Book Review - Kickass Paleo Freezer Meals

Kickass Paleo Freezer Meals

by Lisa Ujka

 

Rating **** (4 stars)

This cookbook is good, and considering the price you should totally add it to your collection. Why? I already have two or three items on my meal plan from this book. The grain free waffles look delicious. Who would not love the Crock-Pot Jambalaya?  I suppose this is when I should warn you that I spent some time in Louisiana and fell in love with Cajon food.

Three is meatballs, chili, sorbet, ice cream sandwiches, and bacon sweet potatoes - you know food people will actually eat! This has been added to my list of go to cookbooks.

The absolute only reason that this book did not get five stars is because the formatting is not as great as it could have been. Do not worry, there is nothing that will interfere in your cooking. It is just not as tied together as it could have been. It also advertises itself as a book for freezer meals. I do think it would be better served without that since it was not included in the book - at all. There is the whole title not matching the content thing again. That being said, you should still get this book!

Book Review - Beginner Paleo Cookbook

Beginner Paleo Cookbook

by Scarlett Aphra

Rating ***** (5 stars)

It is rare for me to pick up a cookbook and want to make even half of the recipes inside. My children are picky. I can tell from the recipe how big of a panic attack it will produce in L. While I want my children to be healthy - I want to have some sanity left when (if) they move out of the house. 

This is a double gem cookbook. It is a cookbook that I will not only cook more then half of the recipes - it leaves me wanting to try a few of the more adventurous ones as well. 

This book has my children's current favorite recipe - Cinnamon Swirl Pancakes. These pancakes are great with some syrup on top with a side of fruit. They are also great as hamburger buns and sandwich bread. Yes these are our current bread replacer. L was so happy to have a "normal" lunch of PB&Honey. 

There are plenty more recipes to find as well. I can not wait to try the blueberry muffin recipe. The banana walnut bread recipe is on the breakfast menu for next month. The lunch selection is a bit slim, consisting of mostly soup or salad. There are some good looking, and simple, recipes for dinner. I can see us coming back to them in a few more months. By then we will probably have already tried every desert recipe in the book. It includes ice cream, chocolate mousse, brownies, cupcakes, and even chocolate chip cookies. I know my kids will eat those.

The second major bonus of this book is the value. This is not a high priced publication by a big name paleo blogger. It does have the quality of a high priced publication. So you get great recipes for a fraction of a cost - hence the double gem part. 

Book Review - Easy Slow Cooker Recipes for Busy Moms

Easy Slow Cooker Recipes for Busy Moms

by Rachel Ryan

Rating **(2 stars)

This is not a Paleo cookbook - it makes no clams as such. I picked it up in the hopes that it would give me some new slow cooker ideas for dinner. I was getting a bit tired of soups and stews. 

The cookbook has several different sections. It contains appetizers, soups and stews, vegetarian dishes, chicken, beef, seafood, and dessert.

Some of the information before the recipes is useful. It tells you how to make your own vegetable, chicken, and beef stock. This may be a bit basic - but I did not know how to do this - so it was helpful. 

None of the appetizers are even adaptable to Paleo. They all contain rice, cheese, and other yucky stuff. 

The true Paleo friendly section is soups and stews. Hum, this was what I was trying to get away from. The soups are not traditional recipes, one soup is Russian Borshch, and most are at least adaptable to Paleo. 

I find it ironic that his book is being marketed to busy moms and contains recipes such as stuffed poblano peppers in a cream sauce - I want to know what kid is going to beg his mom for that. 

Overal there was not a lot of useful recipes in this book. The book lost a star for not having many Paleo friendly ideas - maybe not fair - but it just does not make it useful to me. It lost two stars for claiming to be both Easy and for Busy Moms and not even including one recipe for the picky child. L would even refuse to eat the desserts, rice pudding, bread pudding, peach cobbler, not picky child friendly at all!

Book Review - Coconut Flour Recipes: 40 Scrumptious Recipes

Coconut Flour Recipes: 40 Scrumptious Recipes

by Ready Recipe Books

 

 Rating ***(3 stars)

Coconut Flour Recipes: 40 Scrumptious Recipes is a book which focuses on using coconut flour in cooking. I was extremely excited to find this book, since coconut flour has become my new fascination. The beginning of the book starts off with some nice information about the nutritional value of coconut flour. However, it should have been proof read better. It is repetitive! Perhaps each section was written by different people without any collaboration? 

What I was really excited about was the recipes. 40 recipes is a pretty decent collection for a cookbook. It includes sections about breads, breakfast, appetizers, entrees, and of course desserts. 

This cookbook is not exclusively Paleo. Most recipes can be easily modified to become Paleo. For example replace the butter with coconut oil. However, a lot of the recipes also use cheese, brown rice flour, and tapioca flour. I do not understand the bread recipe that calls for cheese, then uses coconut milk. 

As of yet the only recipe that I have tried is the basic coconut flour bread. It is not a bread replacement, and the recipe is quite sweet. However, we have been enjoying it all week. I look forward to trying other recipes from this book. 

If you want some ideas for using coconut flour, or some variety, then this is a great book.