Fresh Choices
More Than 100 Easy Recipes for Pure Food When You Can't Buy 100% Organic
By David Joachim, Rochelle Davis

     A Fresh Choices tidbit: Holy Cow! The average person living in the US consumes more than 600 pounds of dairy products every year.

      Eating safe IS just as important as eating right. Even though the authors give you recipes and advice for pure food when you can't buy 100% organic, some of the revelations in Fresh Choices may scare you into eating organic for the rest of your life.

      Joachim and Davis' want to "steer you in the direction of the purest and safest meats, poultry, seafood, and dairy products." They say, "Options like pasture-raised chicken, grass-fed beef and RBGH-free milk are increasingly available in local food markets." (They aren't in most small town grocers, but with an informative book like this one hopes grocers will take the incentive and provide them.) The authors also recommend substitutes for those foods they don't recommend, such as switching from Atlantic cod to Alaskan Pollock, hook-and-line caught cod, or sable fish. It's not a book to be glanced at. The authors talk seriously about food processing, pesticides and more. They also use humor when pointing out facts as mentioned in the first sentence of the review.

       The recipes provided are interesting. Herbs are used in most, if not all. Recipes range from easy, such as "Warm Potatoes with Mustard Herb Dressing," to the gourmet, such as "Thai Fettuccine Primavera." Some of the recipes fit my cooking habits and some do not, which is normal in a cookbook. I really enjoyed the Berry-Stuffed French Toast on page 200 - but "seriously washed" strawberries were my choice fruit. I enjoyed reading Fresh Choices, and the only issue I had with it was the lack of pictures. I highly recommend it to the cook in the family.