Customer Reviews

The Food Allergy News Cookbook: A Collection of Recipes from Food Allergy News and Members of the Food Allergy Network

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Although there was some helpful information on item substitutions and explanations of specific foods and their cooking properties, I felt that overall the cookbook did not serve its purpose as a basic, general cookbook.

It says, "Over 300 easy-to-prepare recipes" but what they fail to tell you is that 250 of them are dessert-type recipes i.e. cakes, cookies, pastries, etc. The focus was not on nutritious meals for a main course. Most moms, I would think, are concerned about how they can make nutritious, yet simple meals for lunch and dinner that the whole family would enjoy. Since children with allergies have many nutrients removed from their diets due to often times several, severe food allergies, it is a challenge to find tasteful, yet nutritious recipes especially for toddlers. My least concern is how to make desserts for a 2 year old but rather how to teach her to enjoy a variety of healthy foods.

On a positive note, I think the cookbook would fare well if the title were different emphasizing the large percent of recipes focused on sugar and sweets.

When we first found out our daughter had multiple food allergies we bought this book after getting tons of great info from FAAN. (FAAN is a wonderful resource, everyone dealing with food allergies should join.)

Unfortunately, I think that this cookbook leaves a lot to be desired. We found ourselves disappointed by many of the recipes we tried in here; particularly, the wheat-free recipes often came out with very poor texture.

For baked goods and especially desserts, I'd recommend Cindy Moseley's "Great Foods Without Worry" over this one. We also routinely use some of the recipes from the "Gluten Free Gourmet". This might be a good third or fourth book if you're looking for more ideas.

This book has many good recipes, but it does not include any info about corn allergy. And, many of the recipes contain ingredients that are sources of hidden corn. This would not be a good cookbook for anyone that has been recently diagnosed with corn allergy. But recipes can be adapted to be corn-free, by people who know how to do it. Some recipes call for ingredients that contain sulfites. So people who are sulfite sensitive should use caution, too.

This is just a great book for any person with almost any food allergy. I thought my son would never be able to eat ice cream, being allergic to eggs, but they have a recipe for that too! It is a real life saver! It has main dishes to dessert, a must for anyone dealing with food allergies!

I was looking for a real cookbook with a VARIETY of ideas including NEW meal ideas. The back of the book states "A full range of menu ideas . . ." Not true. Of the 300 recipes in the book, about 250 are for cookies, cakes, pies, sweet breads, muffins and other dessert type items. There are only 50 recipes in the "Main Meals" chapter and it looks like they were stretching to fill the chapter. About 10 of the recipes in "Main Meals" are made of potatoes such as "Potato Fans": slice a potato, sprinkle with salt and bake. Wow. I can barely contain myself. Four of the recipes were for more breads like corn bread and then the all-to-creative Chicken & Rice and Pizza --which is what I'm trying to get away from. I wanted was some NEW creative ideas for meals or side dishes. I will keep looking for a better book.

Anyone who has struggled to cook within the boundaries of food allergies will benefit greatly from this cookbook. Alternative ingredients can be expensive, so this book can save the reader a great amount of money and frustration in the pursuit of the tasty final product! It is a wonderful resource for the cooking challenged like myself!

This cookbook has very imaginative, easy recipes that are better tasting than what you find in many standard cookbooks. While I agree with the reader who calls it a "dessert cookbook", preparing main courses for someone with food allergies is much easier, ie I don't cook fish dishes because my daughter has a fish allergy. However finding baking recipes without eggs or nuts is much more difficult. This book does an excellent job and you never feel as though you are compromising.

I have read many allergy cookbooks in the past. This is the easiest and best one I have found. It uses ingredients I have actually heard of. I gave my copy to a friend and found I couldn't live without it, so I bought another one!

This was one of the first allergy cookbooks that we bought when we found we were faced with mutliple severe food allergies.

Long on baked goods - short on meals, but still a handy reference, and uses easily accessible ingredients. No pink elephants on the ingredient list. All sorts of cookies, cakes, muffins, bars, desserts, pancakes etc.

Easy to read and easy to make recipes.

We have tried many recipes from this one. My daughter's favorite dessert is the swirl cake that we make based on the recipe of this book. That is enough of a positive review for me.

My son has complicated, chronic health issues which greatly restrict what he can and can not eat. This cookbook, which we bought after maxing out our renewals of our local library's copy, has given us several recipes that we have adapted to his diet. And the whole family enjoys the result!

This was a huge help to us. We'd love to make some contributions if another edition were to ever come out!