The Vegan Cookbook “For Food & Love – self-love begins with good food” by author Anne Mühlmeier promises a fusion of Ayurveda, yoga and vegan nutritionto nourish and harmonize body and mind.
Especially in the hectic hustle and bustle of our modern lives, more and more people are looking for ways to balance body and mind and eat in a healthy and sustainable way. Especially for people with chronic illnesses such as lipedema, lymphedema or thrombosis, it makes sense to balance physical and mental needs and reduce stress.
My background with regards to vegan nutrition
So that you can understand a little better the perspective from which I look at the vegan cookbook “For Food & Love” by Anne Mühlmeier, I will briefly tell you something about it my own background in nutrition. During my childhood and adolescence, you could count with two hands the types of fruits and vegetables I was willing to eat. And that's not an understatement, it's the truth.
It wasn't until I started studying in 2012 that I gradually started to think about my diet and new foods. I was lucky with my circle of friends, who always lovingly took me by the hand and encouraged me to try peppers (no joke) and also more exotic foods. I swapped constant consumption of specialty foods for tea and, rather unintentionally, built up a reasonably balanced diet.
That went well until I caught a gastrointestinal illness in July 2019 and my digestion didn't recover in the following six months. The topic kept coming back to me and for the first time in my life I became very conscious of my diet and its effects on my digestion and overall health. That's why I took Veganuary 2020 as an opportunity to go to one plant-based diet to upgrade.
Since then, my digestion has improved so much that I don't think about it most of the time. The knee pain that I had five years ago and that no doctor could explain to me has since disappeared and my lipedema pain level is also pretty low. A predominantly vegan diet has proven to be beneficial for me, so I have tried out many recipes and cookbooks over the last few years. I would like to say that I read the vegan cookbook “For Food & Love” more as a “vegan professional”.
With my photos I would like to show you that the vegan diet is for you large playground to try out can be. True to the motto “Everything can, nothing has to.”
Plant-based nutrition – with ifs and buts
I often hear that giving up cheese in particular is seen as a difficult hurdle when switching to a vegan diet. If this is also an issue for you, then I can explain the term to you plant-based nutrition only warmly recommend it. The focus here is on fruit, vegetables, whole grain products, beans, legumes, nuts and seeds - but it does not completely exclude the consumption of animal products. We emphasize it again and again with regard to self-management with lipedema, lymphedema or thrombosis - you don't have to implement anything perfectly. It's better to start, try it out and be generous if a day doesn't go the way you want.
According to the, plant-based diets include: German Society for Nutrition e.V. (DGE) the Mediterranean and Nordic diet, as well as the Planetary Health Diet and the vegetarian and vegan diet.
Health benefits of a vegan diet
Many areas of vegan nutrition have not yet been sufficiently researched, but some statements about the health effects can still be made: According to the German Nutrition Society (DGE), people who eat a vegan diet, for example lower risk of obesity and diabetes, also is the Cholesterol levels are usually lowerwhat that Reduces risk of heart disease.1
In a study with 22 pairs of adult identical twins, scientists at Stanford University were able to show that cardiovascular health of their test subjects improved just two months after switching to a vegan diet.2
There is always talk of so-called inflammatory foods, which include not only white flour, sugar and alcohol, but also excessive meat consumption and cow's milk products.3 Especially with regard to chronic diseases such as lipedema, lymphedema and thrombosis, it makes sense to avoid these foods.
However, the DGE also emphasizes the following:
If you primarily consume heavily processed, energy-dense and nutrient-poor foods, such a plant-based diet has no health benefits.4
This is exactly where the vegan mindfulness cookbook “For Food & Love” comes into play.
Vegan cookbook “For Food & Love” – the first impression and structure
When leafing through this vegan cookbook it quickly becomes clear that there is a fascinating synergy between vegan diet, yoga and Ayurveda gives. “For Food & Love” not only promises tasty and healthy recipes, but also sets out to explain what nutrition has to do with self-love. My heart pounded as soon as I held the book in my hand. The light pink linen cover with salmon-colored embossing literally invites you to caress it and I immediately like the feel of the pages.
The vegan cookbook “For Food & Love” is divided into five thematic blocks:
- inspiration
- breakfast, divided into the four seasons
- Lunch, divided into the four seasons
- Dinner and breakfast, divided into the four seasons
- Extras, such as soups, desserts, sweets, spreads, chutneys, pestos and drinks
The first topic block is the one about “For Food & Love”. ideal coffee table book makes: on almost 100 pages, the author Anne Mühlmeier presents her thoughts on questions such as “What is self-love actually?” and “What does nature do to you?” She guides readers into the topics of yoga and Ayurveda and writes about the cycle of the seasons and human digestion.
She gives an overview of various spices and herbs, reminds us readers why drinking water is so important and makes an excursion into the areas of coffee and sugar. This is all accompanied by beautiful photos, which at least mentally take me on a journey to rural regions and remind me of the warm summer days in the village. By the way, there is suddenly a Star Wars quote that makes my inner child's heart beat faster:
“That’s how we’re gonna win. Not by fighting what we hate. But saving what we love.”
Pretty fitting for all compression heroes, right? We cannot hate and fight our chronic illnesses, but should fight for the body and life we love.
“For Food & Love” – The recipes
The book is a Great starter work for vegan cookingn, however, the recipes should in some ways be treated with caution (hehe, pun). What do I mean by that? All recipes are deliberately timeless because this cookbook is a very conscious invitation to consciously cook and enjoy. That's why my recommendation for you, even as a vegan professional, is to choose time windows in which you can consciously engage with the recipes.
Some recipes, such as Basic Porridge, are of course also suitable for weekdays if you don't have to leave the house too early. Personally, I love porridge in the morning and My digestion thanks me every day that I take the time to eat this very conscious warm breakfast. Other breakfast recipes, such as mung waffles, require a lot more time and invite you to have a cozy Sunday breakfast.
I HAD to try this recipe because I was really skeptical. I had already tried various vegan waffle recipes and was not satisfied. Most of the time it failed because of the consistency. I also thought it would be difficult to buy mung beans, but I quickly found them in the local unpackaged store. The waffles completely surprised me! I pureed all the ingredients for the dough in the Thermomix and finally baked the vegan waffles. I found it to be very tasty and can easily imagine making it again.
A short excursion to mung beans
When I first leafed through it, I noticed that Anne Mühlmeier uses mung beans quite often in the vegan cookbook “For Food & Love”. This confused me a bit at first because I hardly knew any recipes with this ingredient. My research then showed that mung beans contain particularly valuable protein due to their high Lyin content. They have a relatively neutral taste (which was confirmed by my test of the mung waffles), contain a lot of fiber, carbohydrates and folic acid, but are easier to digest than other legumes and therefore do not cause bloating.5
Lunch, dinner and cake
In the lunch and dinner categories, every hearty gourmet will find what they are looking for. The vegan cookbook “For Food & Love” begins here with the Ayurvedic dish Kitchari, which is also based on mung beans and for which there is a seasonal version. There is also Recipes for burger and asparagus fans, the obligatory pasta with tomato sauce recipe, stews, curries or baked cauliflower.
The recipes largely do not require any substitute products; only milk alternatives are needed every now and then. This also makes the book a great vegan starter work. You can approach it slowly and add new ingredients, but you can actually go a long way with a generous purchase at the market or in the vegetable department. If I'm honest, I mostly used dried herbs instead of fresh herbs. I always have them at home and they last a long time.
For me, I rarely need an excuse to bake. It's enough for me to have fun doing it. And so almost immediately after I held the vegan cookbook “For Food & Love” in my hands, I got all the ingredients for the spiced chocolate cake and baked the recipe. Except for the pears as a fresh ingredient, which I bought, the remaining ingredients were part of the standard repertoire in my pantry: hazelnuts, linseeds, corn starch and the like are a great basic equipment, especially when it comes to baking or breakfast - but you can find them now in every supermarket and even in discounters.
The cake recipe was incredibly easy to make and it was so delicious! I baked the cake for a friend and she loved it as much as I did. Unfortunately, I underestimated the fact that the cake was relatively moist and should have been stored in the fridge. So I can give you this as a tip if you bake the recipe yourself.
Who is the vegan cookbook “For Food & Love” suitable for?
The cookbook is a great addition for you, if you like to think outside the box and want to try out recipes that you wouldn't have thought of on your own and won't find on every food blog. I now own a few vegan cookbooks and follow numerous food bloggers I was surprised at how much in “For Food & Love” was new to me. At the same time, it is also a great introductory work for anyone who is just getting started with vegan nutrition.
The detailed inspiration section at the beginning is perfect for thinking up a few new thoughts about your own diet every day and is a great basis for all further experiments. “For Food & Love” can slow down your everyday life and inspire your cooking. Leafing through and browsing through the lovingly designed pages brings me joy every time.
I also think that the vegan cookbook “For Food & Love” is a wonderful gift for loved ones in your life who value sustainability, mindfulness and good food. Do you finally want to get started? Get the vegan mindfulness cookbook for your kitchen now.
Sources:
- https://utopia.de/ratgeber/vegane-ernaehrung-vorteile-regeln-und-was-du-beachten-musst/
- https://utopia.de/news/zwillinge-studie-kein-fleisch-acht-wochen-folgen_623215/
- https://www.geo.de/wissen/ernaehrung/entzuendungsfoerdernde-lebensmittel–das-sollten-sie-meiden-31630226.html
- https://www.dge.de/gesunde-ernaehrung/faq/pflanzenbasierte-ernaehrung/
- https://www.umweltberatung.at/mungbohne-deckname-sojasprossen#:~:text=Die%20Mungbohnen%20haben%20recht%20neutralen,werten%20die%20Mungbohnen%20weiter%20auf.
