What To Consider When Buying A Healthy Eating Book

If you’ve decided that you want to eat healthier and be healthier, buying a few healthy eating books may help you achieve that. However, getting the right books for your goals and lifestyle doesn’t seem to be a simple task these days, as there are so many out there. For this reason, I decided to put together some tips which will make it easier for you to choose the best healthy eating book for your needs. Here are some of the things you should consider:

What Is Your Intention?

Do you just want to cook more homemade meals which are healthy so that you can be healthier and get more nutrition from your food? Are you already eating quite healthily but getting bored of your current meals? Or do you want to lose weight by eating healthily? Maybe you want to eat more vegetarian meals? Think about your intention carefully, as this will determine the type of book you buy.

If you want to lose weight, some healthy eating books feature exercises in them, including workout plans. For example, one of the books like that on the market is The Bikini Body 28-Day Healthy Eating & Lifestyle Guide by Kayla Itsines. I had a quick look at this book in a supermarket and it seems to be really good – it’s a quite big book packed with lots of information about food, nutrition and a healthy lifestyle in general.

Another book including exercises is ‘Strong’ written by Zanna Van Dijk who is a qualified personal trainer and nutrition consultant. The focus of the book seems to be more on exercises, but there are also 40 recipes in there that are relatively quick to make and easy to structure around your lifestyle.

I also want to mention the range of healthy eating books by Joe Wicks (aka The Body Coach) who’s been labelled the 2nd most influential person in the food industry. Joe’s first book Lean in 15 features a hundred recipes for nutritious, quick-to-prepare meals and guides you through Joe’s signature HIIT (High Intensity Interval Training) home workouts – revealing how to combine food and exercise to ignite intense fat-burning. Joe then went on to publish more books after the success of his first book, for example, Lean in 15 – The Shape Plan and Lean in 15 – The Sustain Plan. Most of his recipes do contain meat so they are not suitable for vegetarians, however Joe did publish a book suitable for vegetarians eventually and you can check it out here.

If you are after healthy vegetarian or vegan recipes, then you should also check out the following books: Deliciously Ella, Good + Simple (by Hemsley sisters) and Leon: Fast Vegetarian.

Introduction To Healthy Eating

If a book starts with a few chapters explaining things like what you need for healthy cooking, equipment needed and nutritional information about particular foods, then this is always a good thing. It just helps you to understand healthy eating a little bit more. Reading about the benefits of certain foods is great as it will motivate you to eat those foods more often.

How Much Time Do You Have For Cooking?

We all seem to have busy lives these days and for this reason, many of us prefer to buy a healthy eating book that contains quick and easy-to-make recipes. If that’s your priority then you should consider books from Joe Wicks (for those of you who eat meat) but if you don’t eat meat, then Leon: Fast Vegetarian would be more suitable for you. There are of course other books on the market full of quick and healthy recipes – just do a quick Google search to find them.

Ingredients

Do you like to stick to ingredients that you are familiar with or do you want to experiment with new ingredients? Some books require simple, well-known ingredients while others like to be more adventurous and will require you to visit your local whole foods store or do some food shopping on Amazon.

It’s really up to you what you want. Check what kind of ingredients feature in the book to make sure there are no surprises! The worst thing you can do is buy a healthy eating book that you hate because it has so many unfamiliar ingredients in it.

Equipment Required

Before buying a healthy eating book, see whether you need any special equipment to prepare the recipes. Do you need a blender, food processor or a slow cooker? If your kitchen is only basic, then you will need a healthy eating book that doesn’t require the use of any special equipment. Alternatively, if you are really up for making something different, it will be worth investing in a good food processor with a blender attachment.

Special Diet

If you are lactose intolerant or cannot eat gluten, you will need to pay special attention when buying a healthy eating book. Deliciously Ella is great for those who cannot consume gluten and so is Ready, Steady, Glow by nutritional health coach Madeleine Shaw.

Those of you avoiding dairy should consider Cook. Nourish. Glow by nutritional therapist Amelia Freer.

Reviews

Finally, before you buy anything make sure you read the reviews so that you know what to expect. These reviews will give you a good idea of what to expect and what people like and don’t like about the book.

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Author Bio

Petra Kravos is a health enthusiast who loves to read the latest research about health and nutrition. She is the founder of Proper Healthy Living where you will find lots of useful information that will help you lead a healthier lifestyle.