Hungry Girl: Recipes and Survival Strategies for Guilt-Free Eating in the Real World

Comment: Hungry Girl: Recipes and Survival Strategies for Guilt-Free Eating in the Real World, I have to say is a good beginning to those who want to eat healthy but not the answer. I like eating healthy and that means that I don't include Splenda or any artifical sugars in my diet. Artifical sugars are bad for you, and I saw too many recipes involving artifical sugars then I normally used to. HG look at recipes with brown sugar!

Comment: This book including the history of how Hungry Girl came to write could easily have been written by myself. Even her recipes are very similar to the concoctions I have come up with in an effort to stay slim in Los Angeles amongst the beautiful people. Hungry girl gave me some new and refreshing ideas to add to my own and I am grateful for that and give this book five stars. I love to eat, and I seem to need that satiated and full feeling in order to be satisfied. I strongly disagree with some of the reviews that say the recipes do not taste good. Perhaps you follow them too literally? I don't know but I have been cooking for years and I just adjust things that don't seem right to me. I just finished a large plate of chili cheese fries and it was absolutely satisfying and healthy too. I was planning to make her macaroni and cheese later. Her recipe calls for a family sized bag of cauliflower in cheese sauce combined with whole wheat penne. My store did not have any of the cheese sauced cauliflower but I love the idea of using the cauliflower to "stretch" the pasta (a trick I often use by whipping a large head cauliflower in my food processor along with a large baked potato....taste great just like mashed potato with less calories, starch and carbs) so I will cut up a fresh cauliflower and will probably make a vegan cheese sauce using nutritional yeast to mix in but will also make use of her cube of light laughing cow cheese to add some more authentic cheesy taste. I just love her ideas, they have really helped me to add variety! I also love how many of her recipes are designed for one, that is so helpful to me. After you look at her book, it's so easy to use the principles of volumizing the meal with vegetables and low calorie choices to make your own recipes. For those who speak of the use of high sodium and/or unhealthy foods I think that Hungry Girl only includes these for occasional use and for the sake of convenience when you are pressed for time, something I can appreciate. Most things are cooked from scratch using healthy items. I don't actually know how many of the recipes I have followed without making any changes at all, but it's the inspirations that have proven most valuable to me. The use of fiber one cereal to "fry" is great. I make chicken fingers like this all the time. I mean sure, it's not the same as a bucket of KFC, but come on people you have to make some sacrifice, and frankly I think she makes the sacrifices a lot easier to swallow. I also like to "fry" eggplant slices in the oven using this method for a delicious eggplant parmesan. I use nutritional yeast for the cheese when I make this. Anyway, I think the folks giving the book a negative review are unable to use the recipes to their advantage and to form their own ideas. A little common sense, cooking skills and imagination make this book a reference to return to time and time again.

Comment: This is a fantastic cookbook. It uses so many more common ingredients then many of my other cookbooks. I am a member of weight watchers and love this book over my weight watchers cookbooks (they seem to call for things I never heard of). I have purchased this cookbook as a gift for a friend, because I love mine and so many of the recipes that I like I knew she would enjoy them too. I have also recommended it to other friends and other weight watcher members.

Comment: I really didn't care much for this book. There were no real original ideas, just basically common sense methods such as using fat free/low fat, sugar free/no sugar added, or light products in place of the original full calorie ones. Also some of the ingredients called for in the recipes are not readily available for most people in there everyday grocery store.

Comment: Fantastic book. Great way to learn how to make delicious foods in a much healthier and low cal way. The only thing is that many of the items are portioned for large groups (But it's great for an individual). Its also a great book if you are counting calories or points (Weight watchers) because everything is so easy to calculate.