Dieting Books

This item was completely cheap in price, it was in excellent condition, and it arrived in less than a week. I am extremely satisfied with my purchase.

When I first received this book, I was a little disappointed because its a small book (approx. 6" x 8") with paperback-type pages. This is not the full-color, glossy pictures of recipes cookbooks. As soon I began scanning the pages of the recipes, I was no longer disappointed.

The book has page after page of delicious, mouth-watering recipes. It isn't filled with makeover recipes that require hard to find ingredients but foods that are naturally low-carb. Dana Carpender does use Splenda in her recipes so beware if you do not like to use Splenda.

If you are looking for a cookbook offering quick, easy, delicious, low-carb recipes then you will enjoy Dana Carpender's 15 minute Low-Carb recipes.

I love this cookbook. The title is not misleading: recipes are really ready that fast. And who knew cauliflower could be so tasty? If you are trying to maintain low carb eating, these recipes are a delight. There is great variety and they're delicious. There were a couple of odd ball ingredients in a few recipes, but those were surprisingly quite easy to find in my local grocery store once I knew to look for them. This book makes it nearly effortless to cook low carb and keep meals interesting. After years of devotion to Cooking Light (which I still like) this is my new go-to book for meals.

Sorry.. but very disappointed In the use of Artificial Sweeteners in so many of the recipes.. especially the deserts.. In a healthier world we should be getting away from the chemicals.. It's only a matter of time till we find out what the latest man made sweetener is doing to our bodies.. I wish the author would have used another ingredient..

I purchased this book at COSTCO for very cheap. I've been on the lowcarb lifestyle off and on.

The recipes are 15 minutes start to finish and taste great. I am considered a very good cook by friends and family and have been impressed with the wide range of flavors. Other reviews of "very hard to find ingredients" is just not true. This has become our go-to recipe book for the week when we come home from work.

Favorite recipes:

Easy Mexican Chicken
Microwaved Fish and Asparagus with Terragon Mustard
Sweet and Sour Pork (also we've made with chicken)
Balsamic Lamb Skillet (also made with Beef)
Chicken Skillet Roma
Chili Burgers
Asian Pork and Cabbage
Unstuffed Cababage

Get this book---it's great!

I have found several recipes from this cookbook that are great, simple, tasty and if you can improvise just a little, even better. I for one cannot always find what her recipes may call for, but I can find a substitute that works well. I really like how this book feels when I open it which makes me just a little more pleased to use it. If you like cooking with whole foods, this is a great recipe book to add your collection. Highly recommeded.

My friend who received this book for her birthday said it was a wonderful book with beautiful photography but I haven't seen the book myself. I love the authors food blog and was motivated by that to order the book for a present.

A good book overall. I found the information about how to substitute healthier options for the more commonly used ingredients the most useful. Recipes are pretty simple.

I think that I'm pretty knowledgeable when it comes to healthy eating, but still, before getting Super Natural Cooking, I considered items like margarine and fat-free dressings to be healthy. But Heidi Swanson's way makes much more sense -- doesn't it stand to reason that foods that are naturally cultivated would be received and digested by our bodies with far greater ease than factory-made approximations of real food? I for one would now much rather have a homemade amaranth-flour biscuit with real organic butter over a piece of sliced, processed bread with margarine.

It makes even more sense when you take into account that Heidi's recipes are delicious. Following the advice in the book, I have completely restocked my pantry with whole wheat and all natural flours and grains, and all natural oils and sweeteners. Now I reach for them when I cook, and I've come to appreciate even the process of cooking as something to enjoy and celebrate.

The actual recipes I've tried thus far are the amaranth seed biscuits (which I screwed up the first time; my own fault -- but the second time, they were delicious), the amaranth ginger shortbread, the mesquite chocolate chip cookies and the polenta-style teff wedges, which I've made a few times. It was all wonderful, homey and delicious. I highly recommend this book for anyone who wants to eat healthy and make a life-style change while doing it.

Even if you're not into 'natural' foods, this is a terrific cookbook. Full of gorgeous photography and really delicious recipes (which are easy to make), it's a perfect cookbook if you're wanting to try some healthy foods or even just some different versions of some vegetable side dishes, new salads, etc.

I especially love the Big Curry Noodle Pot recipe, as well as the fantastic brussels sprouts recipe. Everything I've tried (I've tried about 10 or recipes from here) has been delicious. Very inspirational also when trying to decide 'what to cook'.

This book is good, but a little too disease oriented. If you want a book that is part motivation, part "how-to," check out "Shrinking Buddha." It gives a unique overview of fasting, as well as the requisite author's life story. The last several chapters are devoted to pre-fasting, which preps the body, and then fasting.

The book is not helpful by itself. You must have the authors other books on fasting and eating. The book talks about the benefits and success stories only.

I think this is excellent for someone who is serious about getting healthy and fit!

Fuhrman's sourcebook on fasting is fascinating. Although over the years I read a few of Paul Bragg's books, Bragg's books, while clearly empowering, are a bit bombasting in style and read more like "amazing fasting adventures" rather than serious literature about fasting. As a result, I remained skeptical about fasting until several years ago I stumbled upon Fuhrman's writings.

Fuhrman, I feel is a new Paul Bragg, but better: a seeming paragon of health himself, he is, like Paul Bragg, leading by example, but, unlike Paul Bragg, he offers the educational reassurance of a board-certified physician, most evident in his lucent and clear presentation style. Perhaps, the best way to do his book justice is offer a prospective buyer a few brief excerpts that illustrate both the calm rationality of his positions and the accessibility of his writing style.

Fuhrman offers an enticing rationale for fasting:

Fasting, he writes, "is a state of relative physiological rest." "Health is the normal state. Most chronic disease is the inevitable consequence of living a life-style that places disease-causing stressors on the human organism. Fasting gives the body an interlude without those stressors so that it can speedily repair or accomplish healing that could not otherwise occur in the feeding state. Fasting stops the continual work of the digestive tract, whose activity can drain the body of energy and divert the healing processes." (pp. 7-8).

Fuhrman's writing on autolysis shines with a sense of awe for the homeostatic wisdom of the body:

"The innate wisdom of the body is such that, while fasting, it will consume for its sustenance superfluous tissues, carefully conserving vital tissues and organs. The body's wondrous ability to autolyze (ore self-digest) and destroy needless tissue such as fat, tumors, blood vessel plaque, and other nonessential and diseased tissues, while conserving essential tissues, gives the fast the ability to restore physiological youth to the system." (p. 16).

Fuhrman debunks the myths and misperceptions of fasting:

"The body will not starve or in general even be hungry while fasting because it is `eating'. It is consuming the substances the individual consumed last week, last month, last year that have been converted into body tissue. In fact, the symptoms of hunger generally disappear by the second day of the fast. This illustrates that the body has entered a fasting, and (lean) tissue-sparing metabolism" (p. 12).

"The average individual (not overweight) would have to fast for approximately 40 days or more to exhaust nutrient reserves" (p. 13).

He contrasts juice fasts (very low calorie diets, "supplemented fasting," or, essentially, pseudo-fasts) with water-only fasts and cautions against juice fasts:

"Normally, if we don't eat for a day or two, we start to utilize muscle tissue to make the glucose needed by the body, since glucose can be manufactured from amino acids stored in our muscles. If we continue to fast, however, the body senses what is occurring and attempt to conserve its lean muscle mass by a few different mechanisms. <...> A special adaptation occurs in the fasting state whereby the brain can fuel itself with ketones instead of glucose. By the third day of total fast, the liver starts generating a large quantity of ketones from the body's fat stores. <...> This significantly limits muscle wasting. <...> With severely restricted diets, like juice fasts, the body does lose weight, but the brain and other organs do not subsist mainly on ketones. Therefore, proportionately to weight lost, juice fasts and severely restrictive diets cause to lose more lean body tissue and less fatty tissue than do total fast" (pp. 11-12).

"Juice fasting also does not have the powerful anti-inflammatory properties of the pure water fast that are essential for recovery in autoimmune illnesses" (p. 9).

In describing the healing/detoxifying aspects of fasting, Fuhrman, once again, argues for total (water-only) fasts over juice pseudo-fasts:

"Only when there is total abstinence from all calories do we observe waste products being heavily excreted from the breath, the tongue, the urine, and the skin. <...> This kind of dramatic detoxification cannot occur with supplemented eating plans." (p. 10).

In terms of the organization of the book, Fuhrman offers problem-focused rationale, with a separate chapter on how fasting can be useful in recovery from diabetes, autoimmune disease, cardiovascular problems, and hypoglycemia and headaches. He offers a separate chapter on overeating and how to use fasting to normalizing eating style. For the professional or particularly curious reader, Fuhrman offers a chapter with additional "technical information" about what happens in the body during fasting. This is, perhaps, where Fuhrman's coverage of fasting differs the most from Paul Bragg's.

Fuhrman's book ends with a no-nonsense highly-detailed discussion of what to expect during the first fast. Having enticed the reader to try out a fast, he shares a step-by-step know-how of fasting. For example, on the issue of vitamin supplementation during fasting, he writes: "levels of vitamins and minerals are exceedingly stable during the fast and, if normal to begin with, remain normal throughout the period of fasting" and "Even in prolonged fasts (those lasting from 20 to 40 days) no deficiency develops, illustrating that the body has the innate ability to utilize its stored reserves in a highly exacting and balanced manner." (p. 9).

In conclusion of this review, I want to highlight Fuhrman's writings on the subject of hunger sensations (which he redefines as withdrawal symptoms rather than true hunger), as these have an important implication as to the "next step" in the process of preparation for a fast:

"True hunger is a mouth and throat sensation, felt in the same spot that one feels thirst. Gnawing in the stomach, stomach cramping, headaches, and generalized weakness from not eating or skipping a meal or two are experienced only by those who have been eating the standard American diet with all its shortcomings. <...> Those who have been consuming healthier, low-fat, low-protein, plant-based diet for months prior to the fast typically experience no such typical hunger pains when they fast. <...> Symptoms traditionally thought of as hunger symptoms, are not really symptoms of hunger. <...> These symptoms are signs of withdrawal that indicate healing is beginning when the body has the opportunity to rest from the continual intake of food." (p. 18).

While Fuhrman appears to have tried to pack two books into one - at least, on the level of the book cover ("Fasting and Eating for Health), - the current book is largely about fasting, and, in my opinion, does not do justice to his particular vision of "healthy eating." With this in mind, it would appear to make sense to first read Fuhrman's "Live to Eat" (which introduces the essentially Vegan, plant-based eating lifestyle that he refers to in the above cited paragraph), as a prelude to any fast.




Pavel Somov, Ph.D.
Author of "Eating the Moment: 141 Mindful Practices to Overcome Overeating One Meal at a Time" (New Harbinger, Nov. 2008).

I'VE READ LOTS OF BOOKS RECOMMENDING FASTING BUT NEVER A WORD ABOUT THE REAL EFFECTS IN YOUR BODY, APART FROM LOSING SOME EXTRA POUNDS. THIS BOOK OFFERS A VERY DOCUMENTED REPORT.

This is more than a diet, it is a promotion of the way the human body is meant to consume food for sustaining life. Over the years we have become so caught up as a race in eating junk like processed flours and sugars, along with very thick sauces comprised of primarily bad dairy, that we lost touch with the real reason we need to eat....which is to say....to survive. Now if you are a food lover and actually find food to be a "vice" in your life, this diet will ultimately be hard for you. Yet if you crave increased energy, loss of excessive fat, overall better well being, then buy this book. Gallop simplifies the diet into a very simple "stop light" technique of: Green Light foods = eat as much as you want; Yellow Light foods = be very cautious and only eat once in a while, and Red Light foods = NEVER eat. So with the green light foods you can literally eat as much as you want, regardless of whether or not it is a carb or protein based food, therefore, you never, ever feel hungry on this diet. He promotes 5-6 small meals a day and promotes avoiding anything that is processed. Simply because, by eating processed foods, you are bypassing what the body was meant to do and that is process the fiberous portions of food itself(like the bran that is in whole wheat). By not doing that, the food is digested much faster then it would normally be and thus creates a whole series of chain reactions within the body revolving around insulin productio, that ultimately causes us to gain weight. I LOVE this diet and have adopted it as the way to eat for life. It's that simple, that satisfying, and that good. If you have tried diet after diet and failed, then give this one a try IF you really want to lose weight. Otherwise, treat it like a bad thing and you will fail once again. But absorb it for what it is, a sensible approach to eating for life, and it will work, you'll look and feel great, and it will be the best thing you could possibly do for yourself ever. Bravo to Rick Gallop for providing such a vitally necessary approach to life.

for anyone looking to remove refined sugar and carbs from their diet this is a very good book! It breaks down "allowable foods" by red, green, and yellow categories. Very easy to follow.

I actually got this book as a continuation of my effort to learn all I could about G.I. living. It does not have the list of G.I. food counts, but rather gives red, light and green ratings. Green meaning GO.
Still a great book though and a wonderful guide for those not getting as technical as I was trying to be.

This is a lifestyle changing book as much as a diet book. It's about eating high fiber and healthy foods. Eating high fiber means that food stays with your longer, helps you stay 'regular', and helps you stay full. I didn't really have to cut back. I just stopped eating the white stuff - white sugar, white flour, white rice. Stop eating so much processed foods.

It spells it out easily using red, yellow, green light foods. You stop eating the red light foods.

Course, it isn't easy. We sort of cleaned out the old stuff and started buying the right foods. It takes effort at the grocery and at the table, but it's doable. I dropped 10% of my weight and never really felt like I was dieting.

A very straight-forward book. Explains the Glycemic Index easily and is a quick read. It could use a few more recipes and suggestions for snacks for people just starting out.

I'm 37, am 5 '4" and 155 lbs. I've been following the GI Diet about 90% for the last three or four weeks, and seem to have lost about three pounds and almost an inch off my waist. I bought this book because my food choices should have been enough to satisfy me throughout the day calorie- and fiber-wise, but left me feeling starving and reaching for something sweet a few hours after lunch or crackers, string cheese and bread while cooking dinner. I don't miss eating as much bread as I thought I would and I'm slowly beginning to realize that vegetables CAN be a satisfying meal without the addition of some starch. I still crave sweets. I've found that I can have an occasional treat or go off the wagon for a day and still stay on track. It's a lifestyle change I can live with.

I received this book yesterday -- saw one recipe "Quick Chicken Chili" -- I had all but one ingredient on hand. Less than 20 mins start to eating. Its absolutely delicious!!

Somethings I will be substituting since I am trying to avoid all wheat products,most dairy, sugar. The moderate recipes can be brought to low with a bit of modification.

There's so many I want to try now, I have seveal chronic illnesses doing pretty good with them. But realized my eating habits needed a over haul to have any more break through success and lose some weight. Her introductions even specify if eating out the restaurants to avoid (chinese -- who would have thought) and what to eat at other restaurants -- avoid and allowable to stay low glycemic.

So glad I bought this!!

I was really excited to receive this cookbook because of the great reviews. The first book I received was missing 30 pages, they weren't torn out but the book was bound without them. I called Amazon and they sent a new one, this book is missing the same pages. Maybe this edition was not bound correctly. Such a shame.

By using this book to examine the "effective" glycemic index of various food combined into a recipe, it was easy to lose weight fast at the beginning using very low index recipes, and then advance to low and moderate indices to use for weight maintenance. Just using the older Atkins system of total net carbs did not take into consideration the moderating effects of combined foods upon gastric emptying and assimilation of various carbs, so this book corrects that oversight. Very good and easy to read. Highly recommend.

It's difficult to browse for menu ideas when there are no photos.
It's also hard to make something you've never seen before because you aren't sure what it's supposed to look like during the process or when you're done. There IS good information to help you understand and apply low glycemic concepts to your diet, but she uses egg substitutes, chemical sugar substitutes, and other questionable ingredients. If you're looking for healthy recipes, you'll need to substitute natural ingredients for such unhealthy ingredients.

My husband has a bad back and can't exercise, so the only way to control his weight gain over the years has to be through his diet. This poses problems with him being a meat and potato man who doesn't like fish, rice, or several vegetables. Several of the other books I've read or purchased seem to be full of fish and chicken recipes (anyone can lose weight if that's all they eat). I needed a way of changing the way we think about food and the way we eat, a lifestyle change that is manageable. The radical diets are limiting and most people gain the weight back once you stop because you can't follow them forever. The glycemic index is a lifestyle change that anyone can stick with. The other books also use alot of items you have to get from a gourmet shop, health food stores, or contain exotic items that are rather pricey and most of us would not eat. The Good Carb Cookbook contains recipes that most of us would eat on a daily basis anyway (who needs to purchase expensive meals through one of those dieting companies when you can make them yourself). 2/3 of her book explains what the glycemic index is, how it works, and what things effect the glycemic index of an item/meal. She talks about different kinds of oils, flours, grains, and explains alot of dietary information in terms that anyone can understand. She also explains better choices to lower the GI of a meal and things to add to lower the GI of a meal (such as addition of acid like lemon juice or vinegar) or items that have a fermenting process such as sour dough or yogurt or buttermilk. How about using thick rolled oats in a meatloaf instead of corn flakes or crackers?

I can't sing more praises or state more facts than anyone else who has read this book and took the time to comment on it. This is a must read item for anyone who is serious about improving their health through proper diet

I heard about his book from my kung fu instructor who had great results, from doing the quiz to find out his body type, and then following the eating plan.I wanted to see for my self,so I purchased the book and in the first week I lost 3 pounds, I do not have a lot of excess weight to lose, only about 6 to 8 pounds.The diet is very easy to follow and you are not hungry, also it is eating real every day food. I am very happy with my purchase, and the great results.

This book is wonderful. After trying everything to lose weight, my husband and I had to get serious, we both are Type A's and faced with high blood pressure. We knew we had to find something that worked. Well let me tell you it works and it is easier to stick with it because I understand why it works. We both look and feel so much better. My mood is so much better, my life so much better. We have been on the diet about 6 weeks, we have both lost 15 pounds each and feel great. I still have about 30 pounds to go and my husband about 40 pounds, but for the first time in my life I KNOW I am going to get there. We also follow the diet loosely some days and neither one of us has started exercising yet, but we are planning on it. I sent my cousin a copy of the book and she and a friend started and have both lost close to 20 pounds each. Hurray for Dr. A.

While the information given for body types is very interesting, and I have no doubt that just about anyone can lose weight following them, I'd like to point out that these diets are 1200 calories for the initial program, and 1000 calories for the "last 5 pounds". ANYONE taking in that few calories will lose weight, and it almost doesn't matter what you eat. Also, be aware that part of the program is waiting a minumum of 4 hours between breakfast and lunch, and 5 hours between lunch and dinner, no snacking in between, for the initial program. Add one hour to these figures for the "last 5 pounds" program, and you are looking at waiting 5 and 6 hours between meals. If you're only taking in 1200 calories and waiting that long until you have your next meal, with no snacking, OF COURSE you're going to lose weight!!

Save your money: get a calorie counting book or find a calorie counting website to refer to, use the guidelines I just mentioned, eat lots of fruit, veg, whole grains, some protein, no processed (white) carbs, and low sugar, and you'll have basically the same results.

Oh, and exercise. That's all!

I was excited to get this book. I knew people who lost weight using it. Um, as a g type you get to eat nothing! Minimal protein and lot's of fruits and vegies. No seasoning and very little fat. Honestly, I didn't need a book to tell me that was a good idea. Made food way to much of a bummer. I'd rather be my 10 pounds over weight then not be able to enjoy a steak!

Back in 1984 I purchased this book and began to strictly adhere to the diet for my body type. I stayed on the diet for over 6 months and the results were amazing. I lost the weight only where I needed to WITHOUT exercising and I have kept it off to this day, except while pregnant.

Now, in 2008, I'm wanting to purchase this book once again for my 17 year old daughter (I lent my copy to a friend and never received it back).

I think what I appreciated the most was after determining your body type the book goes on to mention the foods you most crave, like white starchy foods for T-Types, are the ones you should limit the most in your diet.

It's the most sound diet I've ever tried and I even began to enjoy the soup portion of the menu.

I am a beginner cook who, as of about 3 months ago, only had cooking experience making scrambled eggs. I used to eat mostly cereal, sandwiches, canned soup, and frozen dinners, until I decided it was time to learn how to cook. I bought this book based on the reviews, and I have to agree with most of them. The recipes are VERY simple, which is great for beginners. If you have no cooking experience, this is the book for you.

Despite my lack of cooking experience, I am a huge food lover, and I tend to like really complex flavors and dishes. My only complaint is that the recipes in this book can be somewhat bland, but I kind of like this, because it allows me to improvise with different spices and really helps me learn more about cooking. I also love the beginning chapter, which describes many cooking spices and cooking techniques, and what spices go well with what types of meats and vegetables. I am finding that I use many of these recipes as starting points to create my own recipes. The fact that I can even say I am creating my own recipes is crazy to me, and this book has definitely helped me get to this point.

This cookbook is fantastic! As many other reviewers have said, the recipes truly are quick, cheap, and easy! It also contains very helpful advice for cooking newbies (like me) along with these great recipes. I have probably made about 15 of the meals in this book so far (with some repeats), and there really hasn't been one disappointment: my roommates and girlfriend like me more than ever. ;-)

Well worth $10.

This is a good cookbook for beginners that has a pretty wide variety of recipies in it. It's got recipies for soups, meat, salads, pastas, desserts and more. Of course, if you're a very picky eater that only eats a few different things that means that many of the recipies will be useless to you, and you'll probably need a more specific cookbook (or more open pallette.) The recipies are generally easy to follow with a good glossary of cooking terms.

The only big thing missing is an estimated time for all dishes. There is a symbol that appears if a recipie is "quick" but otherwise without going through and reading every recipie I won't know if it'll take a half hour or an hour and a half. A couple of the recipies didn't turn out very good but some turned out amazing, like the Presto Chicken Pasta, but you can generally look at the ingredients going into a dish and tell whether it's going to be bland or not. I had nearly no cooking experience when I got this book and it's helped me a lot, so I recommend it to anyone in my position, but if you're already a good cook you'll probably find the majority of the recipies exceptionally easy.

This cookbook is perfect for a beginning cook, with either an unsophisticated palate, or a sense of adventure and a decent spice collection. I bought this for my step-daughter, and she was thrilled with the glossary of terms. Most of the dishes do not require a lot of imagination to envision, so the lack of photos is only a minor hardship. The biggest problem I found was, simply, the blandness of the flavors. I have two kids, ages ten and fourteen, and they could tell just by reading some of the recipes that they would have to be doctored, and had several creative suggestions on how to do that. All in all though, a nice jumping off point.

I usually don't bother writing reviews, because most likely anything I have to say, someone else has already said it. That may be true, but I have to add one more glowing review! I have had this cookbook for a few years now, and it has been my most coveted possession. I have since graduated, but this book comes with me fr every move, and survives every purge session.

The recipes ALWAYS turn out, and I love that they have the nutrition information right there, easy to see. The greatest thing, is that no matter how bare my cupboards, I can always find a recipe in here that I can use or easily adapt! Just last night, I had pasta (but no sauce), garlic, canned green beans, tofu and peanut butter. Any yet, I made a complete meal! And it was delicious!

I've never been great in the kitchen, but these recipes are easy, quick, cheap and require few ingredients. And, to top it off, they taste great. Yum!

I own a hundred gourmet cookbooks. I am pretty close to a pro level cook. And I wanted to investigate low-carb diets, but not give up my highfalutin habit. So this book was very promising, but of course I was very skeptical. (I had been cooking through "Jean-Georges" just before I started this diet, not that that made me fat, it didn't, but it raised the bar a bit on what I expect from a plate.)

Anyway let's cut to the chase. These are some of the best recipes I've ever made, because she uses the smoker (which I ran out and bought) and she also knows how to do all sorts of other great things.

I really couldn't care less whether these recipes are healthy or not. I'm staying on my diet for a few weeks and going back to gourmet cooking when I reach my goal weight. However I will continue cooking through this book for a long time. Lots of stuff to learn. And my meals will be popular with the ladies as well.

This is hands down my favorite cookbook of all time. I can't recommend it highly enough.

I don't follow a strict low-carb diet, but I do try to limit how much bread/pasta/rice I eat, and this book is something I refer to again and again. Even if I wasn't watching my carbs, the recipes are tasty and interesting and I wouldn't hesitate to serve them at dinner parties to folks who were not watching their diets (in fact, I have done so with raves from my guests). My beef with most low-carb cookbooks is that the recipes are often loaded with fat and dairy products (cottage cheese makes me want to hurl), but not this one. It's not entirely free of dairy products, but they are used appropriately (e.g. buttermilk in ranch dressing) without going overboard. While certainly not fat-phobic, the recipes do use trimmed lean cuts of meat (beef or pork tenderloin, chicken breast, turkey, etc...) and encourage the use of lower-fat condiments when appropriate.

The pictures will make you drool--they are gorgeous. The recipes here range in difficulty from quick and easy to sophisticaed gourmet cuisine of the caliber that you would find in the finest restaurants--but they are all innovative--no run-of-the-mill food here. Personally, I think there's a good balance of easy and difficult recipes here. It's fairly easy to cook some of these ahead; for example: the recipe for plum sauce freezes well, so it's easy to make up a batch, portion it out and freeze it, so when dinner comes all you have to do it pop a pork tenderloin in the oven and defrost the sauce while you assemble one or two of the carbohydrate side dishes. The author gives storage recommendations for such recipes (length of time the sauce/dressing will keep if refrigerated or frozen), which is handy (most cookbooks I own don't give such information).

The book is divided into protein and carbohydrate sections, making it easy to create balanced meals. My favorite protein dishes are the Moroccan Chicken Thighs, roast chicken with rosemary-garlic rub, Pork Tenderloin with Plum sauce, chicken skewers with almond dipping sauce (like Malaysian satay but even tastier) and turkey patties with apples and smoked leeks, although every other one I've made has been excellent as well. The carbohydrate dishes include lots of interesting salads (the black bean salad w/ avocado is fantastic), vegetable sautes and roasted vegetables (I made the roasted asparagus with garlic oil the other night and it was amazing!). Desserts are fruit-based and hit the spot when you want something sweet after a good meal without blowing your healthy eating plan (figs with "virtual" marscapone cheese... YUM!).

Some of the recipes call for smoked vegetables, but not having a stovetop smoker I use roasted vegetables instead with great results. With the focus being on gourmet cuisine there are also a few recipes that call for ingredients that might seem exotic, however any moderately experienced cook can make substitutions with no problem, and your run-of-the-mill grocery store/supermarket will have enough to make probably 80-90% of the recipes as-is. (although I do admit, it's difficult to find ostrich, but I've substituted sirloin or beef tenderloin and the recipes come out great). The Internet can also be a good resource for hard-to-find spices or condiments as well.

I am an avid cook, and what I like most about this book is that it inspires me to be creative in cooking lower carbohydrate cuisine even when I'm not using it directly. I've modified some of the recipes and created several of my own after studying the techniques and flavor combinations presented here. It's made me a better cook. My only problem with the book is that the recipes are so good it's difficult to stick with a sensible portion size :-)

I hope Dr. Chud comes out with another book!!!

There are three main point I want to make in regards to this book:

1- The food in this book is definitely of a higher caliber than most "Low Carb" cookbooks. Ms. Chud knows her way around the kitchen, and is familiar with some of the more exotic ingredients available. I have tried a few recipes, and been suitably impressed.

2- That being said, the main influence on her cooking seems to be latin/hispanic/Central-South American. While she seems to do a good job with the fusion cuisine aspect, I am not terribly fond of the flavors used in latin cuisine. She does use some Asian flavors, but her main influence seems to be latin. She presents some excellent ideas, and if you're a cook that can take an idea and run with it, or someone who enjoys latin flavors, by all means, this is the book for you. However, I prefer more of an asian flavor to my food... For that reason alone, this book sits on the shelf most of the time.

3- As far as LC cooking, this food is definitely of a higher caliber, but the "low" part of the "low carb" statement is questionable in some of these recipes. The use of beans, fruits and fructose make some of these dishes "special occassion" dishes, although still *lower* carb than most.

Overall a good book, hence the 4 star review. But I recommend, as with any cookbook, to read the recipes with a grain of salt, so to speak.

First - I love this book. The recipies and advice are definitely very good. I've prepared many of the dishes in here, and have always been pleased.

I just wanted to point out one thing about this book though... I recommended it to a friend who wasn't nearly as happy as I was because they dislike smoked foods. The majority of recipies in this book call for some sort of smoked ingredient. In fact, you'll need to get a stovetop smoker to really utilize this cookbook. I personally think that the smoked foods are great, and a stovetop smoker is quite inexpensive (and one of the best additions to my kitchen in a long time) - but I do realize they are not for everyone.

So - if you like the smoked food flavor, and you cook low-carb - this is a great book. If you're not a fan of that smoky taste, keep on looking.

I've tried many (most?) of the low-carb cookbooks, and returned almost all of them, either because the recipes were stupid (who needs a recipe for an omelette?) or because they weren't Zoneable -- unlike Atkins, the Zone doesn't allow massive amounts of fat but does allow a small amount of unfavorable carbs per meal.

The book I like best -- and use a lot -- is Deborah Chud's "The Gourmet Prescription: High Flavor Recipes for Lower Carbohydrate Diets." It sometimes feels a bit stiff for everyday use (I wish she would have some more family-style recipes, even though I'm not a mom; I just don't need restaurant-style meals every night) and many of her recipes use her own recipes for 'condiments and flavor enhancers' as ingredients. She also has a strong bent toward Chinese-inspired flavors, whereas my own tastes run to mediterranean, latin, and southeast asian.

But, even given all those caveats, I think this book is the best of the bunch: nice photos, pleasing graphic design, well-documented recipes. I hope she comes up with a second volume of casual recipes with a broader ethnic slant.

Great book, for those who want to know how the "diet" industry is out to make you fail, and how the food industry sets us all up for failure. For those who feel they have no power over anything. . .take your power back over food and healthy eating, and be verbal about it!!!

The biggest thing I came away from Dr Wansink's with is an understanding that we don't stop eating because we're no longer hungry. By now recognizing and paying attention to the "external cues", and by implementing a few of the gimmicks that Dr Wansink has pointed out, I have managed to easily cut down on some of the junk food that I had been consuming. This book would be very valuable to anyone responsible for planning a families meals.

Do you know how much you are eating and why you eat what you do? You probably don't but this book can help you learn. It also offers easy to follow practical advise on how to control and reduce what you eat.

The author is a psychologist who studies eating. His work is mainly aimed at restaurants and food manufactures. They use it to learn how to present food in the way that will help them sell more. This book uses some of that same research to help us consumers learn to understand why we eat more then we think we do and what we can do about it.

Mindless Eating is well written in a friendly style. The information is presented as stories about the different experiments the author and his collaborators did. Wansink manages to avoid getting bogged down in the details that are required for scientific papers and does not use the condescending preaching style that many diet books end up using.

Unfortunately the style gets to be repetitive and predictable after awhile. Some of the stories were just too cute by the end of the book. I would have appreciated more variety in the narrative style.

Mindless Eating is not aimed at the seriously obese, it is more useful for those who have been slowly gaining weight over the years without really noticing. Wansink manages to convey a lot of interesting information in a fairly short book. He provides some practical advise that you will probably not find elsewhere.

I thoroughly enjoyed listening to this book. I have started loaning it to other friends because I found the information very useful.

"Mindless Eating" informs readers why they are typically conditioned to, without thinking, eat more than they realized. People eat more when you give them a bigger container. Almost any sign with a number promotion leads us to buy 30-100% more than we normally would. Losing over 1/2 lb./week triggers a metabolism slowdown that undercuts much of the value of the diet.

Cutting out our favorite foods is a bad idea - cutting back on how much is mindlessly doable. In most studies people can eat 20% less without noticing it. We eat the volume of food we want, not the calories. (Fill your plate with leafy vegetables; drink extra-whipped smoothies - more air.) Strategies include see all you eat - don't go back for 2nds and 3rds. Increasing the variety of food (eg. a buffet) also increases eating - even if it is only increasing the number of colors in an M&M bowl. Leftovers suggest you probably made too much and ate too much as well. Put healthy foods in a visible container (will eat more) and bad foods in a covered (invisible) one.

Visual cues (eg. passing a 7-11 store, viewing an ad for soup) create more eating. Eating with other encourages greater eating - unless you're already a heavy eater, then it encourages eating less. Don't eat snacks out of a box or package - pour yourself the intended amount and put the container away.

Positive expectations (name - "home-made;" and environment - china plate) help create food satisfaction.

Ice requires body heat (expenditure of calories) to melt.

Behavior modification experts say it takes about one month to break an old habit. Three 100-calorie changes/day can result in up to 30 lbs. less in a year.

This is the most comprehensive yet down-to-earth resource for those of us with celiac disease who must live gluten-free. I've read several books that give me medical terms that are useful I'm sure but fail to cover the basics of day-to-day living. This one does just that plus it has recipes and lots of web sites to explore. I would call this the "Bible" for gluten free living.

On page 276 the author teases us with a description of a freshly baked GF pizza, home-brewed GF beer, and freshly baked GF dessert. I don't know about the home-brewed GF beer, though I'm sure they have GF beer, the restaurant is Paisano's in Albuquerque, NM. GF Pasta, GF pizza, you name it, they have it...and it's great!

This is a good book for someone just learning about Gluten free eating. It is basic and easy to understand.

this book has a lot of good info in it with a lot of great recipes.

My 19 year old daughter was diagnosed as gluten intolerant and we started a search for information. I found this book on amazon.com and I was amazed at the fantastic reviews. They are well deserved. My daughter could not put the book down. Most books on the subject are either medical books or nutritional guides. This is an entertaining read which is FULL of useful info such as how to snack at a party. I have spoken with the author Danna Korn and she is very knowledgeable and willing to help. Do not assume a "Dummies" book is too simple. It makes a complicated medical condition simple to understand.