When the Bosh! book came out back in April the vegan world was pretty excited. At least the ones who were fans of their recipe videos. Me, not so much. I can’t really cook from videos. I like things written down. Excited or not, I couldn’t resist when I saw it half price.

I struggled a little to find what recipe to make first. A lot of the recipes call for ingredients that aren’t Kate-approved: lots of courgettes, aubergine, and sweet potato in various bakes and sauces. Jane’s Pan Con Tomate seemed like a safe bet. I thought it was delicious at least. The seasoning worked really well.

Kate agreed with me on the Patatas Bravas though: we both thought it was delicious. As a bonus it was easy to make. All these recipes are. That’s kind of the point of it really. Simple, flavourful recipes, all vegan. It’s a great book to have around for weeknight suppers.

In the few short months I’ve had this book the Special Fried Rice has worked its way into our rotation. And it’s a great example of what I said above. It’s simple, the flavours are great, it’s got your carbs, veggies and protein all in one bowl. But then it also highlights one of my main problems with the book. What’s the deal with all the salt? I’m not anti-salt, I don’t have a heart problem, I’m not big into healthy eating. But this is too much to taste good. This fried rice serves 2, it has three tablespoons of soy and then has you add salt at the end. However, with the salt taken out and the soy sauce halved it’s now a regular. We like to switch up the veggies. Here there is edamame instead of peas and no pepper. Kate doesn’t like pepper.

Another recipe that’s great with a serious salt reduction is the Quick Puttanesca Spaghetti. It has capers, olives, brine and salt. Again if you cut the salt you get a wonderful meal. The addition of the broccoli really makes it.

Last up is the Southwest Bosh! Bowl. Because I’m so bloody hot right now that I’ve stopped cooking. It was actually my least favourite of the recipes. This time I used all of the seasoning but it came out kinda bland. Oh well, you can’t win them all.

At the end of the day this isn’t a groundbreaking book, or a perfect one, and aside from the salt issue the recipes can also get a little repetitive. But if you are after simple recipes, quick ideas, and fuss-free cooking then check it out.

The British exposure to Southern US cooking is basically KFC, mac and cheese and fancy varieties of BBQ sauce in Sainsbury’s where they charge an extra couple of quid to claim it’s from a specific state. My point is that I just don’t have much of a clue. So I bought myself a copy of Sweet Potato Soul for a bit of an education. Which, as it turns out, was a pretty good plan. Here is what we’ve been eating.

I started with breakfast, because it’s the most important meal of the day. I served up Sweet Potato Skillet Home Fries with Tempeh Bacon. The sweet potatoes browned up beautifully and the spices worked perfectly. The bacon leans a little sweet but it goes amazingly on top on the home fries. Or on it’s own. I can never say no to Tempeh Bacon.

Next up is the Peach-Date BBQ Jackfruit Sliders. This involved cooking up a batch of Peach-Date BBQ sauce. I thought it tasted a little flat but I think that had something to do with buying the only peaches I could find; it’s not a great time of year. It also involved a batch of Rainbow Root Slaw which I’ve basically been eating out of the bowl. Combined with Jackfruit and stuffed in a bun it was pretty good, though I think it would have been better with in-season fruit and hot sauce.

Bootylicious Gumbo is another recipe with a recipe inside. It calls for Creole Red Bean Sausages which are deliciously soft cooked in the gumbo. It’s silky, warming, spicy and perfect. And this is another recipe where I couldn’t help but go back for more.

Time to finish up where I started, in the breakfast section. This time with Chive & Cheddar Drop Biscuits. They came together incredibly quickly. Far too quickly to taste this good. It’s like alchemy. And I’m proud to say that I’ve so far resisted from eating a whole batch myself but that’s because I promised myself I’d finish this review first. So should you buy Sweet Potato Soul? Yes. Now.

It was this Instagram post that alerted me to the existence of a cookbook that I did not own. Thanks to Amazon Prime it was here the next day. Modern Vegan Baking by Gretchen Price is an encyclopaedia of vegan baked goods. There’s the sweet — cakes, cookies, meringues, tarts — the savoury — quiche, bread, crackers — and even a chapter for the miscellaneous.

There are a couple of issues I want to get out of the way first. First is that this book is aimed at an American audience. That might not be an issue for you — if you live in Boston it’s probably fairly convenient — but but a lot of the recipes call for Ener-g which I can’t get. I’ve been using Orgran but that required a little fudging of the hydration. Then the other, related, issue you might have is that a lot of the recipes call for commercial ‘replacers’, like the Ener-g and vegan butter. Though they are getting easier and easier to find. Still, I didn’t have anything special on hand when it first arrived so I went for one of the simpler recipes for my first try: Raspberry Corn Muffins. Savoury enough to make a good breakfast snack, lightened up by the burst of raspberry.

I went to the cookie section for my next bake. I made Snickerdoodle Biscotti to rave reviews. The texture was spot on, they were solid enough to hold together while dunking but soft enough to preserve your teeth. The cinnamon adds a lovely warmth. And did I mention the rave reviews? Everyone loved them.

At this point I felt confident enough to make a cake. I’m not a big cake baker. I’m not great at cake decorating. In fact I’m notoriously bad. I’m heavy-handed, clumsy and lack any design sense. I thought that I wouldn’t be able to give it a fair review unless I made a cake. I decided to make the cookie batter cake, a variation of the super-easy vanilla cake. It was, in fact, super easy to make.

What I found harder was the chocolate buttercream I used to top it. It’s made with aquafaba. My issue was following the instructions. Meringue, even aquafaba meringue, deflates when you add the sugar. The recipe says that after adding sugar the peaks will be stiff and glossy. I tried it twice before realising it wasn’t going to happen and carried on with the recipe. In the end I got a delicious buttercream.

I decided to finish up with something savoury. I turned to the yeasted bread section and baked a batch of Seeded and Salted Cracker Bread. It was quick and simple to make and infinitely customisable. Also: very yum.

Do you need a copy of Modern Vegan Baking? If you are into baking, want some fool-proof recipes and don’t mind taking your time to get your technique down then yes, you’ll probably like this one. If you can’t get hold of special ingredients you might want to skip it. It’s made a great addition to my bookshelves, even if I still can’t make a good cake.