cover image Light & Healthy Cooking: 250 Delicious, Satisfying, Guilt-Free Recipes

Light & Healthy Cooking: 250 Delicious, Satisfying, Guilt-Free Recipes

Editors of Good Housekeeping. Hearst, $24.95 (304p) ISBN 978-1-58816-836-8

"We all want to do our best to produce meals for our families and ourselves that meet today's nutritional guidelines," note the editors of this collection of%C2%A0beautifully-photographed recipes, culled from the Good Housekeeping archives. To that end, this book provides a sweeping overview of nutritionally sound meals, from "Breakfasts & Brunches" to "Sweet Finales." There is a clear attempt to balance the eating preferences of the folks who read Good Housekeeping with our modern understanding of what a complete meal should look like: there is a chapter of recipes for beef, pork, veal, and lamb, but information about whole grains and a chapter of "meatless mains" is also present. The book's best recipes don't substitute low-fat or fat-free products for the full-fat items, but instead focus on adding supplemental fruits, vegetables, and whole grains (in accordance with the USDA's MyPlate portioning icon), as in the Coffee-Spice Chicken with Fruit-Basil Salsa, or Pasta with Broccoli Rabe and Garbanzos. Readers tempted to dismiss a Good Housekeeping product as out-of-date should give this book a second look; there are some delicious discoveries within. Color photos. (Feb.)