Insulin Resistance Diet for Beginners: The Complete Guide to Reverse Insulin Resistance & Manage Weight

Insulin Resistance Diet for Beginners is a tutorial guide with recipes for controlling (and hopefully reversing) insulin resistance. Released 24th Dec 2019 by Callisto on their Rockridge Press imprint, it's 156 pages and available in paperback and ebook formats. It's worth noting that the ebook format has a handy interactive table of contents as well as interactive links. I've really become enamored of ebooks with interactive formats lately. For Kindle Unlimited subscribers, this book is included in the KU subscription library to borrow and read for free.

The introductory material and first section define the concepts used throughout the book, explaining metabolic disease in a manner which is non-threatening, layman accessible, and not too technical.  The second section includes two weekly meal plans and recipes. The third section is split into chapters with breakfasts, vegetarian and vegan mains,  poultry and seafood mains, beef and pork mains, sides and staples and desserts. The recipes are fairly appealing, simple, and made with easily sourced ingredients.  The end sections include some metric conversions, ingredient information, resource links and more.

This is a no-nonsense 'do-able' plan with included sample menus and recipes. I am very much a blind follower when it comes to recipes and diet plans and this one feels reasonable and achievable. For people with a diagnosis of insulin resistance, this would be a good and positive plan of action. The recipes follow the same format throughout. A short description with a header containing extra info labels such as 'dairy free', 'super quick',  'gluten free', 'vegetarian', etc is followed by a sidebar which contains info about the prep method and yields. Recipe ingredients are listed in a sidebar bullet point list with measurements in US standard measures. (There is a measurement conversion table included at the back of the book, but it's a hassle not to have them included). The cooking instructions (listed in sequential order) are easy to follow and efficiently written. Nutritional info is provided in the page footer under the cooking instructions  with calories, carbs, glycemic load, protein, fibre, fats, and sodium listed.

My only quibbles with the book (and it's almost universal with the newer crop of cookery and lifestyle books the last year) is that there are very few photos of finished dishes and none of recipe preparation. None of the recipes are extremely complex, so the omission isn't crippling. The photos which are included are clear and appealing and are in color (see cover photo for an example). The other potential issue is that this book is aimed at readers who have no complicating factors, such as inflammatory or auto-immune disorders in addition to a diagnosis of pre-diabetes.

Four stars.

Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.