Post by Adona Mara on Jan 31, 2008 0:02:40 GMT -5
Come to Terms with Cooking
By Susan Burke MS, RD, LD/N, CDE
eDiets Contributor
Updated: January 30, 2008
If you're trying to eat healthy, but you want your food tasty, it's great to experiment by using different recipes and cuisines. The health aspect requires a little bit of kitchen know-how, so you can pick and choose recipes, and modify recipes to make them lower in fat and calories. Some recipes' cooking techniques make them inherently difficult, if not impossible to modify. When you know the lingo, you can make healthy choices.
Healthy Cooking Techniques: These techniques are inherently healthy, but many times the recipes will tell you to add butter or oil to the food, but you don't have to. When cooking in a pan over or under heat, or grilling, use cooking spray to just coat the pan to prevent sticking.
Roast: To cook uncovered in the oven.
Broil: To cook food directly under the heat source.
Bake: To cook food slowly with gentle heat.
Grill: To cook directly over the heat source, with coals or a gas grill.
Pan-broil: To cook in a heavy skillet without adding fat and draining off fat as it accumulates.
Parchment paper: Heavy, heat-resistant paper used in cooking. Fish or chicken breast cooked with spices and fruit comes out deliciously tender and healthy -- a great cooking technique that requires little or no fat.
Poach: Fish or chicken, simmered in liquid, could be seasoned broth or water. Another great, healthy cooking technique.
Pressure cooking: Here's a cooking technique that I recommend to all healthy home cooks. A pressure cooker is essentially a saucepan with a locking lip. It uses steam heat to produce high temperatures that quickly cooks food, which leaves food tender and retains nutrients. Soups, stews and vegetables, especially dried beans and lentils are a snap with a pressure cooker.
Sauté: To cook quickly over direct heat, with just a little added fat or broth.
Steam: To cook over boiling water in a covered pan: Better than boiling, steaming retains the food's nutrition and texture. Steam vegetables, fish, shellfish or chicken: use a small metal insert in a large pasta pot with lid, or bamboo steamer.
Stir-fry: Involves no "frying," you cook foods quickly in a wok (a high-sided pan), stirring often, in small amounts of liquid, so it's both nutritious and tasty. Ingredients are all cut into bite-sized pieces for rapid cooking. Minimal or no fat is necessary; you can modify any recipe and use wine or broth. Shellfish, chicken, tofu and vegetables are very well suited to this healthful way of cooking.
Less-Healthy Cooking Techniques: More fat, more calories
Au Gratin: Foods covered with a sauce, sprinkled with cheese or breadcrumbs, or both, and baked to a golden brown. Very rich and high in calories
Braise: A cooking technique that browns meat in hot oil or other fat, then cooking in liquid. Usually associated with tenderizing tougher cuts of meat, but also adds fat and calories.
Deep-fry: To completely submerge the food in hot oil.
Fry: To cook over direct heat, in oil or other fat, until browned.
Fritters: Savory or sweet foods, first battered, then deep-fried.
Other ways…
Al dente: If you see a pasta recipe that calls for cooking "al dente," that means "to the tooth" in Italian, or cooking just enough to be firm and chewy. Read the ingredient list to find pasta recipes without cream, butter and eggs and include tomatoes, olive oil, garlic and onions.
Baste: To brush or spoon liquid fat or juices over meat during roasting to add flavor and to prevent it from drying out. It's not necessary to baste with fat, instead, make a basting sauce with a mixture of low sodium chicken broth and fresh orange juice.
Blanch: To boil briefly to loosen the skin of a fruit or a vegetable. After 30 seconds in boiling water, the fruit or vegetable should be plunged into ice water to stop the cooking action, and then the skin easily slices off. Generally used for making tomato sauce or fruit purees.
Butterfly: Describes method of cutting open a portion of poultry, meat or fish without cutting clear through, then spreading apart into a thinner-sized cut.
Deglaze: Adding liquid -- usually broth or water -- to dissolve the bits and pieces left in the bottom of the frying or roasting pan after cooking the meat. What's left is made into high-fat gravy. Leave this part out if you're watching your weight.
Purée: To mash or process food into a thick liquid. Can be healthy, as in fruit and vegetable purees. Here's an opportunity to modify recipes that call for heavy cream and butter by replacing with nonfat evaporated milk and olive oil or soft trans fat-free spread.
Susan L. Burke is a registered and licensed dietitian, and a certified diabetes educator who specializes in both general and diabetes-related weight management.
By Susan Burke MS, RD, LD/N, CDE
eDiets Contributor
Updated: January 30, 2008
If you're trying to eat healthy, but you want your food tasty, it's great to experiment by using different recipes and cuisines. The health aspect requires a little bit of kitchen know-how, so you can pick and choose recipes, and modify recipes to make them lower in fat and calories. Some recipes' cooking techniques make them inherently difficult, if not impossible to modify. When you know the lingo, you can make healthy choices.
Healthy Cooking Techniques: These techniques are inherently healthy, but many times the recipes will tell you to add butter or oil to the food, but you don't have to. When cooking in a pan over or under heat, or grilling, use cooking spray to just coat the pan to prevent sticking.
Roast: To cook uncovered in the oven.
Broil: To cook food directly under the heat source.
Bake: To cook food slowly with gentle heat.
Grill: To cook directly over the heat source, with coals or a gas grill.
Pan-broil: To cook in a heavy skillet without adding fat and draining off fat as it accumulates.
Parchment paper: Heavy, heat-resistant paper used in cooking. Fish or chicken breast cooked with spices and fruit comes out deliciously tender and healthy -- a great cooking technique that requires little or no fat.
Poach: Fish or chicken, simmered in liquid, could be seasoned broth or water. Another great, healthy cooking technique.
Pressure cooking: Here's a cooking technique that I recommend to all healthy home cooks. A pressure cooker is essentially a saucepan with a locking lip. It uses steam heat to produce high temperatures that quickly cooks food, which leaves food tender and retains nutrients. Soups, stews and vegetables, especially dried beans and lentils are a snap with a pressure cooker.
Sauté: To cook quickly over direct heat, with just a little added fat or broth.
Steam: To cook over boiling water in a covered pan: Better than boiling, steaming retains the food's nutrition and texture. Steam vegetables, fish, shellfish or chicken: use a small metal insert in a large pasta pot with lid, or bamboo steamer.
Stir-fry: Involves no "frying," you cook foods quickly in a wok (a high-sided pan), stirring often, in small amounts of liquid, so it's both nutritious and tasty. Ingredients are all cut into bite-sized pieces for rapid cooking. Minimal or no fat is necessary; you can modify any recipe and use wine or broth. Shellfish, chicken, tofu and vegetables are very well suited to this healthful way of cooking.
Less-Healthy Cooking Techniques: More fat, more calories
Au Gratin: Foods covered with a sauce, sprinkled with cheese or breadcrumbs, or both, and baked to a golden brown. Very rich and high in calories
Braise: A cooking technique that browns meat in hot oil or other fat, then cooking in liquid. Usually associated with tenderizing tougher cuts of meat, but also adds fat and calories.
Deep-fry: To completely submerge the food in hot oil.
Fry: To cook over direct heat, in oil or other fat, until browned.
Fritters: Savory or sweet foods, first battered, then deep-fried.
Other ways…
Al dente: If you see a pasta recipe that calls for cooking "al dente," that means "to the tooth" in Italian, or cooking just enough to be firm and chewy. Read the ingredient list to find pasta recipes without cream, butter and eggs and include tomatoes, olive oil, garlic and onions.
Baste: To brush or spoon liquid fat or juices over meat during roasting to add flavor and to prevent it from drying out. It's not necessary to baste with fat, instead, make a basting sauce with a mixture of low sodium chicken broth and fresh orange juice.
Blanch: To boil briefly to loosen the skin of a fruit or a vegetable. After 30 seconds in boiling water, the fruit or vegetable should be plunged into ice water to stop the cooking action, and then the skin easily slices off. Generally used for making tomato sauce or fruit purees.
Butterfly: Describes method of cutting open a portion of poultry, meat or fish without cutting clear through, then spreading apart into a thinner-sized cut.
Deglaze: Adding liquid -- usually broth or water -- to dissolve the bits and pieces left in the bottom of the frying or roasting pan after cooking the meat. What's left is made into high-fat gravy. Leave this part out if you're watching your weight.
Purée: To mash or process food into a thick liquid. Can be healthy, as in fruit and vegetable purees. Here's an opportunity to modify recipes that call for heavy cream and butter by replacing with nonfat evaporated milk and olive oil or soft trans fat-free spread.
Susan L. Burke is a registered and licensed dietitian, and a certified diabetes educator who specializes in both general and diabetes-related weight management.