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Cholesterol - Food, Facts and Recipes
by Juliette Kellow and Sara Lewis
Hamlyn
ISBN 978-0-600-61825-6
Published March 2008 - Softcover - 128 pages - $14.95

Cholesterol.  That silent killer can be controlled, and the more naturally, the better for us.  How and what we eat plays a huge part in lowering cholesterol, and therefore lowering our chances of dying from a stroke or heart attack.  Of course if you smoke, have high blood pressure, or live a sedentary life, you're not on the the right path to good heart health.  This book spells Cholesterol out for the lay person, and I liked the traffic analogy.  A healthy diet is the best way to help reverse your high cholesterol, and by eating fruit and vegetables, less fat, more fish and fiber, you'll be helping your body.  Food labels are a good place to start - if you can understand them.  The book discusses saturated and unsaturated fats, trans fats, hydrogenated fats/vegetable oil, salt, alcohol consumption, exercise, stress, and more.  There are also recipes, these of which appealed to me: Tomato, Red Lentil & Cumin Soup; Tuna Pasta Salad; Curried Couscous Salad (sounds divine because I adore smoked mackerel); Cottage Pie with Parsnip Mash, and Pineapple & Ginger Rock Cakes.  When it comes to the eating of five different fruits and vegetables every day, it confuses people and because fruit and vege is expensive, it's sometimes a little limiting.  However, it's this easy: "As a guide, the more colors you go for, the greater the variety of nutrients you'll get.  For example, you could have a glass of orange juice with breakfast, add a tomato to a sandwich at lunchtime, serve dinner with two vegetables, such as carrots and broccoli, and snack on an apple."  Easy!  Apart from being genetically predisposed to having high cholesterol, it's more often than not an unhealthy lifestyle and diet, which can and should be changed.  This book looks at both cholesterol figures in the UK and the USA.
Illustrated.  Nutritional guides along with the recipes.
Conclusion - A great little book to have on hand in the kitchen.  It's not a thousand-page-book - it's short and to the point and extremely useful.