One of my go-to paleo cookbooks!
As I mentioned in Monday’s post where I shared her merguez-style meatball recipe, Well Fed 2: More Paleo Recipes for People Who Love to Eat
It’s also incredibly rare for someone to succeed with a self-published cookbook. You have to fight to get noticed, you have to deal with distribution and shipping and storage yourself, along with getting the printing right. It’s a complete crapshoot in most cases. Not only has she succeeded one, she’s succeeded twice. So, my hat goes off to her for that as well.
Layout and design:
The book is organized with an opening section that gives an overview of paleo, her story, the Whole30 paleo cleanse, dealing with social situations when on a restricted diet, and an explanation of how to use the book. Chapters cover: the paleo kitchen, quick meals, sauces & seasonings, protein, veggies & salads, fruits, and conclude with resources such as auto-immune protocol adaptations, metric conversions, and the recipe index. The book has a strong design aesthetic that includes a typeface that deliberately looks worn in a burnt orange color, and a dark brown that mimics kraft paper. It’s very fun, although sometimes the orange on top of the brown is difficult to read. This doesn’t affect the recipes, which are well laid out and also give you additional ideas of how to use the recipe, in addition to a generous notes section, which I love.
Photography:
Every recipe features a full-color, full-page close up photograph, so readers will get a good idea of what they can expect the dish to look like in their kitchen.
Recipes:
Recipes include sunrise spice blend, chorizo sausage, pina colada chicken, oven-fried salmon cakes, plantain nachos, grain-free tabbouleh, sesame cucumber “noodles,” silky gingered zucchini soup, pear and bacon bites, and banana pecan ice cream. All recipes are gluten-, dairy-, legume-, and grain-free.
What I liked about the book:
It’s an approachable, easy handbook to the paleo lifestyle. Invaluable if you are doing a Whole30 cleanse. Wonderful whole foods recipes. I have tried the merguez spice blend and sausage recipe, olive oil mayo, zingy ginger dressing, and the romanian meatballs. I didn’t love the cloves in the last recipe, but otherwise have enjoyed all of them very much. I also appreciate that every recipe provides serving sizes, prep and cook time, and many give you suggestions on what to pair the recipe with.
I wasn’t so keen on:
Recipes were not coded for special diets (although the whole book is gluten-free, dairy-free, and grain-free); nutritional analysis is not provided, which would be helpful for low-sodium eaters.
Recommended for:
paleo, Whole30, celiacs, gluten-free eaters. Okay for migraine if you know your triggers well. Okay for low-sodium eaters if you omit the salt in her recipes, as they are whole foods recipes that are naturally low in sodium otherwise.
Not recommended for:
vegan or vegetarian diets
A note about my cookbook reviews: In the past, I tested at least three recipes from each book, took photos, and described my experience. Due to my dietary limitations (extremely-low-sodium for my Meniere’s Disease and trigger-free foods for migraine relief), it is no longer possible for me to test the recipes without changing them significantly.
Required FTC disclosure: I received one copy of this book from the author/publisher for the giveaway on November 27th, 2015.
Here’s the book if you want to see more:
I have this one! I have the e-version, so it’s not quite as pretty, but I look forward to digging into it and seeing what I come across that I enjoy. Great review, glad you like the book (for the most part)!