Customer Reviews

Dana Carpender's NEW Carb and Calorie Counter-Expanded, Revised, and Updated 4th Edition: Your Complete Guide to Total Carbs, Net Carbs, Calories, and More

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

She is the reigning queen of low-carb cuisine and for good reason-Dana Carpender knows her stuff when it comes to easily making a carbohydrate-restricted eating plan a part of a normal, everyday way of life. While the media and health pundits choose to denigrate low-carbohydrate nutrition for whatever their reasons, people like Dana just keep living by example and sharing with the world the knowledge and experience she has attained as a decade-plus low-carb veteran. And more than anything else, she recognizes that people need help keeping track of their carbohydrate and calorie intake which is why she's released Dana Carpender's NEW Carb and Calorie Counter-Expanded, Revised, and Updated 4th Edition: Your Complete Guide to Total Carbs, Net Carbs, Calories, and More.

When a book has been through four updates and revisions, you know it's a useful tool for people and this book is no exception. In typical Dana Carpender style, whose line of low-carb cookbooks are heralded by any serious low-carb dieter, she starts off by telling you the basics of livin' la vida low-carb and how to make the most of her 350-page mass paperback book. Useful tips, health checklists, common health problems improved by low-carb nutrition, ways to enhance your low-carb lifestyle, and gentle encouragement dominate the first 30 pages.

It's a great refresher course for those of us who have been eating this way for a long time or an outstanding introduction to a whole new way to think about healthy eating for those who are new to carbohydrate-restriction. I especially liked her section "10 Great Snacks for 5 grams of Net Carbs Or Less!" to help all you road trippers know exactly what to bring with you to stick with your low-carb plan. She even does the same for national fast-food and popular sit down restaurants telling you EXACTLY what to order at places like Burger King, Hardee's, Denny's, KFC and even Pizza Hut! This is a nice book to keep in the glove compartment of your car for speedy reference while traveling.

The bulk of the book is in a table format with the name of the food or beverage, serving size, calories, total carbs, fiber, net carbs, protein, and fat listed for each. It begins with 16 pages of beverages, then 107 pages of common foods you would purchase for your family to eat, and finally nearly 200 pages of all the nutritional information about the foods you would order at a restaurant. I suppose it's a sign of our times that restaurants would receive nearly DOUBLE the amount of space in a book like this, but I'm all about arming people with information that will help them make better choices for the sake of their health. And Dana has done just that with this newly updated version of her carb and calorie counter book.

Love this book! A wealth of information. Very easy to understand and a great little helper to put in your bag. I purchased The Calorie King, Calorie Fat & Carbohydrate counter, his book is okay, if you eat a lot of fast foods out. I don't! Now, Dana Carpender's New Carb & Calorie Counter is the BEST! I enjoy it so much it has become one of my food bible's.

I am basically a low carb eater. My body responds better to less bread, wheat, pasta, etc. Dana Carpender's cookbooks contain delicious recipes, and this fourth edition of her Calorie and Carb Counter includes 200 new entries - including more prepared foods and fast food restuarant menu items.

If you want a guide with popular upscale restuarant items, then get the South Beach Diet Dining Out guide. South Beach also has a Calorie and Carb counter guide.

If you want a calorie counter with pictures, get the Calorie King 2010 which also includes a diabetic guide in the back.

Look for Dana's new book "1001 Low-Carb Recipes: Recipes That Let You Eat All of the Foods You Love and Have Your Low-Carb Diet Too" on March 1, 2010.

This new cookbook is a combination of the best Low-Carb Recipes from 500 Low-Carb Recipes, 15-Minute Low-Carb Recipes, 500 More Low-Carb Recipes, 200 Low-Carb Slow Cooker Recipes, The Low-Carb Barbeque Book, and Low-Carb Smoothies.

I saw all the wonderful reviews and bought it for the Kindle. When I tried searching for Yogurt I quickly discovered I could not click SEARCH and be taken directly to it. There isn't even an index to locate a food and then enter the page number. Useless digitally. I could find a food faster in the paper edition.

Ms Carpender has provided a valuable service to low carb nutrition adherents. She has provided a useful, though incomplete, reference that includes a lot of fast food restaurant menus. Since studies continue to show that low carb nutrition is one of the healthiest ways to eat, Ms Carpender's entire line of low carb books, including her basic review of low carb nutrition and her multiple low carb cookbooks, should grace every kitchen bookshelf and their pages should show the wear of continued use.

The biggest drawback to the book is that it does not provide information for fast food meals when the bread is removed. For example, a Burger King Whopper might check in at 50 gm of net carbs or thereabouts. One cannot find, though, the carbs that are in the bun, but one can order a whopper without the bun and reduce the net carbs to about 3. Providing this information would really help.

As a physician who believes in the benefits of low carb nutrition, and who thinks that much of the diabetes, obesity and heart disease problems are exacerbated by the low fat diet recommendations of the past four decades, I would recommend Ms Carpender's books.

Strengths of this book are that it is organized alphabetically, which can make finding some things easier without sorting through an entire section. Lots of fast food entries, though might consider altering these regionally or special insert sections to cover more ground in each region as chains do vary quite a bit geographically. It is good to include the fiber grams for healthy eating purposes but ADA does not currently recommend subtracting fiber from carbs and might lead some diabetics astray in sticking to a total carb count daily vs net carb count. Some fiber grams or other products like sugar alcohols are ultimately digestible and can affect blood sugar to a degree, which is largely why ADA's recommendation is to count all carb grams. Overall, a good book for those seeking a healthier lifestyle or for new diabetics who need to watch their carb intake.

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I could not find a calorie count for pears, for instance, but there is a calorie count for just about everything on any fast food menu. My point being, this is more for people who eat out a lot.

I wanted a carb counting ebook so the I could quickly search the carb counts of foods. I really wanted the Calorie King book(not available in ebook format,) but for under $6, I thought that I would give this a try. I wasted $6...

While you can increase the font size of the written part of the book, the *important* part, the reason that you BUY the book, is the carb and calorie charts. These you cannot enlarge, and even on a new laptop with a 15.6 inch screen, the information is too small to read and is blotchy. The preview of the book does NOT show this. Shame on you Amazon!

In the end, I bought the $9 Calorie King paperpack at a local store. Save your money on this ebook. Don't buy it. One star... only because I can't give it zero.

Love Dana, always. Good comprehensive list of foods, with highlighted column for the net carbs. Wish this column had come first on the list - maybe that's the only request I could make, then maybe other columns could come highlighted as well - like protein - which is important to me too. But as always, Dana rocks!

Lots of carb counts of fast food --over half the book!and no reason to list them because most of the info is available in store or online. Same with the tons of name brand frozen, canned, or bagged foods...the counts are on the package. But nowhere is there a count for dry sherry or a red onion. Also, weirdly organized. All kinds of fish are listed under the heading of fish, but a beef flank steak shows up under f. Is it alphabetical or by category? You just have to search and take your chances. And will someone PLEASE give a carb count by weight instead of volume for lettuces and other vegetables? Not what I expected from the Queen of Low Carb Cooking.