This is actually an article I had written a while back and thought it would be perfect with Diwali around the corner and all the ghee laden sweets, fried savory snacks, and eating out while shopping is happening! ;)
Simple
Tools to Help Keep your Kitchen Healthy
They say the way to a man’s heart (or anyone’s for
that matter) is through his stomach which in essence makes your kitchen the
heart of your home. Everyone wants a healthy heart (read as healthy kitchen).
Put away the old aluminum pots, stop boiling vegetables until you are left with
nothing of nutritional value but fiber, and avoid investing heavily in high end
kitchen utensils which you saw on TV infomercials. Here a few very simple and
basic kitchen tools which are both light on your wallet, digestive system, and
heart!
Steamer
When food comes in contact with large amounts of
water, a large amount of the nutritional content of the food is lost in the
water. Therefore it is best to steam foods which prevents any contact with
water and keeps the nutritional content of foods intact. Steam foods until they
turn brighter in color, for example, dark green raw broccoli should become
bright grass green in color and cauliflower should go from off white to vivid
white in color. Steam vegetables for a maximum of two to three minutes to
ensure nutritional value remains at its highest.
Steamers can be as simple as two compartment pots,
the bottom pot which holds the small amount of water that comes to boil and the
top colander-like pot with lid which holds the food, or more high tech ones
such as those that are built in to rice cookers.
Oil
Spritzer/Mister
Fat (oil, margarine, nuts, seeds) has 9 calories per
gram versus protein (lentils, beans, lean meat) and carbohydrates (rice, roti,
bread, fruits) which both have four calories per gram. With the bottom line
being total caloric intake to ensure weight maintenance, use of oil should be
monitored when cooking.
Oil spritzers/misters help to reduce the amount of
oil in cooking by spraying a small, controlled amount of oil evenly in your
cookware. Sprizters can be empty ones into which you may fill the oil of your
choice (remember to change your oil every month, so you may get an even
distribution of polyunsaturated and monounsaturated, both heart healthy fats,
in your diet) or ready-to-use ones which come in a wide variety of oils from
olive oil which is great for quick stir-fry items or sautéing vegetables to
margarine or butter – great for lining baking pans when making fresh, homemade
multigrain bread!
Measuring
cups and spoons
Second to total calorie intake in order of
importance in weight management is portion control. Measuring cups and spoons
take the guessing out of portion sizes and help in understanding total calorie
intake without all the numbers!
For example, ¾ cup of dry cereal (wheat flakes, corn
flakes) is equal to one serving of starch; one cup raw salad is one serving of
vegetables. The general rule is 2 teaspoons of oil per person per day. If there
are 5 people in your home, it is best to remove 10 teaspoons of oil in the
morning and put this in a container on the side of the stove and use only that
container for the entire day’s cooking. That is if you are not using an oil
mister for cooking.
Nonstick
Cookware
With the total intake of oil being controlled, the
best way to ensure foods are cooked well in a minimum amount of oil is by using
nonstick cookware. The durable inner coating of nonstick cookware allows foods
to cook quickly and evenly while maintaining the nutritional value of foods.
Nonstick cookware is more expensive than your regular steel or aluminium pots
and pans so you may want to start with just a few basics such as a good
nonstick pan and wok or deep pot for vegetables.
Ensure you are using wooden or plastic utensils
while stirring or mixing foods made in nonstick cookware as steel or metal
utensils may scratch the nonstick surface rendering it less effective and
potential harmful as the inner lining of the nonstick surface is made from chemicals
which are not be ingested. Also avoid cleaning your nonstick cookware with
woolen steel scrubs or abrasive sponges which could also scratch the surface.
Iron
tawa
With a large percentage of the Indian population
still pure vegetarian, intake of iron, along with several other vitamins and
minerals, is lower in this group. Dosas and chillas made on iron tawas leech
iron from the tawa and thus become good sources of iron.
One simple helpful tip – rub a raw onion on your hot
tawa for approximately 30 seconds. This helps to keep the dosas and chillas
from sticking to the tawa and makes the dosas crisp.
Egg
white separator
High
protein, low carbohydrates diets are still the craze making egg sales go up!
Since eggs are the perfect protein, containing all essential amino acids (the
building blocks of protein), they make for a healthy and economic protein
option. However with the increased incidence of heart disease which entails
high cholesterol levels, whole eggs have been substituted with egg whites.
Avoid the
messy separation of egg whites from the cholesterol-filled yolks with a simple
egg white separator. Simply break your egg into the separator and watch it
catch the yolk and let the entire white fall through two holes on the side into
a bowl below.
FYI - If
you have cardiovascular disease, diabetes or a high low-density lipoprotein
(LDL, or "bad") blood cholesterol level, you should limit your
dietary cholesterol to less than 200 mg a day. One whole egg has about 186 mg
of cholesterol — all of which is in the yolk.
Juicer
Although I am not a big advocate of juicing as you
lose large amounts of fiber while juicing fruits and vegetables, I do believe
in having detoxifying juices from time to time to cleanse your system. Fruits
and vegetables are a great source of many vitamins and minerals which help
boost your immune system and give you glowing skin, lustrous hair, and strong
nails. Juices are best had in the morning on an empty stomach and freshly made.
Electric juicers from most of the large kitchen
appliance brand names are available. Simple manual juicers for oranges, sweet
limes, and lemons are also economical and just as effective.
Healthy Hint: Add the fiber back in to your juice
with unflavoured physillium husk (available at most chemists). Get an extra
boost of immunity by adding a shot of fresh wheat grass or wheat grass powder
to your juice.
You are what you eat so do you want to be a deep-fat
fryer or heavy duty, powerful iron tawa? More than half your results for weight
management will come from nutrition alone. Learn fact from fiction and dispel
some of the old methods of cooking when calorie intake needed to be high to
sustain laborious work and active lifestyles. Keep homemade meals light and
nutritious. Clean out your kitchen today to make it a better place with these
affordable and easy tools. Happy cooking and healthy eating!
