Good features of Giedt's book include - 1) recipes for 2 servings, a brilliant idea since Type II diabetes attacks older folks in greater numbers and the average household size for householders over 50 is less than two. I find dividing a recipe for six can be annoying. It's much easier to double or triple the recipe if you want extra servings for freezing. 2) a pantry list at the front of her book which allows one to assess current stocks. As many recipes call for the same items, and it's nice to have a "core" list. 3) a discussion of storage arrangements. Smaller households find big ingredients a hassle. (Giedt does not mention this, but Giam sells special storage bags and "keeper" disks for the refrigerator vegetable drawer, and they work well.) 4) calorie counts, content measures for protein, carbohydrates, fat, etc. and "Joslin" exchanges are listed beside each recipe. (The latter explained in an appendix.) 5) good ideas such as preparing a beef onion mix that can be frozen and used as an ingredient when a single bowl of Chili or some other meal that includes cooked and crumbled beef is desired.

For me, the annoying aspects of this book are these - 1) Although the recipes are low calorie, many of them are high carbohydrate. 2) While the book is loaded with gems of information, the reader will have to extract them. For example, I had to read through a number of recipes before I found the egg = egg substitute equivalencies. As many of the recipes call for eggs or egg substitute, it would have been good if she had included this information in an index. (If she did, I can't find it!!) Neither of these complaints are a "big deal" however, hence the 5 stars.