Jamie Oliver to Create a New Vegetarian Cookery Book!

Jamie Oliver has recently announced that he is going to compile all his vegetarian and vegan recipes into one big vegetarian cookery book! In an interview with The Huffington Post Jamie discusses his US food revolution, and describes the concept of vegetarianism as a ‘brilliant thing’!

In the interview Jamie Oliver describes how all of his previous cookery books have contained 60-65% vegetarian recipes without any previous mention of this fact. He then announces “This year we’re going to bundle all of my vegetarian recipes and vegan recipes into one big massive mammoth book… and it’s right, because in the old days there weren’t so many vegetarians, now there’s many, and ‘vegetarian’ as a general concept is brilliant thing, we’ve got to stop eating so much meat. We are eating too much meat”.

Jamie describes how he loves delicious meals that just happen to be vegetarian, rather than purposeful vegetarian meat-alternatives like nut-loaf. He speaks out in favour of “beautiful, elegant, delicate, seasonal brilliant food that happens to be vegetarian: pastas, stir fries, lovely salads, incredible breads, beautiful grilled roasted veggies with interesting oils, and vinegars and herbs… there’s loads and loads out there… then all the ethnic mixes”, he then muses “so..am I going to do more? Probably, yes I am”. We hope so Jamie!

This is great news for all the vegetarians and vegans out there who are fond of some of Jamie’s recipes, but who are not keen on the idea of paying for a book containing non-veggie recipes. Listening to the interview, it’s also very refreshing to hear a TV chef speak out about the need for reduced meat consumption. It makes a nice change from hearing Gordon Ramsey complaining about vegetarians!

Having watched a few episodes of Jamie’s Food Revolution on a visit to the US earlier this year, and having heard this recent interview with him, I have a lot of respect for him. Although he’s not a vegetarian, he has a positive view of vegetarianism, and is keen to reduce the western world’s dependence on large amounts of meat and fast-food. His TV shows do seem to be making an impact in the US, as he seemed to be onscreen somewhere (be it on an interview or his own show) each time I switched on the TV! Even if just a small proportion of people visit McDonald’s less and eat more fruit and veg, that can only be a good thing.

Good luck with changing eating habits Jamie and we look forward to the publication of your new Vegetarian cookery book!