Customer Reviews

Eating on the Run - 3rd Edition

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

 

 

I rarely recommend a book, but I'm feeling that I must now! The book is called Eating on the Run by Evelyn Tribole. This book brings weight management down to its barebones--you learn what your body needs as basic nutrition, how to eat and feel satisfied, the problems with diets and vitamins and how they can hurt you, dispels myths, and how to apply good eating habits efficiently w/o trading taste or satisfaction. You know me, I LOOOOOVE food but I'm just not much of a cook. And like everyone else, I'm just trying to figure out how to take care of my body.

This isn't a cookbook, but there are several recipes throughout the book--many and enough to have you up and going with good eating habits. Since it is geared to busy people, it's an easy, straightforward read that really helps you to understand weight management and how to apply it. In other books, I usually learn a lot then forget it because it just isn't realistic.

The author has a regular column (Recipe Makeover) in Shape magazine, is the spokesperson for the American Dietetic Association, and qualified for the 1984 Olympic marathon event. Therefore, she has the credentials.

So, in my most sincerist verve, I totally recommend reading this book as a way to change eating habits and understand weight management for yourself.

I have two jobs and I travel 3 to 5 hours a day for work. Oh, yes I am "On the Run". The Author gives some GREAT insight into making small yet very powerful changes to help me make better food choices. I am very glad I have her book and I would recommend it to anyone else who does not like to cook, is always on the run and has very little time to dedicate to meal preparation. The Author hits a Home-Run... She did not get 5 out of 5 because that would mean the book was perfect and come on what book or anything is truly perfect? Great Job ! ! !

As a person who finds it hard to fit in meals between appointments, I found this book to be an outstanding nutritional resource. Tribole really packs this book with helpful comparison charts, such as comparisons of energy bars (please expand!), best bets in frozen cuisine, and brand-name snacks. The "one-minute specials" recipes, grocery shopping tips, and fast-food best bet chart were also extremely welcome. There is a section for weight-loss too, though it doesn't take over the book, which is broad in scope for all readers to enjoy. In fact, this is the most practical book on nutrition for busy people with real lives that I have seen. I highly recommend it.

The third updated edition of EATING ON THE RUN offers a host of tips on how to eat well despite a hectic schedule. From options for speedy grocery shopping and recipes which streamline meal preparation time to tips on eating right while away from home and insights on different diet perspectives, EATING ON THE RUN is more than a manual for busy people: it offers all the basics on how weight is lost and kept off, for families and individuals alike. Any library will find it a popular pick.

Diane C. Donovan
California Bookwatch

The bookshelves are full to bursting with nutritional self help books, many of which rely on fads and unsubstantiated approaches to diet that may actually hurt you and are difficult for the average person to stick to.

This one is definitely not in that category. It was recommended to me by a registered dietitian at the Mayo Clinic, where they do in fact know how to help you eat better, and so does this book.

First, what it's not: This is not a weight loss guide. Though it has a chapter on weight control, weight management is not its primary purpose. This is also not a book targeted at athletes, business people, or any other single group - though, again, there are chapters that discuss the particular nutritional needs of athletes, the challenges of eating while traveling or heavily involved in work demands, and indeed a number of different situations. This is also not a book that will give you lots of exhaustive tables with nutritional information, and though it does include a section with nutritional information from restaurants, commercial menus change so frequently that is actually not a helpful feature.

Instead, the book tries to reshape our thinking about nutrition and eating in general and help us find a way to fit a healthy approach to eating into a busy lifestyle. The author recognizes that few people can spend long hours in the kitchen to prepare elaborate healthy meals, and in fact, many of us don't get near our own kitchens during a typical day. She makes a persuasive case that sensible, healthy eating is possible anyway, for everyone. She offers very specific suggestions, some of which may surprise you - for instance, she describes sitting down in a McDonald's for a breakfast interview with a reporter who watched her food order closely - she ordered pancakes, syrup, and orange juice. She explains her choice in detail. And she offers a very sensible, easy approach to making your food choices over the course of a day or week. There is a section of extremely simple recipes, including one with recipes for single serving meals that take 60 seconds or less to prepare - no kidding. The simplest one is a breakfast "recipe" that she offers to those who "don't have time for breakfast:" Pour glass of skim milk. Drink. Pour glass of orange juice. Drink.

The book has many, many references to solid academic research as well as several useful tables listing things like the fiber content and glycemic index of common foods, which, though brief, give the reader a sense of why some food choices may be better than others.

Some readers may be dissatisfied with the author's willingness to include some prepared and packaged foods in her recommendations, and her unwillingness to recommend strongly organic foods will surprise some. Again, remember she is writing this book for people who struggle to find time to eat at all. She's not going to recommend not eating if you don't have organic options in the office vending machine. Instead, she tells you what you could eat from the machine and actually satisfy a few nutritional needs, and then suggests some things you can keep in your desk or briefcase to eat instead of the less healthy vending choices. For a more stringently organic, vegetarian, or vegan approach you will have to look elsewhere.

One major, puzzling error in the book: in the recipe section, a nutritional panel appears for each recipe, listing especially the calorie and fat content of different dishes. In a major proofing error the cholesterol content is listed as grams rather than milligrams. The numbers given, if really in grams, are utterly impossible - nothing has 36 grams of cholesterol in it. Since the book is in its 3rd edition, and I didn't see the earlier ones, I don't know if this is a mistake carried over from earlier editions or if it somehow made its way into this one for the first time. Just be aware that this seems to be a matter of a consistent typo. I spent a bit of time figuring out if the numbers made sense with the cholesterol unit corrected to milligrams and it seemed to me that they did.

If you want a good general book on improving your nutritional habits, I recommend this one highly. It does take some reading, and it doesn't give you step by step directions for your diet, but I have found it very helpful and refer to it often.

This book covers the basic needs to stay in line for nutrition.
This book gives one the awarness of what we eat and how it can effect us.
Fast food information and how what we eat can be good or bad for our diet

This was very disappointing - most of the tips are applicable only to the normal 9-5 socceer mom types - does nothing for those living and working in high-stress, high pressure, long day, frequent travel jobs - stock brokers, traders, IT personnel. Recommend the Wall St. Diet more real world - real time solutions.

Just read the Syndrome X book and found this to be an invaluable nutritional source for those professionals on the go who care about their health.