cookbook review - one pan & done

Who doesn't like to make delicious meals using just one sheet pan, cast iron skillet, or baking pan? I found this cookbook to be full of delicious, healthy recipes that are simple enough for weeknight dinners, yet impressive enough to serve to guests.

From starters, snacks and sides to breakfast, lunch, dinner and even dessert, this cookbook covers it all. There's even a chapter on vegetarian main dishes.

Each recipe has a short description, the list of ingredients (none of which are obscure), and the instructions. Best of all, most of the recipes have full page photos.

The author, Molly Gilbert is a graduate of the French Culinary Institute, former cooking instructor and private chef, and former recipe tester for the kitchen of Saveur. She's also a food blogger at Dunk and Crumble. 

I've made a few recipes from this book and look forward to trying more. Definitely a thumbs-up cookbook!

I received One Pan & Done from Blogging for Books for my honest, personal opinion review.

book review ~ radical beauty

I've always found Deepak Chopra's theories on alternative medicine interesting, so I was excited to read and review this book. Dr. Chopra is an acclaimed advocate for integrative medicine, the founder of the Chopra Foundation and co-founder of the Chopra Center for Well-Being. He's also the author of more than 80 books and has been described by Time magazine as "one of the top 100 heroes and icons of the century".

Kimberly Snyder is a New York Times best-selling author, nutritionist, and beauty expert. She hosts the popular podcast, Beauty Inside Out.

This book was broken down into six parts, or "pilars":

 Internal Nourishment
 External Nourishment
 Peak Beauty Sleep
 Primal Beauty
 Beautiful Movement
 Spiritual Beauty

There's also an appendix of a few healthy recipes (salads, soups, entrees and desserts). I found the information in this book easy to understand, educational, and inspiring for taking care of yourself in a holistic and healthy way. I'd highly recommend this book.

I received "Radical Beauty" from Blogging for Books for my honest, personal opinion review.

book review - in memory of bread

From amazon.com - "When Paul Graham was suddenly diagnosed with celiac disease at the age of thirty-six, he was forced to say goodbye to traditional pasta, pizza, sandwiches, and more. Gone, too, were some of his favorite hobbies, including brewing beer with a buddy and gorging on his wife’s homemade breads. Struggling to understand why he and so many others had become allergic to wheat, barley, rye, oats, and other dietary staples, Graham researched the production of modern wheat and learned that not only has the grain been altered from ancestral varieties but it’s also commonly added to thousands of processed foods. "

Even though I don't have celiac disease, I found this book an intriguing read due to the sudden popularity in the US of gluten being our enemy. And although I'm not truly gluten-intolerant either, I do find myself bloated after I eat gluten, so it was interesting to find out why so many people like myself are experiencing "wheat belly". The author, Paul Graham not only writes about his physical and mental journey of foregoing gluten, but a couple of the chapters got into the history and science of gluten. Those chapters were a bit too detailed for me, but if I or a loved one had celiac disease, I'd definitely pay more attention to those chapters.

I received "In Memory of Bread" from Blogging for Books for my honest, personal opinion review.

the little paris bookshop ~ review

Monsieur Perdu runs a bookstore on a floating barge, using his intuitive feelings to sell "just the right book" to the brokenhearted. But the only person Perdu can't mend is himself, after the love of his life left him with just a letter - which he never opened.

I had high hopes for this book ~ after all, the plot sounds promising and a little romantic. However, the story and writing ended up being so dull and overly-sweet, that I had to slog through the book to make it to the end.

If you're looking for a good story about bookstores, instead I'd recommend 84, Charing Cross Road by Helene Hanff; Parnassus on Wheels and The Haunted Bookshop by Christopher Morley; and Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan.

I received The Little Paris Bookshop from Blogging for Books for my honest, personal opinion review.

food with friends: the art of simple gatherings ~ a review

This cookbook has a lovely premise: celebrating life with friends and/or family around your table and not expecting perfection, just love and fun. 

The author, Leela Cyd is a photographer for Food and Wine, Sweet Paul, The New York Times and Kinfolk, and a contributor to the kitchn. 

While the book is well-written and filled with beautiful photography, most of the recipes are a little obscure for the average home cook.

 I love to cook and am not a stranger to trying new recipes and even using new-to-me ingredients, but recipes with ingredients such as bee pollen, matcha powder, fresh curry leaves, chickpea flour, oat groats and edible flowers make me quickly turn the page, looking for a recipe with ingredients that I know are easily found. Thus said, there are some doable recipes in this book. Steel-Cut Oats With Toppings sounds simple; so does Sweet and Salty Pumpkin Seed Clusters, Assorted Spa Waters, Black and White Cookies, Spice-Roasted Chickpeas and Toasted Nuts with Lemon, Thyme and Chili.

I received Food With Friends - That Art of Simple Gatherings from Blogging for Books for my honest, personal opinion review.

book review - it was me all along

I had never heard of the author, Andie Mitchell until I read her memoir. She's also now a popular food and weight loss blogger. This memoir isn't a how-to book on weight loss, but more of how Mitchell battled childhood trauma, how food was her comfort, and how she found independence and made changes in her life to overcome obesity.

 At first, the book was very engaging - and also painful to read at times. It was easy to understand how childhood trauma brought on binge eating: her mother was never home because she worked several jobs and she had an alcoholic father. I found myself wanting to hug and rescue this little girl. But the story went downhill from there. I found Mitchell to be self-centered and selfish: leading her boyfriend, Daniel on over and over and then breaking up with him; using her mother's retirement money to have plastic surgery to remove the excess skin from losing so much weight; and spending too many book pages talking about the thrill of working on a movie set and meeting Leonardo DiCaprio. That's great, but a brief mention in the book would've been good enough. I got the feeling it was "always about her".

Mitchell's blog does have a lot of weight loss tips and good recipes, if you're looking for more of something along those lines. She's also just written and published a cookbook, Eating in the Middle. And, you can find her on Instagram and Twitter.

I received "It Was Me All Along" from Blogging for Books for my honest, personal opinion review.

chatty saturday

 Welcome to March in my part of the world...gray and gloomy, and still obviously cold. I see people posting on social media and blogs about how they're already gardening and planting flowers. Trees are bushes are budding and daffodils are pushing out of the soil. I'm so jealous! Next week will be in the 50's and one day even in the 60's but rain is forecasted every single day. Blergh.

It has definitely been a stay-at-home day today. I'm reading these two books: It Was Me All Along is a memoir about an overweight woman's long journey to self-acceptance. It's another book from Blogging for Books that I will review when I'm done reading it. I'm sure you're all familiar with Simple Abundance. I've had this book for many years and even though I've read it numerous times over, I still pick it up from time to time and glean new wisdom.

 It's also been a good day for puttering. I'm always playing with this bookshelf. A few days ago, I picked up those creamy Shawnee pottery pieces that you see flanking the books in the middle shelf. I had just visited my lymphedema therapist (for those of you who don't know, I have late-onset primary lymphedema in my left arm, which is a rare disease) and got fantastic news from her. My arm swelling has gone down to where I don't have to wear a compression sleeve during the day - I only have to wear my nighttime garment, which I lovingly call my "oven mitt". I also did not need any manual lymph drainage therapy and bandaging, which I was dreading (the bandaging, not the therapy - the therapy is  painless) AND she said she didn't need to see me again unless my arm is noticeably more swollen. They don't treat lymphedema unless the swelling is over 2 cm. All the points along my arm that they measure were under 2 cm. If you're interested in learning more about primary lymphedema and/or want to see photos of my arm when it's bandaged after manual drainage therapy, and also pictures of the "oven mitt", click HERE to read my old blog post. Coincidentally enough, tomorrow is Lymphedema Awareness Day.

So, anyhoo...I was so elated after that appointment that on the way home, I treated myself to a bouquet of flowers, an iced coffee, and a stop at a little vintage shop. These pottery pieces were one of my finds. They're not marked on the bottom, so I put them on Instagram to see if anyone would know who they're made by. It was Claudia of Mockingbird Hill Cottage that suggested either Shawnee or Haeger. I figured Claudia would come to my rescue, as she's a big collector of vintage pottery. (Check out her blog to see her beautiful collections of McCoy and Roseville!) 

After doing some searching online, I found they are Shawnee. I was also relieved to find I paid a lot less for them than the asking prices I found on eBay and etsy. ;-)

 It was also a good day to dig out my spring bunny collection. This is only part of them. I'm still playing with where to display the others.

 I don't recall a winter where I've made so much soup. Which is fine...it's something I enjoy making because it's easy to throw together and I can be creative. I usually don't follow any soup recipes - I make up my own. Yesterday, I had roasted of pan of various veggies...broccoli, cauliflower, parsnip, and white carrot. (Trader Joes sells packages of organic tri-colored carrots...orange, purple and white.) We never ate the roasted veggies and today I was wondering what I could do with them. Eating them as is wasn't doing it for me. Looking around in the fridge, I also found a container of my homemade stock. So, I simply simmered the veggies in the stock and to give it some flavor, I added curry powder, turmeric, garam masala, and a little cinnamon. I tasted the soup and to me, it still didn't have enough flavor! I obviously didn't go heavy-handed on those Indian spices. So I then added just a little bit of Thai green curry paste. Tasted again - perfect. I then got out my immersion blender and went to town and pureed the concoction. 

I then added half a can of coconut milk, topped with some croutons, and...

Nom nom.

Lest you think my day has been all fun and games with vignette arranging and playing in the kitchen, you'd be wrong. I also did a 45-minute yoga practice (though admittedly, that was fun, too), washed all our bedding including the pillows, and started working on cleaning off shelves full of tchotchkes in the dungeon basement. Hope your day has held some simple pleasures for you, too.

cookbook review ~ the longevity kitchen

It's no secret that I love to cook, am into healthy foods and nutrition, and have a slight cookbook obsession. I'm always whipping up something delicious in my kitchen and love trying new recipes. So when I came across an opportunity to review books in exchange for honest reviews ~ and my first book to review was a cookbook ~ I couldn't wait to look through it and try a few of the recipes.

The Longevity Kitchen starts out with three chapters full of vital, interesting information before it actually delves into recipes. The first chapter is on Food, Nutrition, and Your Body with short paragraphs broken down into subjects such as the gut, liver and kidneys, the brain, heart, bones and muscle, the immune system, the respiratory system, circulatory system, nervous system, and endocrine system. The second chapter deals with The Healing Power of Food and lists in alphabetical order, foods and spices with great health benefits. The author "especially focused on research into nutrients that fight inflammation, because chronic inflammation is now seen as being linked to impaired immune system function and increased risk of many chronic diseases." The third chapter informs the reader how to make the most out of this book.

The next eight chapters are chock-full of recipes and beautiful photos ~ soups and broths, vegetables, grains, protein, appetizers, desserts, and drinks. There's even a chapter called, "Dollops of Yum!" which feature recipes such as pesto, relish, vinaigrettes, salad dressings, marinade, glaze, and sauces. All the recipes are healthy and there's nothing with impossible-to-find ingredients. I've tried the Brown Rice Pilaf with Saffron and Ginger, the Lemony Balsamic Vinaigrette and the Insanely Good Chocolate Brownies ~ all easy to follow and make with delicious results.

 (Brown Rice Pilaf with Saffron & Ginger - photo taken from cookbook)

(Insanely Good Chocolate Brownies - photo taken from cookbook)

The primary author, Rebecca Katz , has a MS degree in Health and Nutrition Education and has also written three other cookbooks: The Cancer-Fighting Kitchen, The Healthy Mind Cookbook, and One Bite at a Time. She has spent more than a decade motivating people to eat well, and showing how "great taste and great nutrition can joyfully coexist at the dinner table." If you look around on her website, you will find a host of recipes as well as her food blog. The co-author, Mat Edelson is an award-winning medical, science, and sports journalist.

As you can tell, I am truly enjoying this cookbook and highly recommend it if you are looking for healthy, delicious recipes. I can't wait to try more from this cookbook!

I received The Longevity Kitchen from Blogging for Books for my honest, personal opinion review.