Aug 012013
Vegetarian Times (1-year auto-renewal)
Vegetarian Times is the magazine of great food, good health, and smart living. Each issue is packed with mouth-watering recipes that taste great-and are good for you too. You’ll find new tastes, old favorites, and tips on how to cook with fewer calories and less fat.Vegetarian Times magazine is a popular publication that supports a healthy lifestyle through eating green and living smart. Although it might be geared more towards vegetarians, the magazine provides something for everyone-from die-h
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Something of a disappointment,
First, the disclaimer. I am not a vegetarian. I have, however, planned many vegetarian menus and cooked thousands of vegetarian meals, both professionally and at home.
This magazine has a rather quaint approach to cover art and illustrations that reminds me of magazines that my mom read in the sixties. Apart from its appearance, the recipes are wildly inconsistent. Some are very good, fast, and easy to prepare. Others are bland and lifeless, reinforcing the misconception that vegetarian food is uninteresting and “healthy tasting.” Some of the recipes contain obvious errors and omissions or call for such odd proportions that one wonders if they were tested prior to publication.
Vegetarian Times seems to try reasonably hard to avoid the sanctimony and self-righteousness that afflicts so many publications in this genre. Nonetheless, there is enough polemicizing to annoy when it intrudes on the culinary purposes of the magazine.
My final observation is that this magazine has one of the worst advertisement-to-content ratios that I’ve ever seen. In a couple of recent issues, the ratio of ads to recipes is nearly one to one. I don’t mind paying a reasonable price for a useful publication but I do object to paying for the privilege of reading marketing hype.
Bottom line? There are better vegetarian cookbooks readily available through Amazon or other dealers. Robin Robertson and Madhur Jaffrey both offer superior alternatives.
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|A great source of veggie/ vegan recipes, health, and lifestyle info,
After admiring Vegetarian Times on magazine racks for countless months, I finally took the plunge and ordered a one-year subscription. VT features numerous helpful product reviews, vegetarian / vegan recipes, health info, interviews, and a spotlight on green restaurants and businesses around the country. The Carrot & Stick section gives kudos to earth-friendly businesses and institutions and shines a light on animal rights violators. For me, this helps me decide which companies will receive my business based on their track record on environmentalism, recycling, and animal rights.
The biggest downside is the amount (and size) of advertising; the already-thin monthly issues feel like they’re 50% full-page ads targeted at vegetarians / vegans. This definitely detracted from an otherwise artistic, well-laid-out magazine. Personally, I feel that full-page ads are redundant in the Internet age; I’d much rather have a list of advertisers’ products / websites at the back of the magazine, although I realize that advertising revenues are an essential evil inherent to the business.
Many of VT’s monthly recipes are ethnic in nature; I was pleasantly surprised to see that the September issue featured vegetarian makeovers of several High Holy Days standards such as Mock Chopped Liver, Noodle Kugel with Caramelized Apples and Raisins, Sephardic Stufffed Cabbage, and Chocolate Apricot Rugalach. It’s really rare to find Jewish vegetarian recipes in mainstream magazines, so I greatly appreciated the inclusion (for more Jewish vegetarian ideas, check out Olive Trees and Honey: A Treasury of Vegetarian Recipes from Jewish Communities Around the World and The Jewish Vegetarian Year Cookbook).
VT’s recipes, many of which can be adapted to vegan, use common ingredients and are within the realm of weeknight preparation; I haven’t found many recipes that rated “too health-foody” or “just plain out there.” Vegetarian Times is an excellent investment for today’s vegetarian or vegan, and even for those questioning carnivores who are looking to add more fruits and veggies into their diets.
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|I want to like this magazine…,
I really do want to like this magazine. For one, the cover is almost so pretty and comforting, plus they cover many aspects that may be of concern to vegetarian lifestyle, such as environment, health, politics, etc.
However, the recipes are inconsistent. Some, like the readers’ best, can be excellent. Many of their other recipes fall short though, some by glaring oversight (for example, forgetting salt). Also, their ‘ethnic’ recipes usually aren’t that great. Their preoccupation with lowfat recipe also unfortunately lead to sacrific of taste. And seriously does anyone think PAM is healthier than olive oil??
VT is really best when it focuses on American classics done vegetarian. Things like chilis, pot pies, and casseroles.
I still give this 4 stars because I think except for the recipes, the magazine isn’t all that bad, plus there aren’t many other competitors for this market. Their CS has been very friendly when I called. If you aren’t as picky as I am about getting the exact recipes right, then this is a nice magazine. As for me, once my subscription stops, I’m switching to buying time-tested recipes books instead.
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