Thursday, June 3, 2010

Healthy food substitues and smart eating.




Hi,


1.Cooking in less oil : Wondering how to cook tasty gravy without or less oil. Here is the trick.
Add finely chopped onions to the pan, spinkle some salt and let them sweat. The onions will cook in their own moisture. Make tomato puree and add ginger garlic paste. Cover and let the gravy simmer. Once the tomato is cooked i.e color changes to dark red, add masalas of your choice and add vegetable. This gravy can be used to prepare sabjis. It is recommened not to completely avoid oil as it has essential fatty acids but limiting to 2-3 tsp is a good idea.

2.Oats – Can’t eat oats as a breakfast. A good idea of sneaking them in your meal is to take a handful and mix in your chappati aata. The oats rotis are soft and tastes delicious.

Add a table spoon of oats in soups, it makes the soup thick. It tastes more like pasta in tomato soup.

3.
Sneaking Pumpkin in daily meals – To sneak pumpkin in a meal, cook it with toor daal. Once the daal is done mash the pumpkin in the daal and then go about the normal way of giving a tadka. It enhances the daal taste and as for kids they will not notice the subtle difference.

4.Trick to reduce rice quantity –If you just have to have your rice but want to reduce the quantity, then in a plate first pour the daal and then less rice from usual and then daal again. You will feel full with less rice this way.
Another trick that I follow and which works for me, is to take less rice say 4-5 tsp in a bowl , pour lots of daal and then sabji. This way I get to eat my rice but in less quantity.

5.Homemade Healthy Burger – This is one healthy breakfast. Take 2 boiled potatoes, mash them. Add soya granules, grated carrots, mashed boiled green peas and sweet corns. Idea here is to use less potatoes, just enough for binding purpose and the quantity of vegetables and granules is more. Make patties and grill them on non stick tawa with l tsp or less oil. In a bun, apply green chutney, then patty, cover with tomato and cucumber. Experiment by adding boiled chola (garbanzo beans), rajma, black channa.

6.Cream substitute – In gravies like palak paneer is you want to do away with cream add evaporated milk instead . It thickens the gravy just like cream.

7. Use different oils for different meals- If you cook your lunch in say sunflower oil, use canola or some other oil for dinner. In this way you will get essential fatty acids from all the oils. Meaning, you will benefit from fatty acids found in abundance in sunflower oil and also from fatty acids found in abundance in canola oil.

8. Sweet tooth - If you feel like having something sweet after each meal, try having dry apricots. they are sweet and high in vitamins and nutrients. Limit yourself to 5 a day. Some other healthy substitutes are honey and dates. But monitor the intake.

9. Want to snack on something chatpata - Try Jhaal mudi. Healthy low cal snack. Mix cucumber, onion, green chili, 3-4 drops of mustard oil with puffed rice, add lemon and salt. Add green coriander and make it like a bhel.

10. Hungry while on a long drive - In a zip lock bag make this mixture and keep it in car or purse. Take puffed rice, roasted peanuts, roasted channa, walnuts, mix well. 2 to 3 handful of this mix satisfies the hunger pang. Experiment by adding other dry fruits and nuts. It is way better than catching a burger or french fries when hunger pang hits.

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