Pure Food

Pure Food is an excellent primer for anyone who wants to start eating clean.  More plants, less meat.  The recipes are all vegetarian and include some vegan recipes.   The book is organized by month, and some months (July) have far more recipes than spring (March).   Wish there were more photos; there's a few in the middle of the book.

The recipes are not complicated, as the author Veronica points out early, which makes sense because eating healthier isn't rocket science.  You know the general rules.  Stay away from processed foods.  Know where you food is grown.  Organic.  Use fresh herbs when you can.  This book helps you think of ideas after a busy day at work. 

I received this book from Blogging for Books for this review.

Under Pressure

A fellow foodie talked me into buying a Fissler pressure cooker.  It will change your life!  Curtis Stone endorses our pressure cooker!  Oh, the pressure she plied.  Perhaps now is a good time to mention that her company sells these Fissler pressure cookers.   The time you will save.  The sales pitch.  I will throw parties and show you what gourmet treats you can make from it.   She certainly posts photos of what she makes in her Fissler pressure cooker, Korean goodies....but alas, she never invited me to a pressure cooker party. These Fissler pressure cookers come with a slim manual written in stilted English.

The pressure cooker has made a comeback since our grandmothers, but until recently, there were no cookbooks for the pressure cooker with recipes reflecting how we eat now, and the abundant produce available.  Bruce Weinstein and Mark Scarbrough to the rescue.

The Great Big Pressure Cooker is a handy volume and promises 500 recipes for both stovetop and electric pressure cookers.  The authors let you know how much effort each recipe requires, how much pressure, what kind of release.  You'll find a lot of useful information and comforting recipes here.  The main drawback is the paucity of photographs.  Photographs reassure us our dishes look like they're supposed to.  Perhaps more importantly, photographs also inspire us and alight our imaginations (tastebuds).   

I received this book from Blogging for Books for this review.

A Salad A Day

Most folks I know want to eat more fruits and vegetables, want to eat healthier -- myself included -- but wanting is not the same thing as doing.  So, what is it that stops us?  Maybe the notion of eating a salad a day sounds boring.  Or, too difficult to have enough ingredients to change it up daily.

Eating healthy is even trickier at lunch time.  You don't want something that will take too long.  You need something filling, but not too filling that it puts you in a food coma and induces sleep.  Lunch breaks are often short, an hour or less, so you have to maximize that time.  Sometimes, it's better for your career to eat with your colleagues and just go with the flow.  Everyone wants to eat at ________, why should I be the "health nut?"

David Bez decided to do something about it.  SALAD LOVE is not a cookbook, he even states that from the start.  It's more like a photo diary with ingredients listed underneath as "captions."  Bez makes it seem easier by showing us many alternatives.  Vegetarian alternatives.  Raw.  Omnivore.  Fruits and grains.  Different combinations.  Bez helps you imagine the possibilities when you feel stuck, or too exhausted to think.  His salads and the photographs inspire us to love our bodies.

I received Salad Love from Blogging for Books in return for my thoughtful review.