Customer Reviews

Wheat-Free Recipes & Menus : Delicious Dining Without Wheat or Gluten

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

 

 

This book is chock-full of great recipes! There are over 200 recipes for everything from breads to pizza to desserts to sauces. There is a whole section devoted to menus, to help you plan a meal around the foods in the book. There are several wonderful appendices, including one on wheat flour equivalents, hidden sources of wheat, baking with dairy substitutes, and mail order sources for some of the more obscure ingredients used.

My only quibble with this book is that it does use a fair amount of sugar (although brown, rather than white) in some recipes, which is not as healthy as it might be. But the author has another book which addresses this issue: Special Diet Solutions - Healthy cooking without wheat, gluten, dairy, eggs, yeast or refined sugar.

All in all this is a marvelous book for anyone who is dealing with a wheat or glueten food allergy or sensitivity. Don't hesitate!

This book contains my all-time favorite GF bread recipe. Carol Fenster uses stiffly-beaten egg-whites in many recipes to aid in rising and texture. An added benefit is, many of her recipes are lower in fat and cholesterol than other GF recipes. The recipes are well-written, easy to follow. This is the cookbook that I use the most in my everyday cooking as a Celiac.

This book is a great investment (and for those of us who live on gluten-free food, we all know how HARD it is to find anything for celiacs that's a bargain!)! It has over 200 recipies, but to be honest, there are a few that don't come out all that great. Still, a few out of 200 still makes this book a great investment!

This book is divided by section; Breads: yeast breads, quick breads and breakfast breads; Breakfast and Brunch: breads, meats, cereals, casseroles and other dishes; Pasta, Grains, Beans and Rice: pasta, grains, beans and rice; Desserts: cakes, bars and cookies, fruit desserts, puddings and custards, pies, miscellaneous; Soups: soups and soup components; Sauces and Salad Dressings: salad dressings, chutney and salsa, sauces for entrees or vegetables, dessert sauces and miscellaneous; Vegetables: potatoes and miscellaneous; Poultry: grilled chicken, stove-top chicken, and baked dishes; Fish and Seafood: fish and shellfish; Meats - Beef and Pork: beef, mixed meats, and pork & ham; Menus and finally, Appendices with valuable info like wheat flour equivalents and substitutes for wheat as a thickener.

My only major complaint (apart from that some of the recipies don't turn out half as well as they sound, but then again, that's to be expected on a gluten-free diet), is that unless you like Mexican / south-western food, about a quarter of these recipies are of no use to you. Before being diagnosed with celiac I used to get terrible indigestion (the author claims her only problem with wheat and gluten was a runny nose and stuffy sinuses). For anyone who is a celiac, and who has experienced the horrible side effects of simply eating food before a diagnosis is established, you probably want to AVOID foods that traditionally cause heartburn or gas or other symptoms similar to what I call a 'wheat-attack'. I'm sure plenty of people out there are able to handle Mexican / south-western food, but a huge number of celiacs are sensitive to all kinds of food, and kicking food up with peppers and spices and whatever else is great if your sinuses are blocked, but after having heartburn for months on end, you might not be too eager to start cooking up a big ol' pot of chilli!

Over all, it's still a good buy. I mean, even though I don't see many celiacs (espically soon after their diagnosis) cooking some of these things, it's a good book to have. You can make lots of things that are fairly "soft" on your tummy, and maybe after a little while (it's been almost 2 years since my diagnosis and I STILL won't touch a pot of chilli!) you can try some of these more spicy variations in the kitchen. If you're simply gluten-intolerant, or have sinus problems like the author, then this book is a great investment! If I weren't a celiac I'd definately give it 5 stars!

Carol Fenster has given all of us that must eat wheat and gluten free such a gift! The time that it must have taken her to perfect such wonderful recipes is truly something not many have the time or talent to do. She has covered just about everything to make eating wheat and gluten free most delicious, indeed! Besides the delicious recipes she has included menus for Quick and Easy Dinners, Reduced Fat, Low Calorie Meals, Fish & Seafood Menus, Poultry Menus, Southwestern Menus and Meatless Meals. And there are more treasures in the back of this great cookbook that are so helpful such as Wheat Flour Equivalents, Substitutes, HIdden Sources of Wheat, Mail-Order Sources etc. If you need to eat wheat or gluten free this cookbook just must be a part of your life! I wouldn't know what to do wtihout it! It surely is a "must buy" cookbook!

The recipes in this book are delicious and also well-written. Although there are recipes for many different types of food, my three favorites are for traditional "wheat-replacers": Spice Cake, Soup Dumplings, and Pizza Crust. I would agree with the other reviewer below that Dr. Fenster does tend to use too much sugar -- who puts sugar in pizza crust? But the recipes are very flexible, and I find if I change the amount of sugar, or add carrot shreddings to a cake, or cream cheese to a dumpling - the recipes still work great! I highly recommend this book, not only does it include a ton of gluten-free cooking advice, but also has non-dairy substitutes for every recipe. I also like that she writes, for example, "1 teaspoon GF vanilla" instead of simply "1 teaspoon vanilla." For the recently-diagnosed, this is a great reminder to check _all_ ingredients for gluten.

Many of the recipes in this book are very good, but some are only ok. There are some problems with some of them - for example the crepe recipe: it's way too thick. Perhaps the crepe recipe and the pancake recipe were reversed? There have been other errors in the recipes that make me want a better wheat-free cookbook. Where is it?

Wheat-Free Recipes and Menus
Wonderful book...is a must for multiple allergies to foods. I have found more in this book that applies to my needs than in any other I have found.
The recipes that I have tried are delicious! Highly recommend.

I bought this book when we found out my son is allergic to wheat and milk and a slight allergy to yeast, which made this book hard for me to use. There are a lot of good recipes in this book, though, for those who are strictly allergic to wheat only. I'm not sure how many of them I can actually use on a daily basis, but they are nice to keep handy for sure!