Calorie management is the actuality that is achieved by being conscious about the sufficiency. Managing calories by managing what we consume needs to be a way of life to maintain a healthy lifestyle. Carbs in the form of sugars, starch, fats in the form of oils, cheese, butter, fatty acids, and proteins when combined with fats, shoot up our daily calorie intake which might lead to idle fats in the body.
Calories can be managed by altering ingredients in the recipes that we make at home too. Saturated fats and trans fats also can be avoided following this technique however often possible. Let us try to dig into the lesser explored simple cooking hacks and essential techniques to reduce fats and starchy contents of food by altering ingredients for healthy cooking.
Suggested Read: Know more about 7 Healthy Substitutes For Your Daily Food.
1.Reduce Cheese Intake
Cut down a quarter of the cheese recommended for recipes and work your way up to halving the cheese. This way you need not compromise on taste and cheesiness but yet could keep the cheese recipes healthy. Cheese recipes could be restricted to twice or thrice a month with an individual serving size 50 grams. You could also use low-fat cheese, avocado and nut butter and vegan cheese as cheese replacers. Check out the recipes that won’t taste any less yummier with a quarter portion of cheese left out from the recipe.
2.Include Avocado
Avocado is a fruit that has a creamy quality to replace greasy ingredients like butter or cheese. Pista cookies and choco chip cookies can mask the green color of replacing a quarter portion of butter with avocado/guacamole. Find ways to include creamy avocado since it is a low-calorie food with high amount of healthy fats. Try more recipes with avocado to include them in your weekly meal plan.
3.Include Melons
Increase the quantity of melons in daily diet. Melons are low carbs and are high in vitamins and minerals. Sweeter melons like muskmelon, cantaloupe, and watermelon can be eaten to cut down the craving for desserts. Try recipes that include melons to make your suppertime healthier.
4.Use Low-Fat Dairy Products
It is an undeniable fact that milk and milk products contain calcium and other beneficial nutrients. Using reduced fat products instead of full-fat dairy products can help fulfill nutrition and also avoid unnecessary fats in the diet. Have a look at the low-fat recipes made from dairy products with reduced fat.
5.Reduce Maida/ All-purpose flour
Replace half cup of all-purpose flour with whole wheat flour and work your way upwards while making pancakes. You need to be aware that the cookies or cakes which do not have 100 percent all-purpose flour tends to have a heavier texture and wouldn’t be too fluffy like otherwise; but are a lot healthier choice, though. Look at the whole wheat and multi-grain recipes that are tried and tested for yumminess.
6.Use Sugar Replacers
White sugar in most desserts can directly add to calorie value and result in increasing the insulin production in the body. Use sugar replacers like dates or jaggery which have unrefined sugars and aid in satiating sweet tooth.
7.Reduce Cooking Oil
Baking in oven, frying in air fryer, paniyaram pan, steaming, pre-cooking, shallow frying can all reduce oil consumption. We can hence cut down on accumulating bad fats and cholesterol caused due to LDL and trans fat. Instead of fried appetizers or a bag of chips, use roasted vegetables like kale and spinach for snacks which need only drizzling or rubbing with olive oil or coconut oil. Have a look at the recipes which need negligible cooking oil owing to the alternate cooking techniques used.
