Rules of the Game: Peasant Food (not imitation food)

Please NO FAKE FOOD

I've not been impressed with so-called "vegan" food in grocery stores, or "vegan" restaurant choices.

Too often it is some bizarre attempt to imitate or substitute for a hamburger, or a pizza, or an egg substitute that "looks and tastes like real eggs".   Not there's anything wrong with that, just that it seems sorta stupid to have a "fake" hamburger, when you can have a "real" something else that is actually good tasting.

I mean, people have been eating grains, beans, vegetables, and fruit since the dawn of time.   If they never had an urge to make a burger out of it, why should I want to eat one now? 

Clearly, there have been hundreds if not thousands of years, in which the people of each local culture and region of the Earth has tinkered with and perfected the recipes for endless tasty things, many of which are plant-based foods.

A hamburger is a work or art.  It is the best hamburger that has evolved over time, and thousands of variations have been tried and each has it's contribution.   But none of them every were made with barley and black beans.    So if I'm going to have bacon for breakfast, I figure it should be bacon, not this:

Peasant Food is the Answer

What I have decided is that "peasant food" from anywhere in the world is a good bet.   Poor people, historically and today,  eat more tasty, inexpensive, and nutritious food than their wealthier friends, who tend to eat a more western type of diet.  

 
Poor people don't have fancy kitchens, so their food is easy to prepare.   They don't have ready access to sugar, oils, salt, or other processed foods.   In every region of the world, and in every ethnic culture, there are traditional dishes eaten by the poor, that have been honed and perfected over the course of hundreds of generations, using ingredients and spices native to the area.   In short, peasants eat the best, the most nutritious, least expensive, and most healthful diets anywhere.


So, I'm going to focus on finding, preparing, and posting recipes, tips, and techniques for creating the world's best peasant food.     Curries from india, flavored vegetables from asia, spanish rice and cuban beans.   Lentils from the middle east, hummus, goulash, and whatever I can find.

It has to be plant-based.  Cannot have added oil, sugar, or salt.  Must be really, really good.   Not fake whatever.   Real food.   Real good food.    I'll seek out traditional dishes eaten by locals for centuries, from anywhere in the world.    As an added bonus, they will almost always be inexpensive and easy to fix.   

As Peter Pan might have said....   "C'mon everybody..... Let's Goooooooo!"