Punjabi food Festival in Hyderabad

There have always been queries put before me, it could be for any regional cuisine, Hyderabadi, or Punjabi or Gujarati to name a few, of how can the calories be snipped away in simple home cooking too. Eating a completely fat free meal is asking for the possible but eating such meals on a regular basis is asking for the impossible! Fat free food is low in the taste factor as also the satiety metre. Secondly, fats are needed by the body, at least the good fats are. The only solution is to keeping the meals light and frequent with techniques to snip away the calories smartly.

Cook with non-stick cookware. They are good for baking, grilling, sautéing and even for soup. Non-stick pans allow you to cook with no oil, or just a brush of grease or substitute fats with water or juice. You can change the cooking methods. If you tend to deep-fry a lot, change the mindset. Either bake, broil, grill, poach or sauté foods. Microwave is a blessing for those who want to cook using minimal oil. Learn the art of subtracting. Read the recipe and simply subtract the amount of fats and sugars. For example, replace half the butter with fruit puree for an equally moist cake; use one-third less sugar in cakes or cookies and use dried fruit, not sugar, to add sweetness to cereal. Eat lean meats and trim all visible fat before cooking. Go for white meat than red meat. For example, chicken breasts are lower in fat than drumsticks. Choose the skim milk, yogurt and cheese. Avoid use of condensed milk as it is very high in sugars. Eggs are the best protein source and also cholesterol! When cooking, just substitute two egg whites for one whole egg (the fat, cholesterol and most of the calories from eggs are in the yolks).

Most important is to downsize portions. Do this and half the battle is won. Make the servings in smaller size. Use smaller plates, and make any cake serve twelve instead of eight!

Here are some healthy snacks for you!

Baked Chatpati Shankerpali
Hot and sour idlis
Sprout bhelpuri




Till I write again

Sanjeev Kapoor