Celebrate Life! features 6 vegan menus for entertaining family and friends… or for anytime. Two menus are for a stand-up buffet and two are for a sit-down dinner. Each menu starts with an inspiring full color picture of the meal then an abbreviated description of each dish.
There are 50 main-recipes and many more mini-recipes. Mini-recipes are recipes that can be found within many of the main-recipes. For example, Orange Ginger Pine Nut Cream is a mini-recipe inside the main-recipe, Raspberry Walnut Stuffed Baked Apples. Each mini-recipe has its own title, ingredient list and set of instructions. Mini-recipes can be served with the main-recipe or made and used in an entirely different way. All main-recipes and mini-recipes are listed in the index so they are easy to find.
At the beginning of each recipe is a color photo of the dish. Every recipe has its own Kitchen Prayer to inspire you while you are in the kitchen, a section called, Tips to the Cook, where you will find valuable information that could affect the way you prepare and/or serve the dish and Equipment Needed so you know if you have what is needed to complete the dish before you get started.
The Ingredient List has been thoughtfully sequenced so it is easy to use. For example, if a recipe calls for one cup of flour and one cup of water, they will be listed one after the other. In this way, you only have to get out the one-cup measuring cup once and the flour is listed first so the measure cup is dry when you measure out the flour.
Instructions-at-a-Glance are an abbreviated set of instructions. They appear at the beginning of each set of instructions and are written in a colored ink so they stand-out. If you need more information to be able to complete the making of the dish, Detailed Instructions follow.
Jia will teach you how to turn your dishes into edible art. Every recipe has suggestions on how to move your dish from ordinary to extraordinary in just minutes and usually with ingredients you already have.
Each recipe includes Serving Ideas and How to Store.
Special features found in Celebrate Life!
Jia talks about her personal journey with food and how she became vegan. She also tells a story of how she journeyed with her spiritual teacher, Kali Ray, to a sacred river in India and tells about the special ceremony that took place.
Dear to Jia’s heart, is a section she refers to as Kitchen Yoga, The Most Important Ingredient… You! In this section, Jia will teach you that being in the kitchen can be an extension of your yoga practice. No, it is not about how deep you can go into a yoga pose as you stir your soup… but having an attitude of reverence and love when preparing food. She also teaches about building a Kitchen Puja and Food Pujas. You can read all about it in Celebrate Life!
Kitchen Wisdom is filled with valuable information about the ingredients used in Celebrate Life! Kitchen Wisdom covers a wide range of topics, from why you should soak nuts and seeds to how to peel fresh ginger. It answers questions like, “Why shop for eggplant by gender?” The information in Kitchen Wisdom will enrich your life and culinary experiences.
