14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Fascinating Exploration of Thai Recipes for Eating and Well-Being, February 3, 2010
This review is from: The Elements of Life: A Contemporary Guide to Thai Recipes and Traditions for Healthier Living (Hardcover)
The Elements of Life may look like a coffee table book, but it is so much more. It serves as a doorway into the Thai way of life and traditions. Follow the steps and the adventure begins. For the interested reader, this book enables an uncomplicated method of incorporating Thai recipes for food and health/well-being.
The first step is to use the included Elements of Life wheel to determine the reader's applicable Home Element. This step took only a couple of minutes. The elements are earth, water, wind and fire. An individual may have one or two home elements. Once the home element is determined, the Basics Chapter offers general guidance. Read that section first and then turn to the applicable home element chapter for specific guidance for eating and well-being. The entire process is fascinating and encompassing. After using the Elements of Life wheel my home element result was approximately 2/3 water and 1/3 earth. Both the water and earth chapters apply to me, with a stronger emphasis on water.
I first checked the Earth chapter. The contents include Food for Health, Hot weather recipes, Rainy weather recipes, a chart that incorporates the aromas and flavors of the element making it easy to see how to add items most beneficial to me in my cooking and life based on my home element(s). The Bliss section of the chapter offers advice to optimize physical being and includes recipes for facial masks, a foot rub, hair conditioner along with a section of special scents (like cedar, sandalwood, patchouli, juniper berry, etc.) that are complimentary, massage oils, sachets and finally traditional remedies for minor ailments. The Water and other home element chapters are similarly organized.
The book is lushly illustrated although every dish is not pictured. Not surprisingly, the user should be willing to search out specialty ingredients for the recipes. I prepared the Cambodian Salad with Chicken, Smoked Salmon, Mushroom and Arugula Salad, and Cool Rice Vermicelli with Grilled Shrimp, Fire-Roasted Anaheim Chile, and Sweet-Sour Sauce. The recipes were delicious and instructions clear.
This is much more than a cook book, it is an introduction to Thai traditions. The book is carefully crafted by Su-Mei Yu and her desire to share her wonderful culture with the reader is evident on each page. I treasure my copy of this beautiful book and recommend it to all.
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2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A good thai cook book with simple healthy recipes, December 29, 2010
This review is from: The Elements of Life: A Contemporary Guide to Thai Recipes and Traditions for Healthier Living (Hardcover)
A well written book with some interesting yet simple and healthy recipes. There's some beautiful pictures, but I wish it had more pictures of the final dish. I also like that it included some natural recipes for facials and foot soaks.
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5.0 out of 5 stars
This book is unique!, October 20, 2011
This review is from: The Elements of Life: A Contemporary Guide to Thai Recipes and Traditions for Healthier Living (Hardcover)
The most important part of this book is the "elements of life", because the point of eating - it's consuming right product of nature, that provide comparable for your own type energy. So, the whole idea of this book is not just "nice Thia recipes" and "Thia philosophy". Last century, human's life style turns from natural to convenience way, from personal preference to mass way, from energy to calorie, that all things actually brakes connection with your own body and create misunderstanding of its real needs and natural ways that life works! . ...and substitutes by dieting, pills and all kinds of unnatural and unbalanced way to correct that mistake. That particular book provides thousand of years knowledge in very simple way and helps to understand how to find the right food in right time of the day and particular weather, for yourself and each member of the family. This way I found why the potatoes is good for my husband and bad for me..... By the way, it is almost impossible to find such information. This book is unique!
Don't think too much about some Thia or Chinese ingredients, that difficult to find. The most important - to be sure what kind of food it is right for you.
.....But in this system I found confusing nuance. It said that if you born premature, you need to add that time to your B.D. date...I add and was completely wrong in definition of my "home element. So, I used my real (premature)B.D. and everything fall in the place!
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