Blog Posts - Page 33 of 75 - Carma's Cookery | Tips for Unleashing Your Kitchen Creativity

5 Benefits of Owning an Air Fryer

Post author By Carma Spence
Post date May 31, 2017

Have you heard of the air fryer? This is a kitchen gadget that produces food with the tasty crunchiness of frying with significantly less fat.

Let’s face it, from chicken wings and fish sticks to potato chips and hash browns, there is no denying that fried snacks and dishes are among the tastiest and most well-loved foods in different parts of the world. But while their distinctly delicious taste and delightful crunch are truly satisfying, many people who are mindful of their health try to avoid eating fried foods as much as possible.

On a personal note, due to my digestive issues, I’ve had to cut way back on fried food goodness. And, more often than not, the increasing cases of obesity and cardiovascular diseases is blamed on the high-fat content in deep-fried foods.

A few months ago, I was introduced to the idea of air frying and have been curiously looking into it every since. Apparently, with the advent of this cooking method, you don’t have to choose between sumptuous fried foods and a healthy diet anymore!

Air fryers are specially designed to satisfy the cravings of those who are on a low-fat diet without causing any guilt. Below are 5 benefits of using an air fryer. Check them out and start making tasty fried dishes that are healthy at the same time.

Air Frying Benefit #1. Enjoy healthy fried dishes

Some air fryers use only a small amount of oil while some do not require any oil at all. Air-fryers release warm jets of air to evenly cook your favorite foods, cutting down as much as 80% oil compared with regular fried dishes. Another benefit of using an air fryer is that most of the nutrients are preserved. This means that you can get the most nutrition from healthy fried vegetables as if they were fresh. Not only you will get to enjoy nutritious food, but you can also save money on cooking oil.

Air Frying Benefit #2. Fry your food fast

Unlike ovens and conventional deep fryers, air fryers do not take as much time to heat up. If you are planning to cook chicken drumsticks or nuggets for lunch, you don’t need to thaw frozen foods anymore. Load them up into the air fryer and wait for your crispy fried dishes to cook. This small kitchen appliance is a perfect companion for those who are always on the go.

Air Frying Benefit #3. Clean your air fryer easily

Air fryers cook your food in a closed system with non-stick basket and trays. Say goodbye to messy oil splashes and burnt food sticking on the kitchenware. Most removable parts of an air fryer are also dishwasher-safe and easy to clean and to store.

Air Frying Benefit #4. Safe and easy to use

Almost anyone can use an air fryer, including the elderly. Even those who are new to cooking will find this appliance easy to use. Most air fryers have a timer and auto shut off features for energy efficiency and perfectly fried dishes. With air fryers, you can now enjoy cooking your favorite dishes and have no more worries with dangerous oil splatters or an open flame.

Air Frying Benefit #5. Cook in many ways

Air fryers are versatile. They can be used to bake, roast and grill. Experience the convenience of having a deep fryer, an oven, and a hot grill all in one multi-purpose air cooker.

Learn more about the amazing features of the best air fryers and experience the benefits of using one.

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Take Charge of Your Health!

Changing your eating habits can be tough. But it doesn’t have to be if you take a little time to think it out and create a plan.

This Healthy Eating Worksheet will walk you through the process of creating a healthy eating plan. All you need to do is print it out, set aside some time to complete it, and then fill it out. Then you can create your plan, knowing that you have addressed potential obstacles and came up with some creative ways to handle them.

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Tags air fryer, fried food

Healthy Living

Getting the Kids Interested In Food

Post author By Carma Spence
Post date May 29, 2017

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If you want to give your kids an invaluable skill that will serve them well throughout their life, teach them how to prepare food. Get them interested from an early age in food and how to prepare it. Children are like little sponges, so how you introduce them to food preparation will impact them for a very long time.

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Health is something that will always be an important part their entire lives (whether they like it or know it or not), so starting them young with the principles of healthy eating is important. Children generally tend to eat what their parents eat, and if you are ordering fresh food from places like Foodtown, you’re making a good start in their health education.

It can sometimes feel like a losing battle when getting the kids to eat things that aren’t covered in breadcrumbs. However, if you start early enough, you can get through any hurdle and give your children a healthier start. Their activity levels also impact their appetites and their food intake. Sedentary activities like computer games and TV time won’t help your goal for a healthy life. So, how do you get the kids interested in a healthier menu at home?

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Cook together with the Kids

One of the best things you can do for food education at home, is to touch, taste and smell everything together. Talk about every fresh vegetable you buy and where it comes from. Talk about where meat cuts come from and educate the kids about hygiene in between handling. If children see new vegetables, they turn their noses up at it. It’s normal – even adults turn their noses up at things they don’t know about. Getting children to touch and get involved with chopping and peeling food can really get them involved in different ingredients.

Bring the Kids Shopping

Some parents hate bringing the children to the grocery store – it can be particularly stressful when they are young. However, if you take the time to create picture shopping lists and have them help you choose the items, you can get the children excited about food. It’s one of the best ways to get children familiar with different types of foods and recognizing when something is ripe or healthy.

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Plan Your Meals with the Kids

Allowing children to have an element of control over what they eat can really help them to make good food decisions. Mock up charts on the kitchen walls that show that each meal must have two vegetables, a starch, and a meat and they can then choose from a list of what to have. Get them excited about cooking their choices with you. Being involved in the meal from start to finish will help them to get excited about eating it.

Family dinners are important for your children, so you need to encourage sitting down together and eating as a unit. Encourage eating at the table with the right cutlery instead of on the couch eating with a tray on your lap. Food education is about how it’s eaten as well as what goes into the meal itself. If you’re encouraging good table manners, your children will be more inclined to eat better.

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Take Charge of Your Health!

Changing your eating habits can be tough. But it doesn’t have to be if you take a little time to think it out and create a plan.

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Tags cooking with kids, food preparation

Creative Cookery

Obscure Yet Mouthwatering Dessert Ideas For Summer Eating Outdoors

Post author By Carma Spence
Post date May 27, 2017

By Alexis Fam (Flickr: Tiramisu) [CC BY 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Are you hosting a backyard barbecue this summer? People look forward to smokey bbq pork ribs and barbecue chicken wings, but, they also look forward to the dessert.

By Alexis Fam (Flickr: Tiramisu) [CC BY 2.0], via Wikimedia Commons

When it comes to summer desserts, the tastebuds want something chilled, cool, light and airy. But you don’t have to stick to ice cream or some kind of chilled cheesecake. The host that thinks outside the box, is the one who provides their guests with something they may never have tried before. Your cooking should get them hooked on a new recipe. I should make the cookout one they’ll never forget so they’ll want to come back for more.

Dessert Idea #1: Tiramisu

I’ll always remember my first tiramisu. I was love at first bite! For those of you not in the know, tiramisu is a delectable fine Italian dessert, a layered cake with elegant posture and bold flavors. The traditional recipe used ladyfinger-like biscuits, mascarpone cheese, marsala wine, rum and lots of heavy cocoa powder. The diversity of ingredients go well together for none of them will be the main powerhouse flavor. The base is ever so delicate and creamy and stands firmly on its own, which is a welcome change as some cakes rely on the sugary aspect to pull through the foundation. The mascarpone and layers of mouthwatering Italian custard are far from plain and exude their own character on the dish. To make authentic Tiramisu, you’ll need freshly ground coffee beans. You can make coffee granules anytime you want at home with a coffee grinder from places like CoffeeGrinderHub.com.

Photo credit – Jules

Dessert Idea #2: Gelato

Another classic Italian: The humble yet royal delight of frozen Italian custard. A great sweet, creamy treat to kick off the warmer weather with. The beauty of gelato is that it can be simple, just get milk, eggs and sugar as the basis. Naturally, it has a deep yellow color because the egg yolks bring a tanned hue to the custard. The unmistakable richness is brought about because it’s all natural, with absolutely zero preservatives.

You can also make it complex, by adding in, fruits, nuts, berries or just simply amalgamating your heart’s true desires, such as dark and milk chocolate, mint and cream, peaches and orange, etc. It’s a great dessert for summer because of the strange yet wonderful paradox gelato has become, even though it’s rich and creamy, it’s still lighter than traditional Western ice cream.

Dessert Idea #3: Mousse

What could go wrong if you keep it simple? For all you chocolate addicts out there, mousse is a softly prepared, light and airy textured dessert that incorporates air bubbles to create smooth and consistent quality puree. Typically made with whipped egg whites, or some fine dining restaurants are known to use whipped cream, the mixture is flavored with chocolate. It’s incredibly versatile as it can be eaten on its own, or as a layer in a cake, used as the main filling in a cheesecake, or even as a topping on a pie. It can be stabilized with gelatin, but if you whip the eggs up properly, all you need for an upright mousse is to rely on the air bubbles you created. And, of course, properly chill the mousse as it will get soggy if left out in the warm weather.

Tags Dessert, gelato, mousse, tiramisu

Cookbook Reviews

Cookbook Review: The All-Natural Diabetes Cookbook

Post author By Carma Spence
Post date May 23, 2017

The All-Natural Diabetes Cookbook: The Whole Food Approach to Great Taste and Healthy Eating by Jackie Newgent R.D. is a collection of plant-based, nutritiously well-rounded, simple-to-fix recipes. Now out in its second edition, the book has been updated to include vegetarian and quick-fix recipes, tips for achieving high flavor and suggested menus.

I love eating healthfully and thought this would be a good addition to my growing collection of diabetes-related cookbooks.

NOTE: I received a free copy of this book for review, however, I am under no obligation to write about it positively or otherwise.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Over the past couple of years, I’ve experienced an increased interest in the topic of diabetic-friendly cooking. Not only have a married a wonderful man who has Type 2 Diabetes, but I’ve discovered that I’m pre-diabetic (which is, thankfully, reversible through diet and exercise!). This is the fourth in a series of reviews of books on this topic.

Summary of The All-Natural Diabetes Cookbook

The premise of this book is that healthy, natural food should be tasty, otherwise you won’t eat it. The author provides a primer at the front of the book of natural ingredients, including some basic definitions of the terms “natural,” “organic” and how they are different. Recipes are organized into the following categories:

Breakfasts
Dips, Salsas and Sauces
Small Plate and Snacks
Salads
Soups, Stews, and Chilis
Sandwiches, Burger and Burritos
Entrées
Sides
Beverages, Smoothies, and Cocktails
Sweets

So there should be a recipe that everyone in your family will like!

What Worked for Me

The overall design of the recipes is clean and easy to read. Each recipe includes serving, servicing size, prep time and cooking time, which helps you plan your menus. Also, each recipe has some additional information as a sidebar, adding interest and, at times, ideas for scaling a recipe to feed more people.

Not only do the recipes favor natural ingredients, there are also a wide variety of cuisines included.

What Didn’t Work for Me

This is a small thing, but the color palette for the design is rather drab: A dark grayish-green and black. If you like photographs of recipes, you find very many in this volume either.

Recommendation

This is a utilitarian book. It is useful and you should be able to find something for everyone within its pages. Because it is published by the American Diabetes Association, you know that the recipes are safe for people with diabetes, too. So, if you’re looking for a “whole food approach” to dining with diabetes, this cookbook just may be what you’re looking for!

Rating for The All-Natural Diabetes Cookbook

Specs

Format: Paperback (352 pages)
Publisher: American Diabetes Association
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1580405452
ISBN-13: 978-1580405454

Pick up your copy on Amazon.com here.

Previous Reviews in this Series:

Tags diabetes

Healthy Living Well Stocked Pantry

Ingredients: Is Your Meal Completely Healthy?

Post author By Carma Spence
Post date May 18, 2017

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Do you read the ingredients when you buy processed, packaged or prepared foods at the grocery store? If you’re interested in eating a wholesome diet, like I am, you might do a lot of research into nutritious meals and healthy ingredients to make sure you’re getting your daily vitamins and minerals. Maybe your research let you to Carma’s Cookery!

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But, no matter how much research you do, can you be sure that your meal completely healthy? Unfortunately, food manufacturers add some dubious ingredients to preserve their food and give it a certain taste, color, or texture. Some of those additions are harmless, but others are not. The next time you go food shopping, scan the labels for some of these ingredients.

Ingredients Highlight #1: Carrageenan

Carrageenan comes from an edible seaweed known as Irish Moss, and it is widely used in the food industry for its gelling, thickening, and stabilizing properties. The problem with carrageenan is that it’s not digestible and has no nutritional value.

Carrageenan is particularly destructive to the digestive system, and it causes inflammation, leading to ulceration and bleeding. Other carrageenan side effects include leaky gut syndrome, cancer, and it has been linked to diabetes. Unfortunately, health enthusiasts are likely to have a lot of carrageenans in their kitchen, as it’s commonly found in almond milk, coconut milk, most organic foods, and some Starbucks drinks with soy milk.

Ingredients Highlight #2: Palm Oil

When a regular fat like corn, soybean, or palm oil is blasted with hydrogen and turned into a solid, it becomes a trans fat. This might not mean much to you, but essentially it means that food with palm oil can sit on a supermarket shelf for years without rotting or growing stale.

If you’ve ever eaten food two years after you first bought it, you should be suspicious if it still tastes fine. Take a good look at those instant noodles. Also, eating junk food with trans fats raises your “bad” LDL cholesterol and triglycerides and lowers your “good” HDL. These fats also increase your risk of blood clots and heart attack.

Ingredients Highlight #3: Yellow #5 (Tartrazine/ E102)

Yellow #5 is a synthetic lemon yellow dye widely used in the making of potato chips, jams, candy, drinks and even pet food. It is also added to shampoo and other cosmetic products.

The Food Standards Agency in the UK issued a warning in 2008 that certain food colorings, including Yellow #5, caused behavioral changes in children that included loss of concentration and impulsive, hard-to-control activity. Yellow #5 has also been linked to asthma, migraines, thyroid cancer, anxiety, clinical depression, blurred vision, purple spots on your skin and unexplainable itchy skin.

Ingredients Highlight #4: High-Fructose Corn Syrup (HFCS)

High-fructose corn syrup is a sweetener made from corn starch that has been processed by glucose isomerase to convert some of its glucose into fructose. It is sweeter and cheaper than regular sugar, and therefore it has become a staple ingredient in most processed food.

In fact, some studies have linked HFCS to the increasing obesity rates in America. Although households trying to eat well may have purged their cabinets of foods like soda, candy, salad dressing, and frozen junk food, HFCS can also be found in juice, bread, breakfast cereals, and even cough syrup.

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Take Charge of Your Health!

Changing your eating habits can be tough. But it doesn’t have to be if you take a little time to think it out and create a plan.

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Tags ingredients, unhealthy ingredients

Cooking Techniques

Tips to Make Your Barbecue the Best

Post author By Carma Spence
Post date May 15, 2017

If you love dining outdoors in the sunshine, but you find that your barbecue food isn’t quite as good as you’d like it to be, check out the tips below. They’ll help you improve your technique when cooking over a fire and ensure that your barbecue is the best around.

Source: Flickr

Buy the Right Barbecue

It all starts with the right equipment. If you want to make the best possible barbecue food – charcoal bbq smokers are the best. Gas versions may work fine, but they won’t give you the all important smoky flavor that makes a truly delicious BBQ meal.

You should also aim to buy a barbecue that features a lid. This will help you to maintain a constant cooking temperature and help you do things like melting cheese onto your burgers and smoking ribs, that you just can’t do without a lid. Look at any BBQ vendor worth his/her salt, and they’re using a lidded device.

Choose Better Fuel

If your barbecue food is lacking that smoky, woody taste that you find in BBQ joints, it’s probably because you are using cheap charcoal. Instead, go for hickory, apple or oak wood chips, combined with more expensive charcoal for a taste sensation that’ll get rave reviews from your guests.

Don’t Cook in the Flames

Although barbecue dishes are often referred to as ‘flame-grilled’ that doesn’t mean that you should actually cook your food when the flames are high. To get the best flavor, and meat that is perfectly cooked, wait until the coals are burning white and the flames have died down. The heat will be even then, which will help you to avoid burnt or undercooked food.

Make Your Own

If you really want to wow at the barbecue, instead of cooking pre-made burgers and sausages, make your own. The simplest burgers can be made with just high-quality meat and seasoning, and they will taste much better than the average store-bought products. Just make sure that you buy ground meat that has lots of fat running through it because this will make the juiciest, most flavorsome burgers possible.

When I make my own burgers, I like mix in a variety of flavor boosters such as garlic powder, onion powder, Worcestershire sauce and A-1 Steak sauce.

Long, Slow Marinade

When you’re barbecuing, it’s even more important than usual that you let your meat marinade overnight. The longer you can leave your meat to marinade, the more moist and delicious it will be when you take that all-important first bite. As well as leaving your meat to marinade, you should also give it an extra brush for every 10 minutes of cooking time, while it’s on the grill.

Don’t have time? You can speed up the marinating process using a vacuum packer. An hour or so vacuum packed with marinade can give you close to the same results as letting sit overnight.

Carefully Grill Vegetables

Although meat is usually the star of the show, expertly grilled vegetables can give them a run for their money and make your barbecue offerings a bit more interesting. To ensure that your veggies are perfectly cooked, slice them thinly and grill them immediately without adding any oil or seasoning of any kind. Aim to gently char them and only add extra flavors once they’ve been removed from the grill.

Kill It with Sides

Once you’ve got the grilling down, you need to create some killer side dishes that will blow your guests away … and ensure that you all eat a more balanced meal that isn’t just meat, meat, meat. Some good side ideas include grilled corn on the cob, potato salad or flatbreads cooked right on the barbecue.

Tags barbecue, bbq

Cooking Techniques

How to Cook Perfect Pasta Every Time

Post author By Carma Spence
Post date May 11, 2017

Chef Bake Spaghetti Noodles Cook Italian Pasta

Pasta is one of those dishes that’s easy to make but can be challenging to master. Italian chefs built up their expertise over the generations. But if you’re relatively new to the stuff or you haven’t been trained by a grand master, then it can be tricky to get right.

Fortunately, cooking up the perfect pasta dish is easy, so long as you’ve got the right tips at your disposal. Take a look at these chef-inspired essentials.

Source: Max Pixel

Add Mountains of Salt to the Water

When you order linguini from a restaurant, you expect it to be seasoned perfectly and taste delicious. And when it arrives, it usually is. However, when you get home and try to recreate the intense flavors yourself, your efforts fall short. Why?

One of the things that chefs do is use a mountain of salt when they cook their pasta. You might think that a couple of grinds of the salt mill in the boiling water will suffice, but very little of that salt will ever make its way into the pasta. Professionals, therefore, use around a tablespoon of salt to flavor the water. Ideally, the water should taste like the sea.

I’ll admit, in my effort to reduce salt in my diet, I stopped using salt in the boiling water. Boy, what a difference it made! I’ve gone back to adding it to the water and reducing salt in other areas of my cooking.

Chop Your Veggies Finely

Source: Pixabay

The perfect pasta recipe is one where the sauce does the majority of the talking. But if you’ve got big chunks of pepper or mushroom sticking out, then it can ruin the appeal of the dish. The first thing you’ll need to chop your veggies finely is the right knife. If you don’t have a decent set of chef’s knives, look out for a Kamikoto giveaway and save yourself a bit of money in the process. Next, proceed to the chopping board and chop your mushrooms, chilis, peppers, onions and garlic as finely as you can using your best knife skills. Saute them in the pan until they are soft before adding your pasta. You should find that when you do it this way around, your veggies stick to your noodles, creating the perfect ensemble.

Add Your Pasta to Your Sauce – Not The Other Way Around

Professional pasta chefs cook the pasta until it is al dente (nearly cooked) and then add it to the sauce to finish it off. The reason they do this is so that the starches in the pasta can become incorporated into the sauce, giving it a richer, more luxurious texture.

Add Pasta Water To The Sauce

Chefs will also add a couple of tablespoons of the starchy pasta water to the sauce itself. Again, this is so that the glutinous starches can bind with the vegetable ingredients to make them more gelatinous, helping them stick to the noodles. The last thing you want is to add the sauce and a large puddle to appear at the bottom of your bowl.

Try Adding A Bit Of Fat

You might think that the idea of adding tahini or cashew paste to your pasta is a little strange. But it turns out that adding some fat is the perfect way to bring starchy noodles and watery vegetable sauces together. Fat helps make the pasta rich and decadent.

So give these tips a try and let me know how you fare in a commment below!

Tags Pasta