Cooking from My Cookbooks - The Artful Vegan

This book is definitely not for the novice cook. It is written by the geniuses behind the Millennium restaurant in San Francisco. This beautiful restaurant should be on every vegan (and even not vegan) foodies bucket list. The service, wine list and food are all amazing.

You need to have a lot of time, patience, willingness to make several components and often specialty ingredients or equipment. I wimped out this time and went for the easiest thing I could find in the book. Even this recipe had a couple of components, but didn't require a whole day in the kitchen or any crazy special ingredients or equipment.

I bring you the Chilled Avocado, Tomatillo, and Cucumber Soup with Saffron-Lime Ice. The soup on its own was nothing spectacular. It really came to life with the addition of the Saffron-Lime Ice. I added quite a few toasted, sliced almonds to make it a bit more hearty. I liked it, but didn't love it. I was refreshing on a 108 degree day.

I plan to revisit this book when it cools off and I want to blow Fred's mind with an amazing artistic meal. It will surely bring back some very fond memories of our trip to the Millenium Restaurant in San Francisco.