Chelsea Winter's new cookbook cover Tasty. Photo: Supplied
Chelsea Winter's new recipes may throw some people off, with ingredients like banana blossom and whipped chickpea liquid, but she promises they're "heavenly" dishes.
Winter is back with Tasty after another lifestyle switch since her 2020 best-seller, SuperGood, in which she was fully subscribed to a plant-based diet.
Living on a hectare-plot in Taranaki with her own paddocks and vegetable garden, the MasterChef winner has now reintroduced more balance into her diet and feels "more reverence" around animal-based products.
"I'll really take notice of - in the times I can - where it's come from, where it's sourced, where it's grown, how it's been treated, and I'm thankful for it, you know, there's gratitude around it and that's certainly a big thing that's changed for me around what I eat," Winter told Sunday Morning.
Her new book is still meat-free, dairy-free, egg-free and cane sugar free, but it's been designed to accommodate "every style of eater", she said.
One bugbear she found, when meat was off the menu, was plant-based meatballs were mushy.
"So I played around with a few ingredients and I managed to get it so you bite into it and it does actually give you that resistance, you know, that really meaty kind of texture."
A bit of brown rice, dried mushrooms, walnuts and textured soy protein were the "magic ingredients" which transformed them into such a flavoursome hit that she reckons people won't be able to tell the difference with the traditional meatballs.
"They're kind of a bit of a magical act, these meatballs and if you look at the picture they really do look good too, sitting there in their bowl of delicious rich gravy."
Another classic dish of stuffed potatoes, which she describes as "almost comical" for their final towered filling appearance, includes caramelised onions, garlic with herbs, kale, spinach and corn and fried mashed potatoes.
You can customise these by adding your favourite toppings, such as sour cream, bacon (plant-based or free range), coconut yoghurt or aioli.
"You have to kind of pack them down quite a bit, but it's just so comforting and heavenly."
Her corn fritters are chickpea galore, containing it in various forms; mashed, flour, and whipped from the liquid of canned chickpea.
"It's such an amazing journey of discovery - that's why I love doing these plant-based cookbooks, because these ingredients that I had no idea could do all this, they come in and blow my mind."
There's one ingredient in her 'fush' pie that may "freak some people out" but was an "amazing alternative" to smoked fish, Winter said. But, of course, you could still use seafood if you desired.
"When you first look at [banana blossoms] and you take them out of the can, it does look a little bit like a kind of pickled space alien or something, but I promise… you can't taste it, it's more of a texture.
"They are incredible, you squish the living daylight out of them, and they go quite fibrous and they do resemble shreds of smoked fish, so when it's tossed all together, with the lovely creamy sauce, the veg and the leek and everything else and with all that crunchy topping and baked with potatoes, it's a pretty heavenly dish and you wouldn't know you were eating banana blossoms really."
In a bid to move away from white cane sugar, especially for her children, Winter is introducing desserts with coconut sugar instead - which she admits is still refined but much gentler.
"I can noticed the difference, night and day, to when I'm eating something that's piled with regular white cane sugar and with coconut sugar."
The mother-of-two says she doesn't always keep up with all the hype around healthy foods and trends because there's information overload in the media, but she's found listening to her body and using common sense is best.
"I guess what I would subscribe to is eating as much unprocessed food as I can, like most things I make are homemade, but does that mean I don't go to a fast food outlet every now and then and get a burger? No, it doesn't mean that, because I do.
"But most of what I eat it's very nourishing, it's very wholefood, and it's homemade."
'Tasty', published by Allen & Unwin NZ, is now available in book stores.
