Customer Reviews

Natural Gourmet

5 star:		(7)
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This is a great follow-up to The Book of Whole Meals, because the food gets more creative. The first part of the book explains how to balance meals using the Chinese 5-Element system, which really helps in overcoming cravings for junk foods. They also label the recipes so you can figure out how to fit them into the system. I have to admit I've mainly used the book for this purpose. For the recipes, I adjusted them to suit my own taste, and found them satisfying.

This is a great cookbook. The pumkin pie crust is wheat free and it tastes great. It's always a hit at the holidays, and the pumkin pie part of the recipe is dairy free, this recipe is so nutritious that you can eat it anytime. The entire book has some great solutions. And if you are in NYC you should try to take a class at Ann Marie's Cooking School.

This is a superb book! I first discovered Anne Marie Colbin's "Natural Gourmet" back in 1990 while cooking for a friend who had chronic fatigue syndrome. I cooked at least 80% of the recipes for her, and in the process learned a lot about how simple good and healthy food can be to prepare. I learned about the Chinese Five Phases, which have influenced my cooking and eating styles for almost 20 years now. I lost my original copy of this book during a move, so now I'm buying a new one, along with two other of her newer books. The salad recipes are really remarkable, with creative, tasty, and surprisingly simple ingredients. A great book, pure and simple!

AnnMarie Colbin's book is delicious - I bought my first copy when it was published and cooked 75% of the dishes - always a great review from friends who taste-tested! When I moved, it stayed in the moving box for quite some time - the mice enjoyed the pages of recipes as much as I and my friends did!!!! Hence, my ordering a new copy. My kitchen cannot be without this book for an extended period of time and neither should yours.

I purchased The Natural Gourmet around 20 years ago, and have used it and/or its principles in most of my cooking ever since. My old copy got ruined, so I quickly bought this new copy on Amazon.
The recipes are generally delicious, with interesting and unusual flavors, although for some you need to adopt a liking for sea vegitables.
But more than merely listing a series of recipes, this book teaches you how to eat well. It is all about eating a a healthy, balanced, whole foods, mostly vegetarian, diet. It discusses the principles of food selection, including which foods to eat, such as beans, whole grains and fresh local and seasonal fruits and vegetables, and also the foods to avoid, such as refined sugars and processed foods. It teaches how to put together a balanced meal, and includes menues to follow and learn from.
I have learned a lot from this book about proper eating. I recommend it highly.
Sally Necheles

This is a truly wonderful cookbook. I turn to it again and again. It has recipes that range from simple to quite complex, and some of them are pure gems. The tricolor pate is simply one of the finest recipes I've ever encountered and worth the price of the book alone. The tofu quiche is the best I've ever made, and can be varied in many ways. This book expanded my use of some less-used, though still common, herbs and spices. I discovered a love of marjoram, summer savory, and ginger used in unusual ways from its pages.

I could go on for paragraphs singing the praises of this vegan cookbook. And, I'm not even a vegetarian! Buy it. Your taste buds will thank you.

One caveat: the white bean pate is perhaps one of the worst recipes I've ever used. It's an anomaly amongst an otherwise stunning collection of healthy and original recipes.

As the sbtitle says, "delicious recipes for Healthy,BALANCED eating". Recpes are keyed to the Five Phase Theory of eating.