The full title for Healthyish is “A Cookbook with Seriously Satisfying, Truly Simple, Good-For-You (but not too Good-For-You) Recipes for Real Life”.  It’s a mouthful but it does sum up quite nicely what this recipe book is about.   It’s full of food that looks delicious, tastes delicious (from the recipes I’ve tried) and sounds delicious (from those that I haven’t).

The idea behind Healthyish is that you can eat a good, healthy, balanced diet without living on lettuce leaves and by making some simple changes.  So you swap whole grains for refined, add ingredients like olives for natural flavour, and swap processed foods for homemade alternatives (think salad dressing).

The recipes have simple steps so you aren’t chained to the oven and there is a mix of those you might want to make ahead of time and those you can whip up on the fly.  They are full of bright, colourful and good for you ingredients, many of which I hadn’t tried before (like Agave Nectar) but which will likely become kitchen staples.

Plus the ingredients are ones you can find in any grocery store so you don’t have to trail around speciality shops looking for that one thing that the recipe will fail without AND they are ingredients you will use again – so no shelves filled with one-offs that cost a fortune and end up going to waste.  This, alone, was enough to make the book a hit for me, living where I do and without a gourmet deli on every corner.

The book is broken up into breakfast, lunch, dinner, plus snacks and treats.  It is full of great photos of the food and simple, step-by-step instructions.  So far, I’ve tried two of the breakfasts, and two of the lunches.  The breakfasts were a Chocolate and Peanut Butter Smoothie and Pesto-Swirled Scrambled Eggs, the lunches were two soups – Curried Sweet Potato Soup and Loaded Baked Potato and Cauliflower soup.

I loved the smoothie, more than I thought I would, and it was so filling, I didn’t feel the need to eat again till lunch time.  The eggs, I wasn’t so keen on – the pesto was too strong for a morning for me.  However, I’ve stuck with the eggs and goats cheese (the other ingredient) and that I do like and is, again, filling me up till lunch.

The soups were delicious.  The sweet potato one especially.  It was warm and warming on what have been particular cold winter days.  It was also so bright and cheerful it made me feel good just looking at it in the bowl.  My only complaint with both soups is that it said it would serve 4 to 6 and I would say it was double that because they were so filling.  Thankfully, they seem to have frozen well so I have lunches for next week as well.

Next up, are a few of the evening meals, which include meat and veggie options.  I love the look of the Barley and Adzuki Bean Bowls (that’s two different ones) and the Modern Nicosia Salad for my one fish evening a week.  Meat wise, my husband has his eye on the Pork Tenderloin and Sausage, Potato, and Cabbage One Pot Dinner.  Whatever we choose though, I have no doubt they will be easy to make and – hopefully – as much of a success as the other choices we’ve made.

As an ebook I can’t say that this will have a permanent place on my shelf BUT it will definitely be a go to book whenever I’m doing my weekly recipe plans.

About the book…

Healthyish is recipe developer Lindsay Maitland Hunt’s totally doable, delicious, and dead-simple cookbook, helping us to eat how we all want to eat—healthy, but with an occasional bit of decadence.

Lindsay Maitland Hunt is an expert recipe developer who has created recipes for everyone from college students to busy families to seasoned home cooks. Now, she brings her trademark skillset to her debut cookbook, Healthyish.

For anyone on the move, working long hours, and trying to eat a bit more healthfully, Healthyish offers 131 satisfying recipes with straightforward instructions, using as few pots and pans as possible, and ingredients that won’t break the bank. Not to mention, you can find the ingredients at your everyday grocery store (no garam masala or açai berries here!).

Emphasizing balanced eating rather than fad diet tricks, Hunt includes guilt-free recipes for every meal of the day, from breakfast to snacks to dinner, and yes, even Healthyish treats, such as:
Banana–Avocado Chai Shake
Peanut Butter Granola
Salty Watermelon, Feta, Mint, and Avocado Salad
Miso–Butter Toast with a Nine-Minute Egg
Pozole with Pinto Beans and Queso Fresco
Spiced Chicken and Chickpea Flatbreads with Cucumber–Dill Tzatziki
Single-Serving Chocolate and Peanut Butter Cookie

Designed for novices and experienced cooks alike, Hunt’s meticulously considered recipes offer crowd-pleasing flavor profiles and time-saving tips and tricks, and her vegetable-centric dishes, with an occasional dash of meat, dairy, and decadence, are showcased in vibrant, mouthwatering photographs.

Destined to be an everyday kitchen essential, filled with splattered and dog-eared pages, Healthyish is a call for simple ingredients, food that makes us feel good, quick prep, and even quicker cleanup, so we all can enjoy what’s most important at the end of a long day: getting back to the couch.

Publisher: Abrams
Publication Date: 9th January, 2018
Number of Pages: 256
Rating: 5/5

Note: I received a copy of this book in return for a fair and honest review.  All thoughts, feelings and opinions are my own.