Cookbook & Book Reviews

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It was a day of books in the mail earlier this week.

I received these two books from Book Pubco

The 4 Ingredient Vegan and Vegan Bodybuilding & Fitness books

First up, The 4-Ingredient Vegan

The 4 ingredient Vegan Book cover

A great book because it only uses four ingredients in most of the recipes.

Backside of The 4 Ingredient Vegan book

You know I am a sucker for one-pot meals and fast, easy, uncomplicated recipes.  I have a post dedicated to my one-pot meals and recipes.

This would be a great book for someone who is either a novice cook and needs help pairing common ingredients to make sauces, entrees, or easy desserts, or for anyone who wants to keep ingredient lists short but still enjoy tasty vegan food.

Chapter contents in book

Next up, Vegan Bodybuilding & Fitness by Robert Cheeke

Vegan Bodybuilding & Fitness Book Cover

A wonderful book and I have wanted a copy of it for quite some time!

This says it all:

“Renown for his passion, dedication and determination, Robert Cheeke has inspired athletes, trainers and anyone interested in a strong, healthy body. He has been at the forefront in ushering in a different way to fuel and nourish bodybuilders in an industry riddled with animal-derived body-enhancing supplements. Being one of the most prominent figures in vegan bodybuilding, his advice on diet, training, and other facets of the lifestyle make this book a fantastic resource for beginners and experienced athletes alike.”

Table of contents inside book

These pictures of Robert should inspire anyone and illustrate that you can have mass, i.e. not look like a string-bean, and thrive on a vegan diet.  

Page in oak with man doing a fitness pose

Page in book showing transformation of one mans body

When I did my fitness competition and was new to lifting and training, I read everything I could by Robert Cheeke on the internet.  His insights were invaluable in helping me stay true to my plant-based dietary convictions.  And I placed second in my first show.

And he covers one of my favorite topics in the book:

Chapter 8 in book Where Do you Get Your Protein?

I covered it too.  My Protein FAQs Post is chock full of my ideas about protein, where to get vegan protein, and meal ideas.

Thanks, Book Pub Co for the books!

I have previously reviewed many cookbooks and books in many other posts:

Another Book PubCo Review Here

Asian Fusion book

A Book PubCo review Here

Simple Treats Book

Other Vegan Cookbooks Here

Color Me Vegan Book

Ani’s latest book Here

Ani's Raw Food Essentials Book

Matthew Kenney’s books Here

Entertaining in the Raw and Everyday Raw books

Melisser Elliott’s book Here

The Vegan Girl's Guid to Life book

Go Diary Free.  Such a great book and reference!

Go Dairy Free Book

My Sweet Vegan here

My Sweet Vegan Book

The Thrive Diet Here

Thrive The Vegan Nutrition Guide book

Natural Vegan Kitchen Here

The Natural Vegan Kitchen Book

And a Massive Cookbook Review Here

Shelf full of books

Stacked books on shelves

Stacked Vegan Books up close
Close up of Vegan Books on shelf

Massive Cookbook Review Here

Food Styling & Food Photography Books

Food Styling, i.e. The Bible of everything you’d ever want to know about food styling

Food Styling book

Food Styling For Photographers

Food Styling for Photographers book

Heidi Swanson’s Super Natural Everyday

Super Natural Every Day bookAn amazing cookbook with both outstanding recipes and photography.

On A Stick! by Matt Amermendariz

On a stick bookAll recipes and food in the book is on a stick from pizza and tofu on a stick to caramel popcorn and desserts on a stick.  Matt is amazing and I attended a Real Food Styling & Photography Workshop with him that changed my life!

Helene Dujardin’s Plate to Pixel

Plate to Pixel Digital Food Photography & Styling BookIf you are only going to buy one book, period, on food styling and photography, and on photography in general, THIS is the book to buy.  See my review.  5 stars, amazing, the best.

The Cookiepedia by Stacy Adimando as reviewed here

The book contains recipes for 50 popular cookies.  Although it’s always possible to Google for recipes, read blogs and find recipes, use the online recipe websites, or use your Grandmother’s top secret recipe for the perfect chocolate chip cookie, it’s nice to have 50 popular yet diverse recipes all in one book.

The Cookiepedia Book

Momofuku Milk Bar

This is a mind-blowing dessert cookbook that is not for the faint of heart; either in tasetbuds or ability to devote oneself to time in the kitchen to create masterful desserts. Complete review in this post. I highly recommend this book.

The Momofuku Milk Bar book

The book contains recipes for 50 popular cookies.  Although it’s always possible to Google for recipes, read blogs and find recipes, use the online recipe websites, or use your Grandmother’s top secret recipe for the perfect chocolate chip cookie, it’s nice to have 50 popular yet diverse recipes all in one book.

So yes, I have quite a few books.  More books than time.  And more books than appetite unless I want to adopt a football team. But it’s fun to read, learn, and be inspired!

1. What are your favorite cookbook(s) of all time? Rattle off a few titles that come to mind.   Any genre, not just food/cooking. Any cookbooks you’re dying to own?

What books do you get the most use out of or refer back to time and time again?

I always refer back to Ani Phyo’s books for real-life, practical “I will probably make this or can actually see myself making this” type inspiration.  (Book review here).

And I refer back to Matthew Kenney or Sarma’s books for “I will likely never make this but it’s fun to dream and be impressed” type inspiration. (Book reviews here).

I believe that most all books have some hidden gem in them, and something that is useful, thought-provoking, and inspiring.  That’s why I love books.

 

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Comments

  1. I love “Natural Cures they Don’t Want you to Know About” and “The Know it All: One Man’s Quest to Become the Smartest Person in the World”. I also love “The Outsiders”.

  2. Interesting on the 4 Ingredient book, I need to check that out. And just wow on the body-building book!

    1. Currently all of Ani’s books and Kristen Suzanne’s hemp book. But my faves are always changing.
    2. More vegan cookbooks, I have mostly raw vegan, but would like a decent book for cooked vegan recipes.
    3. Ani’s books too, some of my favorite recipes are in Ani’s Raw Food Kitchen.

  3. Those look like great books. I understand you are pressed for time but I think it would be awesome if you read and did a really through review on the Bodybuilding book. Since you did some bodybuilding and all. I’d love to know how his advice measures up with your experience.

  4. ’And more books than appetite unless I want to adopt a football team.’ this is so funny!

    What a great list of books. I’m loving Sweet Gratitude for looking and ideas, and I agree about Matthew and Sarma’s big fat books that are so photo rich.

    I love David Mitchell’s Cloud Atlas (awesome novel), The Time-Traveler’s Wife, the Everyday Raw/Everyday Desserts books, many many books of poetry–The lives of the heart, Slow fire, several ‘best of’ collections of my favorite poets…

  5. the shabbat box!! hhahaha love it!! my favorite childhood book was goodnight moon! or there was this other one I cant remember teh naem but in the book they always repeated “ill love you forever, ill love you for always, forever and always my baby you’ll be” and my mom to this day, still says that to me :)

    Books have such staying power and are such powerful tools when kids are young! i loved reading!

  6. I am obsessed with cookbooks. I love that you receive so many of them :)

    Currently my absolute favorites-refer-to-them-all-the-time are: both of the Spunky Coconut cookbooks, Go Dairy Free, Veganomicon, Appetite for Reduction, Fire and Spice, 660 Curries, Gluten-Free Recipes for the Conscious Cook, the Almond Flour cookbook, and the Gluten-Free Vegan. That said, there are so many more cookbooks I love like Vegan Yum Yum, Vegan with a Vengeance, the Urban Vegan, Clean Food and Nigella Lawson’s books.

  7. There are several books coming out this spring that I am very excited about. Ani’s new Asian Fusion book (I love Ani’s books too), Mimi Kirk’s (sexiest vegan over 50) first recipe book. Sometime this year Matthew Kenney has a book coming out that is titled something like Everyday Raw Express (no young coconuts and no dehydrating). I think his recipes are exciting, but most more complicated than I want to fool with, so I’m really going to be interested to see what he has up his sleeve in this one.

  8. You made some good points there. I did a search on the topic and found most people will agree with your blog.