Easy Luncboxes now has a recipe book!

It has been a crazy couple of weeks here! I have all everything from last week, but still haven't gotten around to updating the blog. Sorry about that! I will get it done tonight, and hopefully get myself together enough to get back into a daily schedule tomorrow. The kids had half days all the prior week due to conferences and it really threw me off.

Recently I was lucky enough to get the opportunity to review a fantastic new recipe book. It's called Cooking With Trader Joe's Easy Lunchboxes. It has taken me a while to get around to writing the review, but I was really excited to have the chance to read the book and try out some of the recipes.

It really is a neat book! I admit that I have a weakness for recipe books. I love them. I have a small collection, and I really use them frequently. I think that each different recipe book, regardless of how similar it might seem to others, has its own merits. Each book has something different to offer. And this one really is nothing like any others I have!

Here is the official blurb:

About the book

Cooking with Trader Joe’s Cookbook - Easy Lunch Boxes is a delightfully different cookbook, born from social media. Through the online network that grew around her EasyLunchboxes products, Kelly discovered a world of bloggers and parents whose ideas for attention-grabbing, healthy food matched her own ingenuity – so she brought them together for this book. Among the book’s 32 contributors are popular food bloggers Marla Meridith (the book’s food stylist and photographer), Aviva Goldfarb, Leslie Durso, and Lisa Leake, with a foreword by food activist Bettina Elias Siegel. The cookbook offers options for the entire family, including vegetarian, vegan, and gluten-free offerings.

Cooking with Trader Joe’s Cookbook: Easy Lunch Boxes is available at bookstores everywhere including Barnes & Noble and Amazon.com (hardcover, $24.95, Brown Bag Publishers).

I like that each section in the book has an intro from the author of that section. Quite a few different authors came together to contribute to the book, and it's great to read a little about each of them, get to know who they are and where they come from.

It would be dishonest to say that I wasn't a bit disappointed in the first few pages of the book. The first bit contains 'recipes' that are really just creative ways of displaying prepackaged frozen foods, like frozen mac & cheese bites. Not bad, just not what I expected when I opened a recipe book.

But the rest of the book is fantastic. Tons of excellent recipes! And some very beautiful, colorful pictures, too. Each recipe is featured with a photo of the finished product displayed in a packed lunch, tucked into an Easy Lunchbox with complimentary sides.

I've given a few of the recipes a whirl, and I was impressed! I LOVE the Personalized Baked Oatmeal To Go recipe - that was a huge hit with the kids. Bean dug into the Pickle Salad and immediately declared it "DELICIOUS!" The Oatmeal Blueberry Pancakes were great, and easily reheated after being frozen for later. I plan to give the Reuben Pasta Salad and Smoky Chipotle BBQ Beef recipes a shot this week, and am sure they will have excellent results!

 

The book has an excellent variety of recipes, all kid friendly and well-balanced. They're geared for good health, very well put together, and use fresh delicious ingredients. There are recipes for every taste - including vegetarian, vegan, and gluten-free dishes, too!

If you hurry, you can get the book for a lower price. It's on sale right now through Amazon for only $16.47!