Raw Food Made Easy For 1 or 2 People [Paperback]

Jennifer Cornbleet (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 31, 2005

Getting 5 servings of fruits and vegetables a day has never been so delicious and easy. In  Raw Food Made Easy for 1 or 2 People, well-known cooking instructor Jennifer Cornbleet shares her favorite no-cook recipes, in smaller quantities ideal for one or two people. Essential time-saving tips and techniques, along with Jennifer's clear instructions, prove you don t have to toil in the kitchen in order to enjoy nutritious, delicious raw food.

• Choose from over 100 foolproof recipes, along with lunch and dinner menu plans.
• Enjoy easy recipes that call for common ingredients and basic equipment.
• Learn how to avoid health-busters like white sugar, white flour, and trans-fats.
• Convert traditional favorite recipes into nutritious treats made from all-natural ingredients.

Editorial Reviews

Review

A chef for Living Light Culinary Arts Institute, Cornbleet has been finessing her hand in the raw food kitchen for quite some time, so it might come as a surprise that her premiere book, Raw Food Made Easy For 1 or 2 People, reduces the craft to the bare minimum. Simple as it may seem, this book accomplishes quite a complex feat: it truly makes raw food easy. After spending ten minutes whipping up your own almond butter, you'll never pay outrageous prices for it again, and the Not Meat Balls will ban cravings for the processed faux-meat varieties. Innovative techniques such as replacing eggs with avocado in mousse and marinating broccoli so that it tastes cooked testify to her understated expertise. -VegNews Magazine

From the Author

My name is Jennifer Cornbleet and I'm the author of Raw Food Made Easy for 1 or 2 People.  I'm here to help you satisfy your appetite at any time of the day or night with recipes that are easy, good for your body, and really delicious.

When you're stressed out, running behind schedule, and hungry...or company's coming...or the kids are clamoring for a snack...raw food recipes are the perfect answer.  All you need are all-natural ingredients from Mother Nature's pantry to quickly create satisfying meals and treats, without turning to processed food that's so often high in cost, but low in taste and nutrition:

• Stir up a large batch of muesli, a breakfast cereal made with rolled oats, raisins, raw nuts, sunflower seeds, and raw honey, to replace the box of commercial cereal that's made with refined flour and sugar and not much nutritional value.
•  Re-define the traditional high-carb, high-fat tuna sandwich by substituting crisp romaine lettuce leaves for bread and a sunflower, almond, celery, parsley, and onion paté for the fish.
• Stuff sweet bell peppers or ripe tomatoes with guacamole for an easy summertime dinner that's ready in minutes, but beautiful enough to serve guests.
• Enjoy silken soups even if you can't or don't want to eat dairy products by letting creamy avocado add richness and smoothness to favorites like cream of tomato, cream of cucumber, and cream of zucchini.
• Keep your salads waist-friendly by combining cucumber, lemon juice, dill weed, yellow onion, garlic and olive for a dressing that is so luxurious you'd never guess it was low fat.  Add a dash of cayenne for a kick of spice.
• Get your teens to eat more vegetables with Latin-inspired raw food favorites like Mexican salsa, made with fresh tomatoes, cilantro, onions, lime juice, garlic, and a dash of cayenne or and a Spanish fig cake made with figs, almonds, walnuts, and fresh berries
• Teach raw food nutritional goodness to children by serving them a banana or talk of celery made with homemade, all-natural raw almond butter and naturally sweet raisins.

Raw food recipes are a wonderful option for busy, health-conscious people who love to eat.  They require no actual cooking time and can be ready in a matter of minutes.  Or you can prepare many of the components to a raw feast in advance so you always have a grab-and-go meal ready when you're hungry.  And because the recipes are raw, the ingredients are loaded with everything Mother Nature intended us to enjoy: vitamins, enzymes, fiber, and scrumptious natural flavor.  

Simple Techniques for Enjoying Raw Food

Eating raw is the most natural thing in the world because every recipe is made with nothing but all-natural, unprocessed ingredients from Mother Nature's kitchen.  Eating raw is also the easiest thing in the world, once you get to know a few basic ingredients, familiarize yourself with some key equipment, and master a few simple techniques:

• For a dairy-free substitute to pour over your morning granola that's more nutritious than boxed non-dairy milk products, simply soak almonds in filtered water and then use a 'mesh bag' or fine mesh strainer to make it ultra smooth.
• For an elegant ladies-who-lunch salad, marinate thinly sliced raw beets in a dressing made with lemon juice, Dijon mustard, olive oil, and herbs and serve the 'tenderized' beets over a plate of mesclun or arugula, topped with raw walnuts. 
• On a cold night, make a simple puttanesca sauce with olives, tomatoes, sun-dried tomatoes, bell pepper, herbs, and olive oil.  Then preheat your oven to a temperature no higher than 200 degrees, turn it off, and place an ovenproof bowl with your sauce inside for about 15 minutes.  Serve the sauce over zucchini fettucine.
• To turn zucchini into wheat-free 'fettucine' slice the crisp green veggie into paper-thin ribbons with a vegetable peeler, spiral slicer, or mandoline. Serve it with the tomato sauce you like best.
• To elevate plain-Jane carrot and celery sticks to hors d'oeuvres status, serve them with a mock sour cream and chive dip made with soaked raw cashews, lemon juice, spices, herbs, and minced fresh chives (or green onions).

There are healthy, delicious raw food recipes that are right for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and those in-between meal times when so many of us fall under the spell of high-sugar, high-fat processed snacks.  And with so many options to choose from, you'll never run out of new ways to add more fresh fruits and vegetables to your everyday eating.

It's all good...and good for you.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 200 pages
• Publisher: Book Publishing Company (TN); illustrated edition edition (August 31, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1570671753
• ISBN-13: 978-1570671753
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 7.9 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (262 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,099 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #9 in Books > Cookbooks, Food & Wine > Natural Foods
  • #28 in Books > Cookbooks, Food & Wine > Special Diet > Healthy
  • #44 in Books > Cookbooks, Food & Wine > Vegetables & Vegetarian

More About the Author

Jennifer Cornbleet is a nationally recognized raw food chef and instructor, and a faculty instructor at the Living Light Culinary Arts Institute. She offers classes, hands-on workshops, and consultations nationwide. Her first book, Raw Food Made Easy for 1 or 2 People, has already sold over 100,000 copies. A companion DVD, Raw Food Made Easy, is also available. Her second book, Raw For Dessert, provides recipes for delicious cakes, cookies, pies, tarts, ice creams, and candies. For more information, visit Jennifer's website at www.learnrawfood.com.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

644 of 653 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Delicious recipes-- you don't have to be a raw foodist to enjoy them, either, June 10, 2006

By 

Joanna Daneman (Middletown, DE USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Raw Food Made Easy For 1 or 2 People (Paperback)

I like a lot of raw things; though I eat a regular diet, I've preferred a lot of my foods raw for years--definitely fruits and vegetables, and some other things that would probably upset a vegan or two.

Cornbleet's book was recommended to me by another Amazon reviewer, and I have to say, this is one book of recipes on raw foods that doesn't require a kitchen full of obscure appliances and a direct pipeline to Whole Food's exotic produce section. You can make most of these recipes from things you find in any grocery, with perhaps the addition of raw nuts like almonds, walnuts and cashews from the Indian grocery store (because they carry them in reasonably good-sized bags and are priced well, too.)

I tried the "Creamy Tomato Soup." This is a kind of gazpacho made simply with tomatoes, avocado, basil or dill, olive oil and some seasoning like salt, onion powder, garlic cloves and pepper. I made a batch, using Adobo powder because I was out of onion and garlic (this is a garlic salt with herbs used in Latin American cooking.) And, yes, think of it, I was out of onion salt and garlic but I did have an avocado and fresh basil. Pretty strange, I'll admit it. I tossed in the best of extra-virgin olive oil we had. Result? A creamy, frothy pink soup, served chilled that tasted like a buttery version of gazpacho. I had to keep from eating the entire batch in one sitting. It was refreshing and soothing. This soup can be lightly warmed if cold soups don't float your boat.

The book has attractive photography, which helps you choose some recipes like raw wraps, either in kale, cabbage or nori wrapping or you might go for the desserts which were numerous and very luscious-looking (fig cake, key lime mousse, berry crisp.) The "spaghetti" made of spiral-cut zucchini with a raw coulis of tomato, dried tomato and other herbs was served with walnut pate "meat balls." We can't eat wheat, and this was a beautiful presentation. Only problem is ONE of us doesn't eat nuts and this book is chock-full-o-nuts. I suppose you can use hemp seed or sunflower seeds if you are anti-nut, but this WILL present an issue for those who are allergic.

The author points out that raw food can be made with a blender and not much else but a cutting board and can be good for campers or motorhome travelers who may not want to go nuts with a stove.

This book has some very tempting but healthy recipes and is a nice way to get your five servings of veg a day without pounding down boring salads or boiled cabbage. Recommended!!

390 of 395 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Life-Changing Book!, November 8, 2005

By 

Kat C. - See all my reviews

This review is from: Raw Food Made Easy For 1 or 2 People (Paperback)

I LOVE Jenny's new book! I have dozens of raw foods books, but this is the only one that makes raw foods cooking successful for me (and my family). The prep time that other books require is what has historically overwhelmed me (I work 80 hours per week) and this book requires virtually none of that. So far, we have fallen in love with Walnut Pate Sandwich, Garden Vegetable Soup, Spinach Apple Soup, Zucchini Hummus, and Brownies. As we try others, I'm sure we'll love them all! This is the book that will change our lives and I HIGHLY recommend it!

260 of 262 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Not only the best but the raw "cookbook" I use most often, April 11, 2006

By 

Patricia D. Biesen "Patricia B" (Chicago, IL) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Raw Food Made Easy For 1 or 2 People (Paperback)

I've been reading about raw foods for years and acquired several books and recipes on-line. I attended the author's demonstration at Karyn's. Unlike some (not all) raw foodists, she looked very healthy and was amiable and non-judgemental. I must use this cookbook 3-4 times a week. I may have to buy a new copy because it is getting so dirty! I have made smoothies, salads, desserts and even actual entrees. With other cookbooks I might have made a smoothie or a soup here or there, with this one I'm creating full raw food courses meals. The zuccinni pasta is great as is the raw chocolate flourless cake and the blueberry tart is genius. It's nice to be able to make things for yourself vs. having to buy them from raw food restaurants (which I'm lucky to be near two). Since I have bought this book I have eaten more raw foods than ever before. I think the author is smart to realize that if the raw food trend is going to catch on, it needs to relate to busy people and communicated in a pleasant, non-preachy way. I can't wait for the next book she writes!