Fit Fare

It’s the new year, time to recover from the holiday overabundance of high calorie meals. Time to be smarter about food choices. One way to eat healthier is to reduce the calories by using healthier alternatives in the meals we prepare.

Cut the fat and sugar
You can reduce fat and sugar in a recipe without losing flavor. Do the math, you can cut 100 to 120 of the calories in a recipe with each tablespoon of fat that you delete from it. When making baked goods, use only half the fat called for in a recipe and replace the other half with unsweetened applesauce, mashed banana or prune puree. You can also reduce the amount of sugar by one-third to one-half. When doing this, you might want to increase the amount of spices and herbs in the recipe to compensate for the reduction in sugar. If a recipe calls for whole milk or cream, substitute skim milk or nonfat evaporated milk.

Change the way you prepare foods
Broil food, if possible, rather than fry it. Saute in broth instead of butter or oil. If the recipe says to baste with fat, use fruit juices, if possible. Fish tastes wonderful marinated and basted with orange juice and grilled. The sugar in the juice caramelizes and gives the fish a beautiful color, as well as imparting good flavor. Try steaming or poaching foods. Many of these techniques work very well with fish or poultry and don’t sacrifice flavor in order to reduce calories.

Watch those portions
Sometimes it’s just not possible to delete, reduce or substitute fat and sugar in a recipe. In that case, watch the portion size. It can be the only way to literally have your cake, and be able to eat it too!