Healthy Cooking

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Hi everyone! I was interested to hear if anyone has any go to recipes or favorite healthier cookbooks that they like? I currently find a lot of things on pinterest but it would be great to have some cookbooks at home :)

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  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
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    If new to cooking, the Bittman basic cookbook is great and he has a fish one and vegetarian one too. I also really like vegetable-based cookbooks for ideas: Greene on Greens and Barbara Kafka's Vegetable Love and really any farm or seasonal based cookbook (these usually have appealing photos too).

    I like the website 101cookbooks, and peruse the occasional vegan site to broaden my horizons (ohsheglows is one).

    I don't like "diet" type recipes -- I find that regular, whole-foods based recipes tend to fit in my goals just fine, and most of my meals aren't super low cal (if I wanted that I'd ignore recipes and go with protein + veg).

    I use cookbooks and websites for ideas, never actually cook from a recipe.
  • MelaniaTrump
    MelaniaTrump Posts: 2,694 Member
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    Consider visiting your library.
    Many books on healthy eating, low cholesterol, anti-cancer, low fat, low carb, whole foods, vegetarian, you name it. All free.

  • dragon_girl26
    dragon_girl26 Posts: 2,187 Member
    edited July 2016
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    A second vote for the Mark Bittman books. I have 'How to Cook everything Vegetarian' and like it pretty well.
    I'm also a fan of America''s Test Kitchen and have their healthy options book (the green one), though all of their books are good. 'Cook without a book" by Pam Anderson is a great one because the recipes give you options and suggestions rather than just a straight recipe, so you can mix and match to your heart''s content (I have the meatless meals version, but I suspect her other book is the same).
    Pinterest also has a wealth of ideas, though you can make many recipes lower calorie by swapping higher calorie ingredients with lower ones, or omitting certain things all together. I do that quite a bit.
  • kommodevaran
    kommodevaran Posts: 17,890 Member
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    What are your criteria for healthier? I'd believe any recipe for a dish would be considered healthy, if the ingredients are real food, and they usually are. Look for cookbooks with food you like, instead, that could be "ethnic", vegetarian, quick meals, kid friendly etc. I don't use a lot of recipes, but when I need help, I google [ingredients+recipe] and look at several recipes for hints and to get the basic ideas.
  • LPflaum
    LPflaum Posts: 174 Member
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    literally everything on the cookinglight.com website. I have a stored recipe index of like 300+ recipes, all under 600 cal.
  • PiSquared
    PiSquared Posts: 148 Member
    edited July 2016
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    I'll second Cooking Light. I've had a subscription to the magazine for a number of years now. I basically taught myself to cook using their recipes, and they very rarely steer me wrong. I think the worst I've come across is not so much bad, as 'Meh, not really worth the effort'. For the most part, though, the recipes are great, and tend toward the practical. I particularly like the Dinner Tonight and Super Fast sections. If you don't have a subscription, their recipes can be accessed on Myrecipes.com for free.
  • enterdanger
    enterdanger Posts: 2,447 Member
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    I like the skinnytaste cookbook, but you can get most of the recipes off her site for free. I also have the first Thug Kitchen cookbook and it's great for Vegans or people who want to make Vegan stuff and add meat (like me).
  • BigTandthesquatters
    BigTandthesquatters Posts: 151 Member
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    Get yourself an Asian, Mediterranean, and African cookbooks. Lots of great tasting easily modified recipes. I highly recommend the Time/life cookbook series.
    I was given the whole series by my dad.
    https://cookbooksforchefs.com/home/foods-of-the-world-time-life-editors/