Healthy, low-calorie food can be as rich and tasty as any other foods you cook. However, many still think “boring” when they imagine a healthy diet. You don’t have to be a whiz in the kitchen to make healthy food appetizing and taste good. Learning just a few low calorie cooking techniques, and ingredients, to use will make any food flavorful and satisfying.
Understanding Low Calorie Foods
Sometimes foods advertised as being “low calorie” actually contain other harmful ingredients. Just because something is packaged as low calorie, it doesn’t always mean that it is good for you. When fat and calories are cut from food, a little of the flavor is also often lost. So, many manufacturers will also increase the amount of salt, sugar, and artificial flavors in order to make the food taste nicer. Keep in mind, when cooking at home; it’s possible to make healthy food satisfying without artificial flavors.
Low calorie cooking doesn’t have to be complicated. To build flavor into a dish, think of it in terms of using ingredients that are low in sodium and calories and high in flavor-enhancing capabilities. Add spices or chilies to your food for a flavor boost. Spices, such as allspice, cayenne pepper, chili pepper, cinnamon, cardamom as well as aromatics, such as garlic, onions, citrus juice, vinegar, olives, capers, fresh ginger, scallions and shallots, are fundamental and all add healthy flavor and are loaded with anti-oxidants without calories. Food that is loaded with flavor will stimulate your taste buds and be more satisfying, so you won’t eat as much.
Trick Your Taste Buds
The more we know about how the taste buds actually work, the more we can trick them into being satisfied with your new, healthier, lighter way of living. Satisfy the nose first! The tongue’s taste buds are responsible for detecting basic tastes (salty, bitter, sour, sweet, and savory), but it’s the nose that detects the specific flavors of foods through olfaction, or smell. Ever wonder why food just doesn’t taste as good, no matter how great it looks, when you have a stuffy nose?
Fat Tastes Good, Right?
Nope! Fat molecules are actually too big to be processed by the taste buds. There are a few good reasons why high-fat foods taste so good. What you may taste are impurities mixed in high-flavor oils such as olive and sesame, and meats such as bacon, or butter.
And, why do fried foods taste so good? A few reasons: When foods are fried in oil, the high-temperature-frying process releases the volatiles in food, therefore triggering the “fat aroma” – thereby, satisfying the nose. Deep-frying at high temperatures also contributes two other desirable characteristics:
- Crispy texture on the outside while moist and tender on the inside
- Unique flavors from the caramelization of sugars and starches and the browning of the food
Keep in mind too that a food’s flavor, and our enjoyment of it, actually relies on many of our senses: smell, touch, sight, and of course, taste.
Low Calorie Cooking Techniques to Use
Considering how the taste buds work, and what makes fatty foods so desirable (such as crunchiness in chips to the moistness in cookies and cakes) here are 10 low-calorie cooking techniques to trick your taste buds:
Freshness Counts: Rather than dried herbs, flavor your low-fat recipes with the freshest ingredients you can find. A handful of chopped, fresh herbs give a huge flavor boost to all kinds of ordinary dishes. Lemon, lime, or fresh oranges (finely chopped) will add flavor to a dish that only calls for lemon, lime, or orange juice. Fresh parsley adds a tasty twist to something as basic as canned soup or scrambled eggs.
Sauté First: Toasting, roasting, or browning certain recipe ingredients — such as nuts and garlic — can bring out the natural flavors.
Brown It!: Browning food by pan-frying or oven-frying in a little bit of oil is ok. Using the oil lightly, or with olive oil, can still be healthy and make the meal more appetizing. Try coating the pan you are pan frying or baking in with canola cooking spray. You can also use cooking spray to coat the outside of the food you are oven-frying or pan-frying? It literally coats the food with a thin layer of small droplets of canola oil — just enough to seal the outside crust or breading and encourage some browning as it cooks.
Moisten for Richness: Fat tenderizes and moistens food like the oil added in muffin or cake recipes. In most cases, you can replace at least half of the fat in a bakery-type recipe with something else that adds moisture. Ingredients such as flavored yogurts, fat-free or light cream cheese, light or fat-free sour cream, applesauce, liqueurs, etc. all help serve this purpose in baked recipes.
With Eggs: Sometimes two or three eggs are called for when really one egg yolk will do. Often, you can add one egg to a recipe and replace the other eggs with 1/4-cup of egg substitute (such as EggBeaters) or two egg whites.
Add New Flavors to “Ordinary” Dishes
Rather than trying to find new recipes, or radically changing the menu, try tweaking standard recipes by adding and experimenting with new flavors. Here are some quick flavor boosters to keep in mind.
Vinaigrette: Use a tablespoon of this classic to top steamed vegetables, grilled greens, bean salads, chicken, or tofu. It’s just a combo of olive oil, balsamic vinegar, lemon juice, and mustard.
Bacon: Turkey or even pork beacon is okay in moderation. Crumble on a salad, add to sautéed or steamed vegetables, or use it to top a turkey sandwich. Three strips of turkey, or 2 strips of regular bacon, are only 90 calories.
Guacamole: Add guacamole to your salad, or plain bean burrito, and you’ll have a much more satisfying experience. Two tablespoons if there are other fats in your meal or indulge in 1/4 cup if guacamole will be the only fat you’re eating.
Seasoning blends: Blends like Mrs. Dash, are a great way to add depth and flavor without adding salt. You can substitute a seasoning blend in any recipe that calls for salt, or sprinkle it on to perk up any food: scrambled eggs, soups, sandwiches, salads, cooked meat or fish.
Toasted nuts: Freshly roasted nuts add texture, taste, and richness to your meals. For instance, pine nuts (pignoli) pair beautifully with sautéed spinach, broccoli rabe, and other sautéed greens. Slivered almonds or pecans are wonderful on fruit salad. To toast: Heat in your toaster oven at 250° for about 4 to 6 minutes, watching carefully that they don’t burn. 2 tablespoons is about 90 calories.
Cheese: Using a stronger-tasting cheese will add a ton of flavor, and a little goes a long way. A tablespoon of Parmesan will give steamed broccoli the same lift as it does a bowl of pasta with tomato sauce. A pungent goat cheese makes any salad — and your standard turkey sandwich — much richer. Max out at 1/2 ounce of regular or 1 ounce of reduced-fat.
Pickles and Olives: I always like to have a pickle jar handy for those times an ordinary lunch needs something extra. Whether you like dills or the bread-and-butter variety, pickles make a great addition to sandwiches, burgers and wraps. Olives of all kinds (I tend to have the Martini variety handy) are a great side to a cheese and cracker lunch. Chopping pickles or olives into tuna also adds a load of flavor – about ¼ cup.
Cinnamon: The key flavoring in so many desserts and baked goods, but few people think to use it in savory dishes. You can add a cinnamon stick or some ground cinnamon to soups, chilies and stews while they’re cooking.
Mustard: Try spreading mustard, rather than mayonnaise, on sandwiches. It brings lots of fat-free tang to the table, and comes many flavors and styles.
Salsa: Not just for chips anymore, salsa will come to the rescue of almost any bland dish. Try it on fish, backed potatoes, sautéed or plain steamed vegetables. Or, experiment by baking with salsa on chicken or fish.
I hope this inspires you to try new things when eating healthy and cooking low-calorie foods. This is by no means an exhaustive list either. Just use your imagination – you have nothing to lose by the fat!
To learn more about low calorie cooking, visit Delish.com!
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.