Five-a-day Fruit and Vegetable Cookbook

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View books by Kate Whiteman, Maggie Mayhew, Christine Ingram.

Not quite what I was looking for...... - Rated
The book is well set-out and the introductory chapter tells you how much is one portion of fruit and/ or vegetables. (One star awarded for this!) Armed with this knowledge, I set out to increase my fruit and veg. consumption..........

However, many of the recipes included are, unless you are a complete beginner, pretty much well known and hardly improve on one's intake of fruit and vegetables. I also presumed that the number of portions of fruit/ vegetables per serving of each recipe would be given, (not unlike calorie-counted recipes) but one is left to work this out for oneself. I found out why......

For example, included is a recipe for lemon meringue pie, which is not exactly going to increase one's fruit consumption. The pie serves six and contains.............the juice and rind of one lemon. (Not to mention enough sugar and fat to kill a small elephant) Eating all 6 slices would barely give you enough fruit for one portion of your daily five!!! Many other fruit recipes are similar.....if you look at the fruit content of the recipe and divide it by the number of servings, some recipes contain VERY little fruit and one portion of the recipe doesn't equal even ONE portion of fruit! The vegetable recipes are better in this respect, but some are very high in fat. These recipes do include a caveat about high fat content, but to increase fat consumption alongside fruit/ veg. consumption is hardly a health recommendation!

The authors provide lots of interesting information about types of fruit and vegetables, (two stars!) but I was looking for healthy-eating recipes to enable me to eat more fruit and veg.

This book CERTAINLY can't be judged by its misleading cover.........there's more fruit on THAT than in some of the recipes!! I feel I wasted my money.

Five-a-day Fruit & Vegetable Cookbook - Rated
I am really quite impressed with this book. The photographs make the food look appetising and I'm sure even the most adamant of reluctant vegetable eaters will be tempted to try something!! The book is divided into sections ie root vegetables and an introduction at each section leads you into the recipes. Well worth a look at for the new and seasoned cook.