‘What did you put in the ricotta?” Ann Maloney asked. We were at a holiday party for the Food team at my house, and Ann — The Post’s recipes editor at the time — was raving about a dish of baked stuffed shells I had made. In our years of working together, Ann and I got to know not just each other’s cooking style, but our communication style, too.
So my response was nonverbal: a raised eyebrow, a sly grin and a shake of the head. She got the message. “No ricotta? It’s not vegan!” she exclaimed.
“It is!” I replied. Her reaction was everything I had hoped for: As an Italian American and (obviously) an accomplished cook, she is someone whose opinion I value highly, particularly on this subject and this cuisine. To have a red gravy queen think not just that the dish was cheesy, but that it was delicious? Perfect.
Years ago, my friend (and author and public-television star) Pati Jinich, a Mexico native, asked her husband and teenage boys to try a chorizo I had fried up in a skillet in her kitchen. She told them, “It’s made with —” “All sorts of spices,” I interrupted. Only after they devoured it did they learn that it was tofu, not pork.
It can be a thrill when it happens, but the truth is, my goal with plant-based cooking isn’t usually to fool anybody. In fact, I tend to cringe at those headlines that say the results of a recipe are “so good, you won’t miss the meat!” I figure, what does the meat have to do with it? I’d rather people lov.
