The Recipe Book & or the Cookbook ?

This topic contains 5 replies, has 4 voices, and was last updated by Purple Vegie Eater 9 years, 2 months ago.

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Frangipani

4:56 am
10 Sep 15
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Hi,

I’m just looking online to buy the recipe book but there is a cookbook as well.
To those that have these, is it worth buying both or just one? Is there much of a difference between the two or will I be doubling up on recipes?

Thanks in advance ?

Kitten1

8:57 am
9 Oct 15
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Did u decide as I am having the same debate too

LittleWing

8:45 pm
15 Oct 15
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There’s only a handful of recipes i make from the fast diet recipe book… to be honest I don’t find most of them very accessible and they are a bit of a departure from what I’d normally eat, so it doesn’t have a massive appeal to me. The recipes I like are the ‘Pan Roasted Veg’ and there’s a Cottage Pie recipe that I like too. Also, I find the calorie count to be anywhere from a little bit out to wildly out on many of the recipes. Which is a shame… because the book could be so much better, a look on Amazon reviews will show you I’m not alone in this feeling and I hate to be negative because 5:2 is bloody brilliant and I am massively thankful to the team behind it all. It has helped me lose 2 stone of baby weight twice in under 3 months both times so really have nothing but gratitude to Michael (and Mimi!)

There’s a wealth of really great <500 calorie recipes online, I made an Aubergine Rollatini my last fast day which came in at 350cal for a very delicious meal, which I served with courgette spaghetti (courgetti!) I can dropbox the recipe if anyone is interested 🙂

Purple Vegie Eater

9:05 pm
15 Oct 15
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Hi LittleWing
I used the Fast Cookbook and Kate Harrison’s book to get recipe ideas when we started 5:2 two and a half years ago. By getting brand new ideas (particularly the Asian flavours which can massively improve leafy, low cal meals) we have totally revamped our eating habits. This allowed us to not only reach our healthy goal weights quickly, but has meant we have maintained easily.
Without totally changing your everyday diet, it is a lot harder to maintain and not slip back into the old habits. There are SO many fabulous tasting ideas out there that don’t include the dreaded white carbs. Once you master the recipes, the general theme can be applied to every meal. I always have masses of lettuce, garlic, shallots, celery, fennel, carrot, chilli, ginger etc on hand to whip up a salad. Introducing much more seafood (fresh fish, smoked fish, prawns etc) has meant a healthy, sustainable future for us.
All the best with your continued journey into a healthy future. PVE

LittleWing

10:48 pm
15 Oct 15
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Hey PVE! I totally get what your saying, I guess I’m not really into Asian style cooking (save a stir fry) and the book is quite heavy on that style of food. I can’t always afford and/or source the ingredients suggested and when feeding a family of whippets I need to be able to serve up bulk (the dreaded carbs!) simultaneously without cooking more than 1 meal an evening! So perhaps the recipes do work for some folk and not others, I was just giving m’humble opinion on the recipes.

Saying that, I made the Tofu and Lemon cous cous from the book the other day (minus the ‘mirin’) and it went down a treat!

I have also found a lot of things I have always cooked are very easily adaptable to lower calories (just don’t have the pasta, potatoes, bread etc) and some of them are inherently low cal anyway.

The book is beautiful, and a lot of the recipes look tempting, but they are not necessarily made up of store cupboard staples and I guess unless you are willing to make a complete shift in diet, as you so successfully have, they might not work for you.

One more thing! I like to eat all my calories in one go and a lot of the recipes are for 100 here, 200 there… I don’t know. I’m clearly not sold on it. Perhaps its not tailored to the ‘mum-on the-run-feeding-her-family-of-skinny kids-and-slender-husband-on-a-budget-and trying-to-lose-weight’ audience!!!

Only 2lb to go to my goal weight of 8st 5lb so can’t be doing that bad anyway 😉

Purple Vegie Eater

11:13 pm
15 Oct 15
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Hi again LW 🙂
You’ve done really well. Keep it up!
I totally understand your stage of life. I raised 4 kids on a shoestring 🙂 With all the different tastes and fads, I was usually cooking a whole lot of meals. I got around it by either grating vegies in dishes to disguise and bulk up the meat or serve it all separately for them to choose. They are all very healthy adults now. 🙂

I was never one who needed to diet and was always put off by the ‘low cal alternates’ to everyday foods. My approach was to simply cut out foods that have empty calories. This was easiest by a total change. I also love cooking and researching new exciting tastes. Many of the herbs I use grow in my garden. It doesn’t have to be expensive. As I said, just get ideas from the book and a general feel for what works.

The kids can simply have added carbs (bread, potatoes) while you eat the leafy veg. To be long term sustainable, it really does take a commitment to change. Not bad role modelling for the kids either. “Mummy ate too much at the party yesterday so she will skip breakfast and eat a salad for lunch.” is a good message for kids to grow up hearing rather than “I’m overweight and can’t do anything about it” or “I’ll drink the diet Coke and the Weight Watchers soups”, the message many people send.

You are doing yourself and your kids a great service by your approach. Fantastic! !! P