Even though most vegetarians typically exclude meat and fish from their diets, there is still an abundance of vegetarian cuisine options available, from egg plant rotini to veggie burgers and pita wraps. Vegetarians can start the day with a breakfast of carrot cake oatmeal, pancakes or a fruit smoothie. A mid-day meal can consist of golden Austrian cauliflower soup, strawberry salad or a chickpea sandwich. Vegetarian cuisine served for an evening meal can include grilled zucchini with vegetable chili, veggie-stuffed peppers or mushroom and white bean casserole.
Rice is often featured in vegetarian cuisine and comes in dishes such as spicy tofu rice pilaf, simple fried rice and rice pudding. Mediterranean rice salad features long-grain brown rice, cucumbers and bell peppers and is served chilled or at room temperature. Rice is also featured in Cuban black beans and rice and Jamaican-style picadillo. Cashew veggie fried rice, Brazilian brown rice and black beans, and rice red lentil salad are also common vegetarian dishes.
Pasta is a staple ingredient in many types of vegetarian cuisine, including butternut squash pasta, asparagus pesto pasta salad, and Asian noodle salad. Spaghetti with olives and lemon features pitted Kalamata olives, coarsely chopped fresh parsley and garlic. Vegetarian lasagna features assorted sauteed or grilled vegetables, such as zucchini, portobello mushrooms and broccoli. It features a tofu filling of roasted Tahini, minced basil leaves and minced Italian parsley, and a pesto made of basil, olive oil and pine nuts.
Vegetarian cuisine also includes a variety of types of veggie burgers, such as quinoa veggie burgers, tofu veggie burgers and black bean veggie burgers. Walnut veggie burgers feature cooked brown rice combined with chopped walnuts and onion. Lentil veggie burgers feature brown lentils, bay leaf and chopped onion. Gourmet baked tofu patties feature tofu, corn and celery and are baked rather than fried. Carrot burgers feature diced carrots, crushed cornflakes and finely chopped celery and are served on hamburger buns.
Soups are another type of vegetarian cuisine with many varieties available, such as fennel carrot soup, barley bean veggie soup and cream of celery soup. Other vegetarian soups include Chinese cabbage tofu soup, cream of broccoli and chickpea basil vegetable soup. Vegetarian cuisine also incorporates stews, such as chickpea kale sweet potato stew, lima bean stew and Jamaican red bean stew.
Grains are used in an abundance of vegetarian cuisine, including oatmeal date nut muffins and oatmeal currant scones. Vegetarian granola, cookies and nut loaf also feature grain products. Bread products, such as zucchini bread, banana bread and carrot muffins, are vegetarian breakfast options. Vegetarian dessert options include items such as apple crisp, poached pears and sour cream blueberry muffins.