American Health Food Book: 2Nutrition News for the 90s - Hardcover

"More than 250 fabulous recipes--plus up-to-the-minute nutrition news!" trumpets the subtitle of this compendium of columns from the pages of the magazine American Health . The book contains hundreds of recipes developed by food writers and health professionals that emphasize healthful ingredients and nutritionally correct preparations. After a quick overview of what constitutes a core diet for optimum health and cooking techniques to lower everything but food's flavor, organization changes. Each chapter covers a single topic, from such staples as wheat and rice to sugars and beverages. Every chapter has two authors, one to explain the category's contribution to health and the other to survey culinary techniques for the spot-lit foodstuff, with recipes (contributed by Marian Burros et al.) that follow. If too many cooks spoil the broth, then too many authors, each with a distinctive voice, mar the fluidity of the prose. Thus, this is an excellent book to browse. Recipes are accessible, many calling for just a half-dozen ingredients and a few quick steps to assemble the dish. What gives them a boost is, often, an unexpected key ingredient. For example, in latkes, chayote squash takes the place of potatoes.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Recipes and essays on food and nutrition from American Health magazine. "Nutrition news" and recipes are organized by main ingredient, from wheat to sugars and sweeteners; each chapter opens with nutritional background and findings, followed by specific cooking advice and then the recipes, accompanied by paragraph-long nutrition analyses. The recipes, however, tend to be pedestrian, and the health information is more limited and less well written than that found in other similar titles; both Jean Carper's Food Pharmacy Guide to Good Eating ( LJ 4/15/91) and Prevention magazine's Healing Foods Cookbook ( LJ 4/15/91), though with a slightly different slant, are better choices.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.