Cooking with less fat and saturated fat

Cooking with less fat and saturated fat

I have a national column and a cookbook called The Recipe Doctor. My mission is to lighten up dishes and/or improve their nutritional attributes without sacrificing flavor, enjoyment, or free time. We’re talking about real recipes for real people.

I believe food is one of the great pleasures of life. I know what it’s like to work hard and cook for a family of four. I don’t want to spend hours in the kitchen especially preparing “health” food that tastes mediocre. I’m figuring you don’t either. So I don’t peel, sift, whisk, or pull out the double boiler unless I absolutely have to. The point is that healthful food isn’t going to do anyone any good if no one is eating it. The bottom line: It’s got to taste great and it’s got to be quick to make. Can it be done? You bet.

I don’t believe in increasing the sugar or salt in a recipe to “get away with” using a lot less fat. And I don’t believe there is a satisfactory substitute for chocolate or butter. So I still use them in certain recipes (when they are truly the best fats for the job), but I do use less.

I have found after lightening hundreds of recipes over the years that there is an ideal fat replacement and an ideal (smaller) amount of fat for almost every recipe. For example, if you cut the fat more than half in a cookie recipe, it isn’t a cookie anymore it’s a muffin. Given my 15 or so years of recipe experimentation, I’ve learned a lot about lightening recipes. I have learned what works and what doesn’t. I’ve assembled some of my lightening tricks below. Keep them handy and you’ll be home free on this front. Cooking tips to take home:

When you cook or bake with less fat, you need to add other ingredients that help replace the qualities of the lost fat, while still adding flavors that complement the other ingredients in the original recipe.
Start with the best tasting, freshest ingredients you can find. Fresh garlic, basil, and parsley, for example, have more flavor than if they are dried.
Choose the best tasting “light” products on the market. For example, choose the creamiest “light” cream cheese and the sharpest reduced-fat cheese. Philadelphia light cream cheese, Cracker Barrel light sharp cheddar, Naturally Yours fat-free sour cream, and Louis Rich turkey bacon all taste terrific in recipes.
Good nonstick cookware can help you cut the fat because it doesn’t require as much to prevent sticking.
Canola and olive oil cooking sprays help lubricate cookware and food, with a minimal amount of fat, by allowing you to spray tiny particles of fat onto the dish, pan, or food surface.
Sometimes you can opt to use a cooking method that eliminates the need for cooking fat (broiling, roasting, poaching, or steaming).
When fat is necessary to maintain the character of the food (oven frying, sautéing, pan frying, browning), do use it just use less. Use canola or olive oil instead if you can.
No additional fat is needed when using cake mixes. Most mixes already contain 4 grams of fat per serving of mix. Replace the oil called for with fruit juice, fruit puree, liqueur, flavored yogurt, chocolate syrup, or “light” sour cream, depending on the type of cake.
In cookie recipes, you can cut the fat by a third or half. Fat-free cream cheese is one of the most successful fat replacements in cookie recipes just blend it with the softened butter, shortening, or canola margarine, and proceed with the recipe. For example, if the cookie recipe calls for 1 cup of butter, blend 1/2 a cup with 1/ 2 a cup of fat-free cream cheese and continue on with the recipe.
You can use diet margarine to make frosting. The water added should not be a problem if the frosting isn’t heated and stays chilled.
Use whole milk or the new fat-free half-and-half as a substitute for real half-and-half. It gives the recipe a richness and creaminess that you just can’t get with non-fat or low-fat milk. If liquid whipping cream is called for, in order to end up with a great-tasting dish, you may need to use real half-and-half in its place.
When you change the fat content of a batter or dough, you also change the way heat is conducted through the food. I found the best results (even heat distribution and less burning) when using the Cushionaire bakeware line (the double thickness bakeware).
There is something about the construction of corn syrup that makes it hold on to its moisture in a baked item longer. It actually seems to release its moisture slowly into the baked food. You can reduce the amount of granulated sugar called for in baking recipes (so the calories from sugar won’t increase) and then replace some of the fat with corn syrup.
Whipped egg whites can add a light texture to baked items. Egg whites whip best at room temperature. They must be separated from the yolk (egg yolks prevent the whites from holding air). Use a glass, copper, or stainless steel bowl for whipping egg whites (plastic tends to hold onto grease even after cleaning, and aluminum can react chemically with eggs and turn them grayish.) Don’t over-beat your egg whites. They will collapse and separate. Stabilizing ingredients (like salt, lemon juice, and cream of tartar) help keep the whites smooth and aerated, but will also slow the whipping process, so add them just after the eggs become frothy.
You can often reduce the number of egg yolks in a recipe simply because it can be done without visible ramifications. Egg yolks contain all the cholesterol in the egg, (about 200 milligrams apiece) and keeping cholesterol moderate still seems to be a good idea. But egg yolks also contain 5 grams of fat each. If it is an egg dish, such as quiche, omelet, frittata, or strata, it usually works wellto split the recipe evenly between real eggs egg substitute. So if the recipe calls for six eggs, use three eggs and 3/4 cup egg substitute.

Each recipe has an ideal fat threshold, the minimum amount of oil, butter, margarine, or shortening needed to produce a food that tastes like its fat-laden original. If you go below this ideal amount, and if you don’t use a suitable fat replacement for the fat you’ve taken out, you won’t be happy with the results. After years of lightening recipes for my column and cookbooks, I’ve learned from my successes (and failures), and come up with the table on pages 60 and 61 listing ideal fat thresholds and fat replacements for different types of recipes.

Keep extra weight minimal or off

Obesity and inactivity are generally considered to be among the most important risk factors for developing colorectal cancer by some experts. Being overweight has long been recognized as a risk factor for hormone related (and other) cancers.

A six-year study at the University of Pittsburgh found men with waists larger than 36 inches were twice as likely to develop colon cancer than thinner men. Researcher Robert Schoen, M.D. suspects that having fat around your belly is associated with increased insulin levels, which may be one of the things encouraging colon cancer to grow.

Italian studies found that excessive weight at certain ages predicts colorectal cancer risk in men, whereas how much weight is around the middle is a more reliable risk indicator for women. For more information on why fad diets are a waste of time, and for the latest research on shedding extra body fat for good.

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Cooking with less fat and saturated fat

Keep extra weight minimal or off

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