IN PRAISE OF VEG

ALICE ZASLAVSKY, MURDOCH BOOKS, $70

It’s a long time since I got genuinely excited about parsnips, but parsnip latkes and hasselback parsnips got me sitting up and when four-ginger parsnip sticky date pudding caught my eye well, take a look at the ribbons of parsnip lolling languorously atop this baby, then tell me you don’t want it with the recommended syrupy moat of salted caramel plus both cream and ice cream. Described as ‘plant-forward’ – the aim is to put the veges first, then build the rest of your meal around them – Zaslavsky’s recipes have a splash of her Georgian heritage spiced with a dash of her Aussie upbringing. The 150 recipes are arranged by colour and for each vege there are notes on buying, storing, cooking methods and how not to waste the bits you might normally throw away plus some fascinating nuggets of knowledge (did you know Catherine the Great’s military might was financed by rhubarb?). Do the maths and you’ll figure that it’s not an encyclopedic collection (some veg with only one recipe) and I do see some wasted opportunities: still giddy from those parsnips I was keen to see what was in store for the summer glory of corn but was disappointed by the slightly lack-lustre line-up of corn fritters, sweetcorn soup and cobs barbecued Mexi-style with grated cheese. But I’m willing to forgive that for a spiral swede tian, zucchini flowers stuffed with scallops and roasted rhubarb on grilled haloumi. Never again will you be flummoxed by those produce-box surprises.