Customer Reviews

The Complete Idiot's Guide to Vegan Living

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I've been a vegetarian for the past 8 years, and my New Year's resolution this year was to go "all the way" and eliminate all animal products from my life. This book has been a great help, especially with all the cooking and recipe info. I still have a ways to go, though, especially with "veganizing" all of my household items. A highly recommended book!

Good book. Great for starting vegans. The author has a website as well www.veganchef.com where she has a full cook books worth of recipes that you can use for free. Ms. Bennett is a huge asset to vegan culture whether you are christian, buddhist, athiest. agnostic, or hari krishna. She proves this through her book & website.

The Complete Idiot's Guide to Vegan Living is a wonderful resource for anyone considering going vegan. It covers all the angles-health, ethical, social, and culinary. There is also a sampling of Beverly Lynn's recipes (she also has a great recipe site called The Vegan Chef).

The book's chapters are broken down into short, manageable sections. The tone does not play up on guilt, as some vegan books do, but instead encourages the reader by taking the intimidation out of veganism.

I highly recommend this book for anyone considering an animal-free lifestyle.

Overall, this book is a pretty good beginning resource for the new vegan, or for those like I am, in the process of experimenting with and transitioning to veganism. It covers common types of vegan staples (such as tofu, tempeh, soy cheeses, milk substitutes, and legumes), hidden animal ingredients to look for (such as carmine red and "natural flavorings"), good ideas for all of the daily meals, non-food-related vegan issues (such as wardrobe, household cleaners, and candles), rebuttals of common myths about veganism, the myriad of health benefits associated with a vegan diet, how to handle eating out, and how to cope with the non-vegans in one's midst. And the book doesn't seem really preachy, holier than thou, or guilt-tripping. The authors stress that such a big sea change in both diet and lifestyle can't happen overnight, and should take place at one's own pace. It's also great how they acknowledge that it's probably impossible to be 100% vegan, no matter how seriously one takes the commitment. There will probably still be some foods, clothing, and household products with unknown non-vegan ingredients that slip through the cracks. The most important thing is to do the best one can.

As wonderful of a resource as the book otherwise is, though, I wished there had been a chapter covering the ethical reasons behind going vegan, not just the health benefits. Granted, the issue of factory farming was covered in depth in 'The Idiot's Guide to Vegetarianism' and they might not wanted to have significant overlap between these two similar books in the series, but it can never hurt to repeat and reword such important information, particularly since it seems to be the main reason most people go vegan. And while they did say that higher prices mean the food is higher quality (one always does get what one pays for), buying only or mostly organic isn't always an automatic guarantor of getting the best food available. Not everyone can afford the grocery bills that go along with buying the more expensive organic versions of normal foods, and there isn't always a huge difference between organic and regular. A number of the recipes (and they are great recipes) thus call for ingredients that are going to be rather expensive and/or hard (if not downright impossible, depending upon where one lives) to find. In spite of what the ultra-health-conscious crowd might say, I really don't think it's going to be jeopardizing my health if I use white flour and wheat grains instead of making a total switch to whole grains only. One can easily be a successful vegan without having a pantry and fridge stocked full of organic foods and hard-to-find products like oat flour and amaranth.

My other major issue with the book was the anti-vaccination section in the chapter on raising vegan kids and having a healthy vegan pregnancy. I kind of think that saving a life takes precedence over all else, even if it means having to violate one's ordinary beliefs and lifestyle. Better a baby get non-vegan vaccines and thus be able to live a full healthy life as a vegan than be at risk for being killed, maimed, or disabled by a scary disease like measles, polio, rubella, whooping cough, or diphtheria. A lot of the "information" in this section was just plain false, like claiming that vaccines cause autism (that ridiculous claim has been debunked by all of the reputable medical and scientific sources), that vaccines cause more harm than good and aren't usually effective (was this section written by the anti-vaccine radicals at Mothering magazine or something?!), that there are a lot of bad side effects (not mentioning that that's only true in a small minority of cases!), and that some vaccines contain mercury (only the flu vaccine still contains mercury, and only trace amounts). Reading blatantly false propaganda like this really raises my blood pressure, and it had no place in an otherwise very sound and researched book!

In spite of some questionable portions, I would recommend the book to someone who's just become a vegan or who is interested in becoming one, but only to be used as a supplement with other vegan-related books that cover some of these issues in more depth.

As the authors state 'vegetarian is a diet - vegan is a lifestyle'. And, I speak as a vegan, they pulled all the elements of that lifestyle together for me in one place. In a fun way. This gives me a way to think about what, how and why I choose to live this lifestyle and enables me to communicate those things with others. I'd like to add a plug here for Vegan With a Vengeance. Isa Chandra Moskowitz writes really fun and well-researched cookbooks. Also, I take many cues and inspirations from (the practically saintly, in my eyes) Colleen Patrick-Goudreau and her podcast from Compassionate Cooks. Don't miss it.

I have been a lacto-ovo vegetarian for many years, and have recently become a vegan. I am so glad to have found this book. It is full of great information and has helped me with an easy transition. I'm sure I'll be using this book as a reference quite frequently. And the recipes are great too!

I was vegetarian for 3 months and woke one morning with an epiphany- I should go vegan. I researched many issues online, such as the AR reasons to go completely vegan and dietary needs. This book filled in the gaps.
I disagree with the reviewer who mentioned that this book should list specific ethical reasons for veganism. Most people transitioning, aside from the "Skinny Bitch" phenomenon, are doing so because they know the horrors of factory farms. There is a small discussion on wool, but I felt even that was superfluous. I also disagree with the notion of the tone being haughty. This book is not about persuasion, but simply an instruction manual of sorts. There is nothing wrong with it seeming authoritarian when the "complete idiot" is looking for a firm resource.
There are some questionable chapters, as previously mentioned, but the value of the other sections out weighs the misinformation. The authors probably believe these things in their hearts, and it is up to the reader to decide whether or not to vaccinate or eat raw or what have you. I have found many vegan and vegetarian books to have strange ideas or "facts" that weren't cited, which is one reason why I went vege only 2 years ago. The authors have listed other sources, so the reader can research and get straight facts or make up their minds.
I found this book to be excellent. I've cooked several of the recipes, which were delicious and easy enough for a so-so cook to create. I often refer back to the guide, even a year later. If you're even considering living vegan this book is invaluable.

I am transitioning to vegan and tried before but didn't know a lot about it. This book was easy to understand and very helpful. It did repeat itself on certain things but it even had starter recipes. I would reccomend this to anyone just starting out. It gives you reasons why this is good for your health. It is also good for the enviroment. If you have questions and are even thinking about going vegan or curious, this book is for you.

As a vegetarian going vegan, the table of contents promised to answer a lot of my questions, such as will I be able to keep my weight and what is a good vegan diet for physical excercise.
To my disappointment, many of the headlines covered only chit-chatty chapters on the subjects, revealing the authors' lack of authority on the basic nutrition.
What's even worse is, I found the general tone quite self rightious, which in my oppinion is a very poor way of advocating vegan living.

Vegan Living is a great book to understand what does it means to be vegan. Is the easiest way to become vegan trough recepies, vegan support groups, etc.