I have to be very careful and make sure I’m not doing anything nutrition-wise I’ll regret years from now. Also, thanks to all the questions and concerns from both sides of my family, I have been very cautious. I’m already inclined to be very cautious, so this has taken it to an extreme regarding nutrition. I’m glad for that though because nutritional knowledge and cooking techniques have also become my passion.  

Breakfast is our biggest meal of the day, and I make sure that we all have good, balanced food, to start our day with. We eat a full breakfast every day. It’s sad knowing there are so many people skipping breakfast because they don’t have, or make, the time to eat it. Even though there is no scientific proof that breakfast is the most important meal of the day, I know from experience that it’s very important.

a few kinds of seasonal fruits

a few kinds of seasonal fruits

I’m going to share how I prepare breakfast with you, which is rather gourmet, but simple at the same time. Each morning, we all have fruits, proteins, carbohydrates, and a probiotic drink. How on earth can we eat all that for breakfast you might think, right?…

Read More

Like most people, I considered yogurt a healthy part of my diet for a long time. Even though I always saw Kefir on the same shelf as yogurt, I didn’t know its real benefits until a few years ago when I was learning about fermentation. It surprised me to find out it has many more beneficial bacteria strains (probiotics) than yogurt. Before long, I tried it and quickly switched from yogurt to kefir almost entirely, as it actually tastes great, and is easier to drink too.

Whenever I hear fellow parents complain about their children’s upset stomachs, that they can’t go to the bathroom on a regular basis, or being lactose intolerant, I try to introduce kefir to them. Most of the time I end up answering this question: “What is kefir?”  Well, from all my research, I can easily explain that kefir is one of the most probiotic rich foods, and it has been used in European countries for many centuries.

Similar to yogurt, it can be made from either cow’s or goat’s milk. The magical 24-hour fermentation process transforms the regular milk into a slightly sour and thick milk when it becomes kefir. During the process, yeast and good bacteria eat most lactose, also known as “milk sugar,” from the milk. It has been proven that many people who are lactose intolerant can safely drink kefir. It’s also rich in vitamin B, calcium, magnesium, folic acid, and has a lot of good bacteria known as probiotics that help with digestion….

Read More