Flax the Super Food!: Over 80 Delicious Recipes Using Flax Oil and Ground Flaxseed

Flax - the Super Food - Book Review The Introduction, provides a helpful background on flax that's easy to understand. The author speaks from his experience, having developed, marketed, and distributed flax products for the health food market as well as studied flax farming and pressing techniques. Covered is the history of flax, from before Christ, to the present, including where flax is raised today. The author gives illustrations of how flax has helped both animals and humans. Flax can be a food and a medicine, both on the inside (in food and as a laxative) as well as on the outside (as poultices for healing wounds and healthy skin). There is a good explanation of the fiber, mucilage, lignans, and oil in flax and their health benefits. There are helpful consumer tips on how to purchase, use, and store flax oil and flax (both the brown and the newer gold varieties of flax.) The author stresses how to buy flax oil in small quantities, in dark containers, and "cold-expeller-pressed" as heating and refining changes the flax oil into unhealthy trans fats. The recipe section, written by two cookbook authors, features a variety of healthy, vegetarian recipes that include not only flax but also soy foods such as tofu and soy milk. Each recipe has a helpful nutritional analysis. To eliminate confusion ,it might help to explain whether a recipe calling for "ground flaxseeds" means to measure the flax before or after grinding. Some other helpful additions to the book might be: o A mini conversion chart of how much whole flax seed equals how much ground flax o A nutritional analysis of flax and flax oil, such as found on a food label, that would include the calories, fat, fiber, protein content, etc o A few more documented human research studies from places such as NCI (National Cancer Institute) to further substantiate the many health benefits of flax. o A bit more discussion by a nutritionist discussing omega 3 and omega 6 fats, including possibly a chart showing the fat composition of flax and flax oil by the percentage of each type of fat. o A list of flax resources (books, web sites) and places to get flax in the US and Canada - such as the Flax Council of Canada.