Italian food without dairy, and what that leaves you

Chicken Cacciatore, Lentil Minestrone, Minestrone Soup, Perfect pasta and tomato sauce, White Bean Bruschetta and the pasta salads are the simplest starting points. Their flavour comes mainly from tomatoes, stock, herbs, vegetables, beans, seafood or olive oil rather than cheese or cream. Check the stock, pasta and any dressing, since dairy can still appear in packaged ingredients. Pizza and risotto need more deliberate substitutions because their usual texture depends on cheese, butter or cream.

Use olive oil instead of butter, and build the texture by adding hot vegetable stock gradually while stirring the rice. Cumin Lime Shrimp over Creamy Cauliflower Risotto can get its creaminess from blended cauliflower, while Mushroom risotto can rely on softened mushrooms, stock and the rice's own starch. Finish with olive oil, herbs, lemon or another dairy-free source of richness rather than parmesan. The result will be less buttery, but it should still be thick, savoury and cohesive.

Read the method as well as the title. Look for butter used to fry, milk in a mash, cream stirred into a sauce, parmesan at the end, and cheese in pizza dough or toppings. If both people want the same meal, agree on the replacement before cooking, rather than leaving one person to adapt a finished dish. Olive oil, dairy-free stock and a tomato, herb or vinaigrette-based finish cover many of the recipes here without making separate dinners.