Customer Reviews

Exchanges for All Occasions

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4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
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What a God-send! The book the nutritionist gave me was too big to take anywhere conveniently and was entirely too broad in it's listings. This shows so many of my favorite foods that I know planning meals for my "new-to-me" diabetic diet is going to be a snap!

I was diagnosed with diabetes just two weeks ago. The dietician at our local hospital introduced me to this book. It is a wonderful resource for tracking consumption of carbohydrates. I look forward to using this book on a daily basis. It is easy to understand and contains volumes of information, for a very small price.

The Pocket Guide is the most recent of the "Exchanges for All Occasions" books. "Exchanges for All Occasions" by Marion Franz has been through 5 "editions" since 1983. Although these books share the same title, they have DIFFERENT SUBTITLES, different ISBN numbers, and are very different books. The history is a little fuzzy, but the earliest editions (C1983, 1986, 1987)were called "Exchanges for All Occasions" and "Exchanges for All Occasions: Meeting the Challenge of Diabetes." They were published by different publishers and their editions and revisions overlapped. The 3rd book was titled, "Exchanges for All Occasions: How to Use the Exchange System for Healthy and Creative Food Choices-3rd Edition," and was published in 1993.

The main book of this group is the 4th edition, titled: "Exchanges for All Occasions: Your Guide to Choosing Healthy Foods Anytime Anywhere-4th Edition." C1997, ISBN 1885115350. This book is very, very good, and also very, very rare. When it can be found, it goes for about $40.00. It is a terrific book and its exchange lists include "carb-counting," WHICH THE PREVIOUS EDITIONS DO NOT, along with good information about meal planning, carb-counting your own recipes, and dining out. It has a salmon cover and is a 5.5" x 8.5" trade paperback. If it can be found, it is very expensive. I have one and probably wouldn't part with it for any amount of money (within reason).

This great little pocket guide was published in 2000. It has the identical salmon-colored cover as the trade paperback 4th edition, but it is a tiny book and is titled "Exchanges for All Occasions: Pocket Guide to Healthy Food Choices Anytime, Anywhere." This little guide, C2000, ISBN 1885115563, is the book that most of the Amazon reviews for all editions are referring to. Notice the reviews say it is a very handy size. It has the same exchange lists, including carb counting, as the 1997 bigger book, but none of the other information. It is a very handy pocket book with good exchange lists for everything, including ethnic restaurant foods.

All of the different Amazon sale pages for the different editions contain an assortment of different books, and they mostly show the cover of the 4th edition and the good reviews of the pocket edition.

Because the 1997 book is so valuable and so good, you often will find the 3 older editions (1983-1993)listed under the 4th edition's ISBN for a high price, or even the Pocket Guide's ISBN for a moderately high price. The earlier 3 editions of "Exchanges for All Occasions," which were published in the 1980's, do not have carb-counting and do not have the salmon-colored cover of the 4th edition and the pocket edition. These old editions are readily available on Amazon for about $2.50, and sometimes masquarade on the product page of the 4th edition at a high price, or the product page of the pocket edition at a medium price. Buyer beware.

While this small book is very thourough and seems to cover most any food, it has no index in the back, and that can be a problem. Sometimes I just can't find a food using this: it may not be listed in the section I think it should be...and without an index in back, you may not be able to locate it. (I have an older version of this book also, and often used the index. If I wanted to find spagetti exchanges, for instance, all I had to do was look up spagetti in the index and it would show the page number.) It can be frustrating when you need to locate an exchange for a food, but can't find the food in the book.

When will the authors of exchange books realize that what folks who go by food exchanges need is a book with all foods simply listed in alphabetical order, with their exchanges beside them??? When one needs to quickly find an exchange, there's nothing that beats being able to find the foods in alphabetical order!

I have the third edition of HOW TO USE THE EXCHANGE SYSTEM FOR HEALTHY AND CREATIVE FOOD CHOICES. I've never had to worry much about diet as I am petite and never overweight. However, now that I find that I have a bad case of "anemia" I decided I needed some help on the nutrition side of the meal instead of just having things which taste good.

The exchange program was initially developed to help those who need to control calories or people who have diabetes. As active as I am, riding the buses every day and running here and yonder all over town, I need as many calories as I can get. Of course, I don't overdo pastas.

The base of the Food Guide Pyramid, which has replaced the basic four food groups, contains breads, cereals, rice, and pasta -- all food from grains. Because of a severe bout with diverticulosis in 1980, I was told to eat only whole grain breads, no nuts, no popcorn, and a few other restrictions. I soon grew to like the taste of the wheat bread and have preferred it to the white for 25 years. However, in the past two or three years, I have discovered that I can include sunflower seeds in my salad, and actually eat popcorn at the movies. Pasta, I like only variously, not as a steady diet, and I don't like rice anymore at all.

Veggies and fruits make up the next rung on the Pyramid, which I do enjoy, and the milk and meat further up are something I don't use enough, as I do have oesteoporosis (need the calcium) and now the anemia (need meats). About the only fats I eat are in the cooked foods I get at restaurants, which is not excessive. I hardly ever use margarine or butter, and usually the Best Blend of Veg. & Canola Oil for frying (which I don't do very often). The Olive stuff I just can live without.

So it is apparent that I am deficient in all of the things I need to be healthy. Now, if I ate all of that stuff, I wouldn't weigh 99 or 100 pounds ever again. And that's not good. Too many people are so huge they can hardly walk. I walk every day and run sometimes to get the bus I need.

I had decided that all of those fat people ate french fries and junk food all of the time, and that is why they are so big around. Not so, they are eating what they are supposed to, but in excess. I spend so much time sitting at the computer when I am at home, after running around catching the buses, that I often forget to eat. 'Course I do go to the movies and eat popcorn with lots of butter as often as I can, which isn't half enough to keep me occupied.

The recipes listed in the separate sections and the guidelines for food purchasing and special occasions is interesting, but since I am not much of a cook, I can manage what I need on a simple plan. I've learned over the years about fiber, less salt in the diet, pouring off the liquid of canned vegetables and using my own water (gets rid of the sodium) and snacks which I can have and those which cause me gastric disturbance and pain.

This book is a valuable resource to use in place of recipe books and name-brand cookbooks. I especially like the index as it shows everything in alphabetical order so that you can look up what you need at the moment, and the recommended references for each section to do further reading if need be.