Eat Vegan on $4 A Day {Cookbook Review}

I’m not vegan and while I don’t have plans for our family to make that total change any time soon, like any conscious omnivore, I do believe that we can all stand to have a few more fruits and vegetables in our diets. As a testament to that, I’m renewing the Eating the Alphabet series again for 2012! Frankly, I find veganism a bit intimidating. Vegetarianism seems more doable (at least in includes dairy, which would be hard for us to cut out entirely) so when I received a copy of Eat Vegan on $4 a Day I was anxious to see how easily I could prepare vegan dishes, but do it inexpensively as well.

You see, there seems to be a misnomer that eating healthy (and especially fruits, vegetables and grains) is more expensive. Not so as the author, Ellen Jaffe Jones shows us in her book. Jones’ style is unassuming and not like a lecture. Her background is in investigative reporting and she’s a self-taught cook and vegan. She knows that changing the way you eat will take time and through her book she provides the ideas and tools to make that process a little bit easier.

Jones start off with a look at the financial cost of eating healthy–or rather how it doesn’t have to be expensive. She offers food plans for shopping as well as money saving tips. She also takes on top objections like how cooking from scratch takes too much time (or not) being the only one in your family to eat that way and helps readers overcome those objections. Included in the book are sample weekly meal plans that show the reader just how they CAN eat vegan for $4 or less a day.

The remainder of the book is filled with lots of recipes for breakfasts like sweet potato muffins, entrees like Chunky Chili, Taste of Thai Saute’ or Veggie Sushi and even desserts like Carrot Cake to Live For or Apple Crisp. There are also lots of yummy salad dressings and salads included. What I discovered is that many of the meals I’ve been making are already vegan so it wouldn’t be that much of a stretch to expand our selection.

Overall, I think Eat Vegan on $4 a Day is a great primer for those wishing to make a lifestyle change for the way that they eat.

Disclaimer: I received a copy of this book from the publisher for review. I am also an Amazon Affiliate member which means I earn a very small percentage of any orders placed through my site. My opinions, however, are my own and my true feelings.