Proper Healthy

Proper Healthy

by Calum Harris
Setting: England
Genres: Cooking / Vegan
Published on December 31, 2024
Pages: 240
Format: eARC Source: Netgalley
Amazon

Easy, healthy dishes that just so happen to be plant-based. Each of the recipes in this book come with up to four health 'boosts' to meet your dietary needs: 

  • ENERGY
  • GUT HEALTH
  • PROTEIN-PACKED
  • SHAPE-UP

Eating healthy means missing out on the food you love, right? Wrong. If you’re looking for a no-nonsense way to eat well, then Proper Healthy has you covered. Calum Harris has done all the hard work for you, working with a registered dietician to create easy, plant-based dishes that come packed with up to four health benefits to boost your meals. 

Whether it’s helping your gut health, upping your protein-intake, restoring energy levels or eating lower-calorie meals, these unapologetically tasty, hassle-free recipes are guaranteed to deliver. 

From brunches and quick eats, puds and pick-me-ups, this is a book for anyone who cares about what goes into their bodies and what food can do to their mood and energy. It’s for anyone looking to stick to a plant-based diet, or for plant-based eaters looking for healthy inspiration. 

Recipes include:

Pretend-like-you’re-in-LA smoothie bowl
Gingery basil rainbow noodle jars
Gnocchi shepherd’s pie
Cacio e pepe leek rigatoni
Tempeh taco bowl with chipotle crema
Shredded BBQ jerk tofu bowl 
Upside-down pistachio and orange semolina cake
Raspberry miso blondies

I’ll admit that I didn’t have high expectations when I picked this book up off of Netgalley. The cover doesn’t look like much and I had never heard of the author. I ended up quite surprised by how many recipes that I ended up bookmarking.

The interior photography is well done. The book is bright and cheerful. The writing is a bit affected and overly fake friendly for my taste in some of the recipes. Just tell me how to make the recipe. We don’t have to be pretend best friends while we do it.

But the recipes are actually quite good. There are a few tips here that I hadn’t thought of before.

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On this recipe for example, I hadn’t thought of making a crema with silken tofu before instead of a yogurt or nondairy sour cream. I would be more likely to make sauces this way. It is simple and obvious once you think of it but I hadn’t.

I think I will be making several of the tofu dishes that he has in this book has toppings for salads or bowls that I make. He makes good flavor combinations. His recipes aren’t complicated and even if you aren’t interested in making the entire dish there are nuggets that you can take away from each one.