Super foods Every Day by Sue Quinn is an interesting little cookbook. So interesting, in fact, that the 14-year-old pseudo-daughter took one look at it and said, “I want that!” …that’s a first.
This little 160-page book is laid out in the best way possible for quick digestion. The first eleven pages gives a pretty good primer for what defines a super food and the individual benefits of each superfood. After the primer, every two pages is a recipe. The first page has a beautiful picture of each individual ingredient, a list of the ingredients and amounts needed for the recipe and a quick look at the vitamins and minerals the dish contains. The next page shows a quick blurb on the potential benefits of the dish, a beautiful picture of the finished product and the directions for putting the dish together.
This small book is about the size of a small tablet and sits in your hands quite nicely. However, I think the binding makes a bit difficult to put it on the kitchen counter open to the recipe being made. For someone experienced in the kitchen, probably not an issue, for a 14-year old trying to learn to make things she thinks are yummy and healthy, not being able to just go back and forth to the book is a turn off.
I think its also important to remember superfood doesn’t mean healthy. The subtitle for this book is 65 recipes for optimal health. I would have liked to see the nutrition breakdown for each and every recipe because I’m not sure the recipes in this book fall under the “optimal health” heading. Let’s take the Nutty Grilled Lettuce (p72) as an example.
The potential benefits of this meal are:
1. protects against cardiovascular disease and cancer
2. lowers cholesterol
3. regulates blood sugar
4. supports skin health
5. antibacterial
the ingredients include:
1. 2 tablespoons of mayonnaise
2. 2 tablespoons of crème fraiche
3. sea salt flakes
4. freshly ground pepper
5. 3 large romaine lettuce hearts
6. extra-virgin olive oil
7. 3 large hard boiled eggs
8. 3 tablespoons of hazelnuts
If you are trying to prevent cardiovascular disease and have a genetic proclivity towards high triglycerides leading to high cholesterol, then I’m pretty sure both mayonnaise, crème fraiche and 3 large eggs are right off your list of optimally healthy ingredients. …And maybe romaine lettuce does have the benefits listed above, but this meal, as is, doesn’t even come close to the potential benefits listed.
My family, due to health reasons, works really hard to have optimally healthy meals every single day. Even after the example above, this is really one of the first cook books I’ve received for review (this one from blogging for books), we’ve been able to consider trying out the actual recipes. With a few minor tweaks and substitutions, this book could help one truly eat as healthy as possible from breakfast to dessert.
