Tips for cooking light
Useful tools
- Non-stick pans, pans and plates: to cook foods without adding fat, and brown them without letting them stick.
- Steam cooking or pressure cooker: for cooking without adding fat, preserving the nutritional properties of food.
See also
- Wok with lid: to combine cooking in a pan and steaming.
- Grill and / or barbecue.
- Baking in the oven.
- Greaseproof paper: to avoid buttering or greasing trays and packets.
The good ingredients for light cuisine
- Semi-skimmed dairy products: light cream, semi-skimmed milk, semi-skimmed concentrated milk ...
- Baking resistant powdered sweeteners.
- Stock cubes with meat, fish, vegetables.
- Maize and potato starch.
- Jelly.
- Herbs (fresh, dried or frozen): thyme, laurel, rosemary, basil, chives, tarragon, chervil, mint, parsley, dill ...
- Spices: curry, paprika, saffron, nutmeg, cinnamon, chilli, ginger ...
- Garlic, onion, shallot, lemon ...
- Various condiments: different types of vinegar, mustard (classic, strong, flavored), gherkins, capers, flavored oils (walnut, hazelnut, olive ...) ...
- Unsweetened cocoa powder.
- Canned and frozen natural food products
- Lean meats and cold cuts: ham cubes, minced meat, bacon ...
The cooking methods without adding fat
- Boiled:
Great for all foods.
How to do? Vegetables need to be cooked for a short time, in order to be crunchy and retain all their vitamins. To flavor meat and fish, you can add a stock cube, herbs or spices. Ditto for pasta or rice ...
- Stew:
Great for cooking vegetables, meat and fish.
How to do? It is slow cooking, over low heat, steamed. Put the food in a container with a little cooking liquid (wine or broth), cover it and let it cook over very low heat.
- Baked:
Excellent for all foods (roasts for meats and fish, gratins for vegetables, egg-based preparations (desserts, soufflé ...).
How to do? To prevent them from drying out too much, when cooking meat and fish, add liquids (broth ...), chopped vegetables (tomatoes ...) and herbs, spices ... In the oven, you can also cook al foil, which consists in cooking foods in aluminum, to cook them with their own water, as if they were stewed.
- Grilled
Excellent for meat and fish.
How to do? It is best to reheat the grill thoroughly before cooking the food; do not prick them, in order to limit the escape of liquids.
- Steamed:
Excellent for all foods.
How to do? Foods are cooked naturally, and then accompanied by a lean sauce (fresh cheese and herbs, tomato sauce, lemon juice ...) to prevent them from being tasteless.
Dietary secrets for light cuisine
- Weigh, measure. It is better to weigh the ingredients so as not to overdo it: a spoon for the oil, a scale for the butter or pasta ...
- Replace. Whole milk instead of skim, bacon instead of ham cubes, sugar instead of sweetener, flour instead of starch, sausage instead of ground beef ...
- Revives the flavors. To compensate for the reduction in fat, you have to play with herbs, spices, broths that increase the flavor but not the calories.
