The Blue Zones Kitchen: 100 Recipes to Live to 100

👌AWESOME ! I have bought 2 of these "Cookbooks" ! Try to buy the "Spiral Bound" style Cookbook. It is much easier to use while following the recipes ! Beautiful & vibrant photographs to match the "Worldly Recipes". The explanations, writing, shared knowledge of spices, & natural ingredients make this book a fun & great motivator in the kitchen. Better than being there ! Thank you ! YAY ! Washington, DC

If you’ve ever thought, “I’d love to cook like someone who can blow out 100 birthday candles without needing a nap,” then The Blue Zones Kitchen is your culinary holy grail. This book is essentially the love child of a cookbook and a life coach, showing you how to eat like the world’s longest-living people while keeping things simple, hearty, and delicious. The recipes hail from the fabled “Blue Zones”—places like Sardinia, Okinawa, and Nicoya—where people somehow outsmart death while making meals that are surprisingly low on kale but high on flavor. It’s filled with vibrant, plant-based dishes that make you realize beans are not just a side dish—they’re the main event. And it’s a feast! Chickpeas, black beans, fava beans, beans that probably haven’t even been named yet—they’re all here, ready to make you feel like a champion of longevity. The best part? The recipes aren’t preachy. You’re not required to meditate while stirring the soup or perform yoga poses between courses. It’s all about creating wholesome, satisfying food that nourishes without making you feel like you’ve been banished to a life of quinoa and sadness. And don’t worry, you’re not signing up for a monk-like existence. There’s wine (thank you, Sardinia!), there’s olive oil, there’s bread—because even centenarians know that life without bread isn’t really living. The Blue Zones Kitchen isn’t just a cookbook; it’s a passport to living longer, better, and tastier. It’s filled with mouthwatering photos and storytelling that makes you feel like you’re learning the secrets of life from your wise old Italian grandmother—except she’s also best friends with a Japanese fisherman and a Costa Rican farmer. Highly recommended for anyone wanting to add a dash of longevity to their plate without sacrificing flavor.

Gift for my vegetarian Aunt in-law. Great present that features plant-based recipes without the vegetarian lifestyle being the main focus, it’s all about longevity and food practices of cultures that have existed for centuries. Very interesting to those vegetarian and not!

This plant-based cookbook contains recipes from some of the healthiest regions of the world, the Blue Zones. Be aware, however, that many recipes include white flour, refined sugar, oils, or may be fried. These recipes will not fit in with Dr. Esselstyn's heart disease prevention diet, Forks over Knives, The Alzheimer's Solution, or other currently popular diet programs for specific health concerns that also take inspiration from the Blue Zones. However, the recipes are still miles ahead of the Standard American Diet which most people follow. Therefore, many of us will benefit from this approach. And the recipes should appeal to everyone, no matter what diet or lifestyle you choose. The recipes are organized by region, not category. Beyond the actual recipes in this cookbook is a section which details the healthiest ingredients from each region featured in the book, as well as explanations why each ingredient is important. Almost all of these ingredients are easy to find at most supermarkets, or perhaps an occasional trip to an Asian market. Occasional substitutions are listed, such as using sweet potatoes instead of yuca in the Yuca Cakes recipe. The recipes are pretty much what you might expect for regional selections. Stuffed grape leaves from Greece. Toasted fregula from Sardinia. Okinawan Sweet Bread. And smoothies and smoothie bowls from Loma Linda. Throughout the book, though, you'll find a wide range of flavors, seasonings, and cooking techniques that bring extra flavor and variety to each meal. I was drawn to this cookbook not only because of the proven studies showing longer, healthier, and happier lives in the Blue Zones, but also because my mother has Alzheimer's and I worry about my own future. The Blue Zones are also regions where Alzheimer's rates are some of the lowest in the world. Loma Linda, California, boasts the lowest rates in our country. I'm already familiar with some of the recipes in this cookbook and look forward to trying more. Highly recommended.

I have a LOT of plant based cookbooks. This one is such a wealth of information, extremely interesting, gorgeous photography, and simple, interesting, authentic dishes that our grandparents and great grandparents ate daily. Don't pay attention to the sniping - the majority of the centenarians across the 5 blue zones were NOT vegan, and DID eat grains regularly. Which should put to rest the Western phobia about grains and gluten. But apparently many did not make that connection. The recipes are simple and tasty - after all, they are what everyday rural, non-industrial populations eat EVERYDAY (someone criticized the recipes for being "ordinary everyday food." And surprise, there is white flour and sugar in a few recipes. So, yes, if you're eating pounds of beans and vegetables everyday and getting lots of daily exercise, a) prevalence of lifestyle disease is very very low or nonexistent, and therefore, b) it's possible to enjoy a sweet treat once or twice a week - like ONE serving, not a whole cake - without your body and brain having a meltdown. Don't be deceived by the simplicity of most of the recipes - the natural flavors of the whole foods, the food and spices and herb combinations reveal the instinctive genius of our ancestors and explains the lack of lifestyle diseases that lead to the long, slow, and miserable health declines we've come to take for granted in the past 100 years. If you didn't die of infectious diseases, accidents, or acute, random maladies such as appendicitis, or childbirth, most people lived into their 80s. Then in the 50s, in spite of the miracle drugs such a insulin, antibiotics, etc, more people began living into older age - but began declining sooner. Doesn't have to be that way.

Blue Zones: areas of the world where the residents have a long, healthy old age. Okinawa is one of them, and the recipe here for sweet potatoes is one I'm familiar with. In fact, I spent time in Japan, found I lost weight without trying (something normally difficult for me) running my legs off up and down stairs and eating nearly no sugar for the time I was there. The lack of sugar was startling in the Japanese diet, in particular. The one hundred recipes in "Blue Zone Kitchens" are not outlandish and though there are a few unusual ingredients, they are obtainable by mail order if you live in a more remote area; for example goji berries are found in health food stores and Asian groceries but you can mail order them. These are used in a breakfast oatmeal dish and they add a lot of important anti-oxidants. Most of the recipes, however are things you can find anywhere and are not unusual. You can find more recipes such as Pumpkin pancakes. Breakfast burritos with black beans by signing up for the Blue Zone website and newsletter. So not only eating but lifestyle is important; having friends and family in a tight network (a friend who lived in a Thai village said it was UNTHINKABLE to be alone) and plenty of gentle but daily constant exercise and movement. And the Okinawan idea of eating 80 percent full known as "hara hachi bu". I was amused to see Hearts of Palm ceviche (raw "fish" marinated) as I love hearts of palm but here they are only found canned. Still, they are really delicious and you can make a meal out of a salad if you cut them up and put them in. Better than artichokes. The Costa Rican recipes in particular are light and flavorful. Though I love Japanese food, I actually loved the Costa Rica chapter the best. And the ancient foods of Sardinia; you haven't lived until you've tried Fregula, their primitive, rolled pasta, a relative of cous cous. It's really good. There is one recipe for fregula with asparagus but it's versatile and very light. You get pasta, but you don't feel heavy after eating it. There is also a recipe for the Sardinian flatbread, their ancient bread originally made on the floor of woodfired ovens. You can see this being made in one of the episodes of Anthony Bourdain. Lots of delicious recipes. Will you live longer? Not sure this book alone will do it, but good recipes high in fiber and low in saturated fats and full of flavor.

This review is based on cooking with 2 recipes so far. The first one is the Ikarian Longevity Stew and the 2nd is the Steamed Purple Sweet Potatoes. Expectations - From looking at the beautiful pics and following the step by step instructions, my expectations is for the food to look similar and have an amazing taste to. There are many cookbooks, where there are a hit and miss with several recipes and I am hoping that this book is not the case. So, let's start with the Ikarian Longevity Stew. The aroma, and ease of preparing and cooking was simple. I believe 1/2 cup of olive oil for the recipe is a little too much, if trying to attempt for weight loss, because the calories can add up. That's about 900 plus calories itself, just for the oil. I decided to use canned beans and followed the step of covering the black-eyed beans with water to cover. Once done, the stew was too water and didn't look anything like the book. I later decided to just drain the water and the Stew came out a lot better. Overall, this recipe is amazing and use a little tweaking. 2nd Recipe - Steamed Purple Sweet Potatoes. If you read the entire commentary on page 119, you realized that this recipe was created by the author. He stated, "Here's a coconut version of my own invention, which I served - to rave reviews - to a New York Times food critic." So this recipe was an total failure. It's only two steps. 1. Steam potatoes for 10-15 mins, remove from heat and let rest, then add one 13.5 oz can of organic coconut milk. First of all, there was way too much coconut milk and the food looked like mashed throw up. It had an okay taste, but looked nothing like the picture. The instructions advises to mash the potatoes, but the pics doesn't look mased at all. Not sure what he garnished it with. Conclusion - I am unbiased in my review, but I will attempt to try more recipes. But based on the hit and miss with just the first 2 recipes that I attempted, I'm afraid that I may be disappointed with, some recipes are okay, while others are just blah! I then decided to ask around in the FB Blue Zones group, and so far a few people agree that the recipes didn't come out to their expectations. As one person stated in our group "Yes, I think there are a number of errors in the recipes."... These are coming from people that support the Blue Zones lifestyle, but disappointed with the recipes. I gave 3 stars because, it's the recipes that matter. NOT, the brilliant pictures, and stories, and the cover design of the book. Yes those are appealing, but how does the recipes stand up.

In order to use a cookbook, you need to enjoy looking through it (otherwise, you’ll pull something up from the web and never find it again, right?). This book should be on coffee tables, it’s so beautiful! The photos from around the world and of people living happy lives makes you want to create these dishes. I also appreciate the included stories and info on communities/people. I love that the ingredients are SIMPLE. You don’t have to wander Whole Foods for an hour looking for an exotic spice you’ll never use again! The dishes are hearty, flavorful, and easy to make - very satisfying. They also give room for you to add your favorite veggies and spices if desired. I’ve even been to a Blue Zone dinner party where everyone brought a dish. We were soooo full, because everything was delicious! There’s no guilt associated with this book, only visual beauty, great health and satisfying flavor - WHY would you pass that up?!