The Healthiest Meals on Earth: Review
This creation of Jonny Bowden is part cookbook and part educational journey into food. It is to say the least a very attractive-looking book. Flip through the pages and you'll be instantly inspired to sample some of the delicacies within. That said, splendid photography does not a good cookbook make, so let's delve into the Healthiest Meals on Earth and see if the contents rival its appearance.
The recipes within the book are broken down into what Bowden calls "polymeals" - components of a meal divided according to 3 criteria;
- Maximizing nutritional impact
- Taste
- Relative ease of preparation
A couple of examples of polymeals are as follows;
Fabulous fiber - featuring black bean cakes, basmati rice and citrus avocado salad with nut oil
Healthy fats and protein-packed - featuring Thai-spiced mango and prawns with a coconut fruit salad.
Here are some of the book's highlights
Some aspects of the book that could be better
- No nutritional breakdown! This may not bother most people but I like to know the caloric breakdown of a meal in terms of macronutrients as well as fiber, sugar, etc.
- While the meals are certainly unique, many of the ingredients are more obscure and hence more difficult to come by - you may run yourself ragged trying to track down many of the ingredients.
- Not only are some ingredients hard to come by, but some of the cooking can get very expensive, very fast. Bowden recommends grass fed beef, wild salmon, organics and many recipes call for expensive nut oils and sugar alternatives such as agave nectar, xylitol and the like.
- While Bowden gives some great alternatives to sugar, he mistakenly labels splenda as "toxic to the body" without qualification and yet includes stevia as "safe" (a "natural = safe and unnatural = toxic fallacy).
Overall Impression
I have to say I have really enjoyed trying out some of these recipes and look forward to continuing to try more of them. The book is just as much an educational resource as it is a cookbook and will likely appeal to a broad spectrum of health-conscious individuals. Those who are short on cash and shorter on patience may want to pass on this one. Overall, however, the many upsides to The Healthiest Meals on Earth definitely outweigh the negatives.
So "edible by someone with a nut allergy" not so much one of her polymeal criteria, then.
ReplyOr dairy, or wheat, or...
I'm not sure what a diet that catered to all allergies would look like.
ReplyI always really enjoy a new cook book and especially ones that help me to lose weight but when they have obsure ingredients which I have to hunt down, costs a fortune and then I only use a little bit I am not so keen. Hopefully not all the recipes are like this as I would like to give it a try.
ReplyStevia isn't bad, but sucralose (Splenda) still tastes much better to me and I'm not going to stop using it until I see some serious evidence that it's worse for me than processed surgar.
Stevia mixes fine into some things, such as protein drinks and oatmeal, but tastes AWFUL in tea and coffee. You need to experiment with it to see where it belongs... but it's a nice change-up from our fake sweeteners.
My favorite simple breakfast: Old-fashioned oatmeal cooked up, then toss a scoop of whey protein in it. Oats 'n Whey!
ReplyI have read some of the things he writes about and I don't agree with some of his ideas especially the ones about healthy oils. I think I will skip this book.
ReplyI think this book would frustrate the hell out of me. Any time a recipe calls for ingredients that I can't find, I get super frustrated and end up trying to figure out a reasonable substitute or I give up on the recipe entirely.
ReplyWhen you say that Ingredients are hard to come by, that puts me straight off. There is nothing more annoying that buying some obscure spice, and using it only once.
ReplyThis is an interesting article. Wish I had read this sooner. Thanks for sharing.
-Alexis
ReplyI have to say, I do like the way the cookbook focuses on different types of foods. So many diets get stuck on one thing, and that is why people cannot follow them.
For instance, if I can only have chicken on a diet, I will end up hating chicken, even though right now I love chicken.
Variety is important in a diet, so I do like that in the cookbook. That being said, I have a problem with the book.
I agree with a lot of the other comments. The food in the cookbook might be good, but I need meals that are easy to prepare and the ingredients are readily available. I work full time, and I just don’t have time to go from one grocery store to the next to find tonight’s dinner.
I think it’s good to take some of the fundamentals of eating different types of foods. However, I want to take those fundamentals and incorporate them into a diet that is easier to follow.
I think a good diet has:
• A wide variety of foods
• A selection of common foods
• Meals that are easy to prepare
I know when I can have a variety of foods, I do better.
At the same time, I need ingredients that are easy to get my hands on. I don’t like to have to dedicate a lot of time to the kitchen, so I need variety and the opportunity to make something easy.
John Tenn
ReplyDietInspection.com
What is healthy for MOST of us may not be so for those with food allergies (what a revelation). This is not a book for the wheat or nut allergic person...obviously it is written for the general public.
And...duuuhhhHHHHH...it is about the healthiest foods in the WORLD so again an obvious point, unless you live in the big city where exotic ingredients are far easier to access. It is not a book about the healthiest food in the USA...with ingredients from the nearest food store.
ReplyFinally a cook book by someone who knows what they are talking about!
ReplyYay for Jonny.