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A review by midwifereading
It Starts with Food: Discover the Whole30 and Change Your Life in Unexpected Ways by Dallas Hartwig
4.0
Overall, I really appreciated the approach in this book. It wasn't what I expected, at all. Essentially, Whole30 is an elimination diet, designed help you rule out, for yourself, which kinds of foods may be a problem for you. Essentially, you eliminate the foods most commonly linked to systemic inflammation, hormonal problems, and cravings. It's like quitting smoking cold-turkey, but with problem foods. After your initial 30 days, you gradually reintroduce the problem foods, one at a time, and evaluate yourself to see if/when/how you ought (or ought not) to add them back into your regular diet.
It has a very down-to-earth, conversational writing style, which isn't stellar, but very accessible. I think my favorite part is near the end of the book, when the dreaded "meal plan" is discussed. Rather than giving you a pre-made menu and grocery list, this book outlines some basic staples to have on hand, a few bare-bones recipes, and tells you to run with it. This is right in line with the way my husband prefers to cook. We make a menu plan, I buy him some ingredients, and he makes what he wants, based only very loosely on the menu. So, I think this might be do-able for our family.
I felt encouraged by the overall tone (in spite of a condescending sentence every now and then), and the fact that it encourages personal responsibility and informed decision-making. They expect you to take the science, their experience, and the information in the book, and apply it to yourself, evaluating carefully as you go.
I'm happy with it.
It has a very down-to-earth, conversational writing style, which isn't stellar, but very accessible. I think my favorite part is near the end of the book, when the dreaded "meal plan" is discussed. Rather than giving you a pre-made menu and grocery list, this book outlines some basic staples to have on hand, a few bare-bones recipes, and tells you to run with it. This is right in line with the way my husband prefers to cook. We make a menu plan, I buy him some ingredients, and he makes what he wants, based only very loosely on the menu. So, I think this might be do-able for our family.
I felt encouraged by the overall tone (in spite of a condescending sentence every now and then), and the fact that it encourages personal responsibility and informed decision-making. They expect you to take the science, their experience, and the information in the book, and apply it to yourself, evaluating carefully as you go.
I'm happy with it.