Low-carb series: The Low-Carb Cookbook Review

Today I'm reviewing the Low-Carb Cookbook by Fran McCullough. I'm planning to make this part of a series on low-carb cookbooks.

I'm looking at cutting down on sugars as an interesting health and culinary challenge. I love to try new ways of cooking food or planning meals. What is living a life without carbs all about? It's not all burgers all the time. In fact, I feel that low-carb recipes make me think more about eating vegetables and using seasoning and flavor to make up for sugar and starch.
  
I would definitely recommend this book as a beginner's guide to low-carb eating. The author clearly walks us through low-carb food groups and how they can be prepared. For example, there's a section on vegetables that gives about 3-4 different ways to cook each vegetable. I like that the book did not rely on weird substitutes for high-carb foods, but instead capitalized on existing, familiar foods like eggs, cheese, vegetables, and seasonings to make satisfying meals. Along with the recipes, this book lists menu ideas, like the South American Menu, the Italian Menu, and the Simple Dinner menu, which saved me time in planning.

I also appreciate a good index, which this book has. I tell you, I get pretty annoyed with a book with an index that has enough cross-references to make me feel like I'm reading a Choose Your Own Adventure book.

What I've tested: I've made a variety of beef and pork dishes, 3 different ways of cooking zucchini, a cauliflower side dish, some spicy shrimp,  a greek salad, and some fun things like chimichurri sauce, spicy mayo, and corn chips. I'll post some of these up eventually. These all turned out incredibly well, with simple, successful flavors, with the exception of the corn chips. I did not have a good baking sheet, so my chips did not brown evenly and got burnt on the edges.

However: I would not recommend this book to those who are focused on 30 minute-or-less meals, or for those who like to make one dish that can be the entire meal. What I found in this book were recipes that required a fair amount of marinating, cutting, boiling, steaming, baking, and pureeing before they were ready to be eaten.


For example: I made steak with chimichurri sauce with baked zucchini for dinner one evening, and it took me two hours. Cooking is a hobby for me, but even I was frustrated with how long it took. True, I could have done a little bit more on the preparation side, but the book didn't provide any estimates of how long the meals would take to prepare, either. Many of the dishes I made had a long cooking time, taking at least 30 minutes or more to bake. I learned my lesson and ended up making many of the recipes on a weekend when I had some down time. 

The beginning of the book discusses the health benefits of low-carb. However, it's geared towards dieters and ignores people who might be interested in low-carb for other reasons. So, for a book whose "target" audience is presumably calorie- or carb-conscious, the book surprised me when it didn't list calorie or carb counts for any recipes. The author throws out descriptions like "low on carbs!" but she doesn't give any numbers to back it up. If you crave the numbers, you're not going to find that in this book.

Lastly, the author's writing style grated on my nerves. "Nothing's stopping you from serving these potato skins with sour cream." Sure it is. I don't have sour cream in my house!

In conclusion, this book gets 3.75 stars out of 5 for me. Great recipes, poor delivery.

Book Review: The Time Traveler's Wife

Today I'm reviewing the Time Traveler's Wife. Similar to the book I reviewed yesterday, this book is told in a non-linear style and jumps from character to character.

How did I come to read this book? It was not quite as romantic as fate bringing to my hands in a burst of inspiration at a used book store. Actually, I asked for some reading recommendations back in June, and my friend Amber recommended this book as "a terrific love story that made [her] bawl [her] eyes out." Then, the movie version of this book came on, and my boyfriend wanted to watch it, but I protested that we not watch it until I could finish the book. I ordered it from PaperBackSwap, and I read it as fast as I could so my boyfriend would not have to wait too long for me :) Hopefully we'll be watching the film soon enough. If you want to read it, I will be posting it back up soon on my bookshelf.

This book is about a man, Henry, who time-travels inadvertently, and his wife, Clare, who has known him her entire life, and their love story. It pays homage to the science fiction concepts of super-evolved humans with special talents, similar to books like Beggars in Spain by Nancy Kress. At the same time, it's firmly grounded in chick-lit territory, so it only focuses on science-fiction genetics when absolutely necessary, and instead spends more of its time giving us an understanding of the character's feelings and troubled relationship. One of the things I admired about this book is that it actually had a realistic understanding of genetics; concepts like genome sequencing and gene therapy are treated unpretentiously.

I would recommend this book to people who want a Romance Plus, the kind of book that won't make you feel like you read 500 pages of pure fluff but soothes you with its mildly philosophical yet not head-splitting trip through time travel mechanics and the power of free will. I think of it as a step up from the Twilight series.

However, people who are a) sticklers for well-developed or original characters or b) looking for a storyline outside of traditional white Catholic values probably won't enjoy this book as much.

The story builds a lot of suspense from the alternating storyline, but I had a hard time sympathizing with either character. It was just the structure of the story that kept me afloat. Clare epitomizes the life of privilege as a rich, beautiful, smart girl; she's supposed to be the heroine, but she came off to me as too precious. She even has a trust fund which allows her to fritter her time away making annoying paper sculptures of birds, which are described in superbly irritating detail. Henry is slightly less annoying, because he's had to go through a lot (his mother's death, his father's alcoholism, and dealing with his time-travel "condition"). Even then, sometimes his character is brutal--a violent drug addict and womanizer in his early life. It's poorly explained, and instead it seems like he was written conveniently "bad," so that the romance with Clare is even more dramatic. 

One part of the story involves the characters wanting to have a baby together but encountering many difficulties due to the Time Traveler's genetic makeup.  I had a serious problem with this part of the book. The Time Traveler suggests to his wife that they adopt. Her response: adopting a baby would be "pretending." She proceeds to selfishly insist on dragging her husband through seven gory miscarriages and years of marital turmoil. I was really disgusted with the book at this point. I sincerely hope that no one who is adopted feels that their parents were "pretending." I know that some people reading this book will unfortunately look up to the title character, so I feel sad that a topic like adoption was treated so negatively.

The main characters Henry and Clare barely make it past stereotypes despite 500 pages spent developing them, and the other supporting characters don't stand a chance. There's the Alcoholic Dad, the Bi-Polar Mother, the Jerk Brother, the Mean Ex-Girlfriend, the Rich Yet Absent Lawyer Father, the Best Friend With The Crush On the Girl, the Flighty Female Friends, and the Clueless Coworkers. All of these characters are just props to the main love story. Good thing they are not all that fascinating, otherwise I would have wanted to know more about them. There's also some troublingly one-dimensional stereotypes of household servants and people of other cultures and races, who were written with an exoticism I found unsettling.

It was an entertaining read in parts, whizzing through creative time-travel trips and even having some funny one-liners, so I wouldn't discourage reading it. Just don't expect to come away enlightened or uplifted.

Book Review: The Known World

Today I'm reviewing The Known World, by Edward P. Jones. I find this a perfect choice for my first book review as this feature on my site is somewhat "unknown" to me.

I found this book at the used book section of the library in my hometown. I was home on vacation when my dad suggested that I check out their recent haul of books going for 50 cents apiece. I might have put this one down except that I noticed a little gold badge on the cover that said "Winner of the Pulitzer Prize." OK, I figured, I guess it might not be all that bad. It turned out to be one of the most extraordinary books I have read in years. 

In short, this book is about the moral consequences and complexities of slavery. Despite the heavy topic and frequent sense of tragedy, the story was told in a masterful, precise style that actually left me feeling uplifted. 

This book is for literature carnivores who love to rip apart the meat of characters and plots. I would not recommend this book to literature vegetarians who want leafy descriptions of places, clothes, and appearances and to only digest one or two main characters at a time. 

I would recommend this book to anyone who appreciates stories full of mythology, well-developed characters, and intertwining plots. Each character had a story and motivation for his or her actions, down to minor characters that I only met for one paragraph or one sentence. Events that happened earlier in the book had consequences for later events, but in indirect ways that gave me an appreciative "Aha!" moment instead of a brick over the head. In one case, one character does something dishonest early on. It's set aside until hundreds of pages later, when his moral unreliability limits his ability to vouch for someone else who's in trouble, thus affecting the other character's fate and setting another course of events into action.

The book was told in a non-linear fashion, and what was special about this book was that there was plenty of foreshadowing and suspense, but it was executed precisely enough to give me a sense of longing, but not enough to completely ruin the surprise. The author gave enough information for me to understand what was going on until when he described it more later. For example, in the very beginning, he goes through a few pages of describing a major character before even saying his name or saying what year it is. By that time, I was hooked and I wanted to know more about who the characters were and when the events were taking place. 

At times, the book is biblical and allegorical in nature, and at those times, I did feel that I was missing out on some allusion or metaphor. There were also times when I lost track of some of the characters, but a "who's who" guide in the back of the book was a handy reference. On further re-reading, I want to take more notes about each of the characters so I can remember them better. Despite this, for most parts of the book, there is something to meet the reader at her own level. 

Have you read this book? What did you think? 

To New Books

I am going to add something new to my blog - book reviews.

One of my book sources? I recently joined a site called PaperBackSwap, a site where I swap books for free with other people. Because I've been ordering some books lately that have been on my reading list for ages, I've been reading more lately and catching up on that list.

My other book source is fate. Blind luck. Every now and then, I hit up a used book sale, or book swap, or the used books section of a library or thrift store, and I take home a pile of strange books that I've never heard of before or never bothered to think about before that day. To me, these are my most cherished books, because they are book I would have never found under any other circumstances: they are not recommended to me by a friend, they are not sold with glossy covers at Borders. They are just stories that have crossed my path. And after I have read them, it is like my life depended on it.

In my book reviews, I'll tell how I found a book. It is important to me that my belongings carry a story, and books are no different. Like most book reviewers, I will also tell you a little bit about the book and offer up some praise or criticism. I hope that you will enjoy this new running feature on my blog, and that perhaps I will introduce you, too, to new books.

Summer reading recommendations?

Anyone have any good fiction recommendations for summer reading? I'm wanting to read more fiction these days. I've just finished reading Emma by Jane Austen (loved it!), and I have a gift card to Barnes and Noble that's a-burnin' in my wallet. Got any suggestions for me?

I have a confession...

I'm going to read the twilight books.
----
At least I was warned. My friend Alex said (after leaking a spoiler), "If that convinces you not to read them, this conversation will have been successful."

If the books are anywhere near as hysterically funny as the bad acting in the movie (I laughed straight for about 2 hours, much to the annoyance of my movie-going companions. There were jorts! How could I not crack up?), I will be quite entertained on my morning commutes.

The To-Read List

Books on my shelf that are waiting to be read:

Some that I picked up from the thrift store last time I went home:
Airframe - Crichton
Toward the End of Time - Updike
The Hours - Cunningham
Sherlock Holmes - Doyle
Seabiscuit - Hillenbrand

On loan from a friend:
The Amber Spyglass - Pullman

Purchased with Christmas money:
The Chronicles of Narnia - Lewis

Handed off to me from a friend:
An Area of Darkness - Naipaul

Given to me by my thesis advisor:
Les violons du diable - Grasset
La 7e femme - Molay
The Tragedy of Origins - Lyons

"Found" at my sorority house:
Emma - Austen

From a used book sale:
Library, An Unquiet History - Battles


This doesn't even touch the long list of books that have been recommended to me...
Case in point: if you want me to read it, put it on my shelf :)

Books and their stories

Books I read in 2007, in order of reading:

These I found at my local thrift store:
1. 4 Blondes - Candace Bushnell
2. Lucky Girls - Nell Freudenburger
3. Anansi Boys - Neil Gaiman

7. Digital Fortress - Dan Brown
8.The Talented Mr. Ripley - Patricia Highsmith
10. Divine Secrets of the Ya-ya sisterhood - Rebecca Wells
12. Bridget Jones Edge of Reason - Helen Fielding
14.The Martian Chronicles - Ray Bradbury

This one was given to me by a friend, R., after he didn't need it for a class anymore, :
4. Their Eyes Were Watching God- Zora Neale Hurston

This one was recommended to me by my thesis advisor on the topic of noir literature:
5. The Black Dahlia - James Ellroy

These were recommended to me by friends near and far, most of which I was able to find at the GW library:
6. Wicked - Gregory Maguire
19. Chronicles of Clovis - Saki
21. The Catcher in the Rye - J.D. Salinger
22. Animal Farm - George Orwell
27. On the road - Jack Kerouac
20. Kafka on the shore - Haruki Murakami

This one was given to me for my birthday from my "little sis," T.:
9. The Good Earth - Pearl Buck

These were loaned to me by my roommate last year, L.:
11. Mother Night - Kurt Vonnegut
13. A Clockwork Orange - Anthony Burgess

This one was given to me by my high school English teacher when she retired:
15. The Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck

These I found at the UVA Graduate English Dept.'s used book sale:
16. The Year of Ice - Brian Malloy
17. Kaffir Boy - Mark Mathabane

This one I found while browsing through the GW library:
18. Innocent World - Ami Sakurai

These were loaned to me by my co-workers:
23. No Matter How Loud I Shout - Edward Humes
25. The nanny diaries - Emma Mclaughlin and Nicola Kraus
29. The Golden Compass - Phillip Pullman

This one I found at College Park bookstore for free:
28. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone

These were loaned to me by a nutjob I found on craigslist:
24. Body Language - Pease
26. The Game: penetrating the secret society of pickup artists - Neil Strauss

And most turned out to be excellent reads during an excellent year :)