Sweet and Natural: More Than 120 Sugar-Free and Dairy-Free Desserts [Paperback]

Meredith McCarty (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 18, 2001

Acclaimed natural foods chef Meredith McCarty brings together simple recipes for pies, cobblers, cakes, cookies, sorbets, and fresh-fruit desserts that are both healthful and delicious. Using fresh fruit, whole-grain flours, natural sweeteners, and light vegetable oils, the recipes range from home-spun classics to spectacular newcomers, including blackberry cobbler, chocolate-pecan bourbon bundt cake, peach and cherry pie, lemon-walnut tea cake, fresh plum galette, raspberry sorbet, orange-ginger oatmeal crunch cookies, fresh strawberry compote with orange-ginger syrup, and many more.

Sweet and Natural is a must-have resource for anyone who wants or needs to eliminate unwanted fat, refined sugar, and cholesterol-and celebrate good health with great desserts.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"[Meredith McCarty's] material is excellent-informative (I learned a lot!), thorough, and very readable." --Rebecca Wood, award-winning author of The Splendid Grain

"Meredith McCarty demonstrates that low-fat vegan cooking can be both delicious and nutritious. Some of these recipes are low fat and to be enjoyed heartily." --Dean Ornish, M.D., author of Dr. Dean Ornish's Program for Reversing Heart Disease and Everyday Cooking with Dr. Dean Ornish

"Lucky us! Armed with decades of experience in natural foods cooking, Meredith McCarty has risen to the considerable challenge of creating great vegan desserts and has given us hundreds of memorable ways to celebrate her sweet victory." --Lorna Sass, author of The New Soy Cookbook

About the Author

Meredith McCarty has been a vegan natural foods chef, instructor, speaker, and consultant for more than twenty-five years. She lives in the San Francisco Bay Area. Her previous book is Fresh from a Vegetarian Kitchen.

Product Details

• Paperback: 272 pages
• Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin; 1st edition (July 18, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0312267827
• ISBN-13: 978-0312267827
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 7 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #628,835 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Recipes for the health minded baker!, March 3, 2005

By 

Sweet pea (WI United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Sweet and Natural: More Than 120 Sugar-Free and Dairy-Free Desserts (Paperback)

I love this cookbook. It has great information on all types of sweeteners and goes through many different types of oils and flours too. The main ingredients she uses in this book for sweeteners are brown rice syrup, barley malt syrup and some have maple syrup. It is pretty easy to find the ingredients and the directions are easy to follow although I am a fairly experienced baker so I do "add lib" when I cook and find that the end result has been great. I made the lemon cake with the sauce but minus the lemon tofu cream because I have a slight allergy to soy. Tofu is definately a required taste and she uses very little in this book and it can easily be omitted.
She does use carob in some recipes so if you do not like carob you can just use cocoa powder or non dairy tropical source chocolate chips. There are quite a few color photos too.
I look forward to making more recipes from this book and the book is worth buying just for the eye opening info she provides on chemicals and how some of our ingredients are processed. It really motivates you to try to find a more natural alternative.

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars More Than Just A Cookbook, November 24, 2002

By 

Jan Cohen (MEDIA, PA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Sweet and Natural: More Than 120 Sugar-Free and Dairy-Free Desserts (Paperback)

The author is so clearly an expert in her field for the way she explains and clarifies her information. She helps you understand the ingredients in the recipes and the need for wholewheat pastry flour, natural sweeteners instead of refined sugar, dairy and its alternatives. I try to live dairy free and have used her information when explaining to friends my lifestyle. The recipes are fabulous. The Apple Crisp was a hit at Thanksgiving dinner. No one knew there wasn't sugar, eggs, and bleached flour in the dessert they raved about! Should be on the bookshelves of bakers who care about there family's health but want to create great desserts.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Helpful tips-delicious recipes!, April 10, 2007

By 

LivingBookWorm (Lilburn, Ga.) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Sweet and Natural: More Than 120 Sugar-Free and Dairy-Free Desserts (Paperback)

Meredith McCarty has succeeded in providing us with a guide to healthy dessert making while being very conscientious of a totally vegan lifestyle. Everything we've tasted from the recipes in this book have been delicious and straighforward to make. The book's also packed full of explanations of how certain ingredients won't work, gives suggestions on ones that will and offers gorgeous pictures of the finished product.

I highly recommend this to all vegans looking for desserts to serve family and friends alike!