Reviews
Best way to eat good!
My wife and I have been changing how we eat since August of 2009. Together since then we have lost over 117 pounds! Hungry Girl has been helping us to eat healthier but not miss any of the taste! LOVE HUNGRY GIRL! We try recipes almost daily. Easy step by step instructions with all the nutrition info we need to manage in weight watchers! You gotta get these cookbooks! ALL of them!
"Guilt-Free" does not necessarily mean healthy
I checked this out from the library because the title sounded promising. I was hoping for easy and guilt-free recipes. To me, "guilt-free" means eating healthy foods and that is not what all of the recipes in this book are. My mistake. The definition of "guilt-free" in this book is "low fat and low calorie" even for recipes with poor nutrional profiles. Quite a number of recipes in this book have just such profiles.
I have read a lot of good books on nutrition, my favorite one currently is Pollan's "In Defense of Food". I do not count calories and I do eat whole, natural foods and not too much white sugar as recommended in that book (and because of that book, I have switched from reduced-fat products (which are processed in order to obtain fat reduction) to regular "whole" products). I have lost weight by doing this.
Many of the recipes in "Hungry Girl 1-2-3" are in direct opposition to the research/advice found in books such as "In Defense of Food" and "The Belly Fat Cure". These books promote eating whole, natural foods to increase health; weight loss can be a benefit, as well. We now know that we need healthy fats for good health - the low fat advice of the past has been discredited. Many Hungry Girl recipes call for highly processed foods, including egg substitute and reduced fat and fat-free foods, as well as products with partially hydrogenated oil & fake sweeteners.
I have not actually tried any of the recipes yet (most of the other reviewers here have not, either, apparently) but a few of the recipes do sound good (and do have what I consider healthy ingredients for myself) plus I have gotten some ideas for my own recipes from even the ones with highly processed ingredients (there are a couple I want to try but will substitite real food for the fake ingredients). Ultimately, though, I prefer cookbooks where I don't have to modify. Some of the Hungry Girl 1-2-3 recipes feature very few ingredients and that also appealed to me...however, food quality matters. I highly recommend Rozanne Gold's "Recipes 1-2-3" and "Low Carb 1-2-3" for recipes with only 3 ingredients (prep is not always simple or quick, though). Also, the mini recipes in Jacques Pepin's "Fast Food My Way" are very good and easy to prepare.
On the positive side, there are a lot of recipes that do not use processed foods and look to be very easy to prepare. Overall, though, it is disappointing to find that these recipes are labeled "guilt-free" solely because they are low in calories and fat and not because of the quality and nature of the ingredients. So, I would not make a lot of these recipes for my family or myself based on what I believe to be guilt-free (healthful) eating.
Forget the bookmarks--mark the whole book!
I purchased this book a month ago on Amazon and have been anxiously awaiting its debut. Since it came in the mail today I have not been able to put it down. I want to make everything in it! I started marking pages with strips of paper I ripped off the packing slip but quickly ran out of paper. Then I moved on to bending corners... pretty soon I realized there was few pages left unmarked so I gave up! I think I could make any of these recipes for my husband and he wouldn't even realize I made a low fat and healthy version of his favorite food. That is the true test--if a non-dieter can enjoy and even ask for dishes made from a guilt-free recipe book! I have used my 200 under 200 recipe book at least 5 times a week since I got it for Christmas and can't wait to begin trying all these tasty new dishes. We are hooked on Hungry Girl!
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