If you want to control your energy intake, learn how to save calories in the kitchen by preparing your meals.
Knowing how to save calories in the kitchen can be important to ensure the success of a diet that is more adjusted to what you need, allowing for more effective weight management.
A nutritionally balanced daily food intake that does not exceed individual energy needs is a key factor in preventing weight gain and fat mass, as well as possible associated consequences, such as diabetes, and cardiovascular diseases, among others.
In this sense, it is important to adjust the daily diet to nutritional needs, either by changing food choices or by adjusting the amounts ingested or the cooking methods used.
HOW TO SAVE CALORIES IN THE KITCHEN?
Before moving on to practical tips on how to save calories in the kitchen and meal preparation, it is important to understand that energy needs vary according to age, sex, weight, physical activity, and genetics, among other factors.
Therefore, to reduce your energy consumption and make it more balanced daily (not only in cooking/food preparation, but in all your daily food choices) you should consult a nutritionist to make conscious dietary changes, without giving up essential foods for the body.
Replace canning in oil/olive oil with natural canning
The simple exchange of canned food in oil/olive oil for the natural version / in water could mean a saving of around 100 Kcal, which comes from the excess fat existing in canned foods immersed in fat.
If there is no canning in water for some foods, opt for tomato sauce. Even in the latter case, you can save a lot of calories.
Avoid fried foods and prefer cooking methods that use less fat
Frying is a cooking method that is characterized by a higher energy value due to the fat content used to cook the food. Methods such as cooking, sautéing, or grilling significantly reduce this value.
For example, if you opt for boiled or baked potatoes without fat instead of fried potatoes, you can save about 100 Kcal. Alternatively, you can use fat-free fryers, which do not need fat to “fry”.
Avoid sauces or replace them with less caloric alternatives
Adding sauces to meals almost always increases their energy value.
Mayonnaise, béchamel sauce, cream, and vinaigrette, among others, are important sources of fat that can transform a meal with low energy value into a meal that compromises balance. Avoid, therefore, its use or replace it with less caloric alternatives.
In the case of mayonnaise in particular, it is one of the sauces most used to season salads, and make “pastes” or other sauces, increasing the energy value of a meal, as well as its fat content.
If instead of choosing mayonnaise as a sauce/seasoning for your meals (1 tablespoon of mayonnaise has about 99 calories), opt for a quark cheese “sauce” or low-fat Greek yogurt (one tablespoon has 9 calories ) — which will save you about 90 kcal from excess fat.
Use a sprayer to season
Using a sprayer to season your dishes and salads makes it much easier to manage the amount of fat added to the meal, in particular olive oil.
To give you an idea, each gram of fat is equivalent to 9 Kcal, so by better dosing its use you can save quite a lot of calories in your meals. This is because the traditional “thread of olive oil” can easily represent more than 150 Kcal!
spiralize vegetables
Spiralized vegetables, in particular courgette, leek, or carrot, are an excellent way to replace pasta, rice, or potatoes, as they have a very low caloric value and significantly reduce the carbohydrate content and, consequently, calories, of the meal.
Just buy a spiralizer or directly buy the vegetables already spiralized and cook them the way you like best, as they are versatile foods and fit into different types of dishes.
Remove visible skin and fat from the meat and opt for lean portions
To cut down on calories in your cooking, a practical approach is to strip off the visible skin and fat from the meat since they pack a high caloric punch. Moreover, it’s not just about opting for white meat; it’s crucial to select lean cuts. These are parts of the animal with lower fat content, like the loin for pork, the rump for beef, or the breast for chicken or turkey. Making this choice can help you trim down your meal by up to 100 calories.
Limit intake of foods with “coating”
Foods such as breading, fillets, rissoles, and puff pastry, among others, are foods that, in addition to the energy value associated with the “stuffing” of meat or fish, also have an elaborate coating based on flour, breadcrumbs, or puff pastry / shortcrust pastry, which adds a high energy value to the meal.
Even when they are cooked in an alternative way and with less fat, such as in the oven, for example, they are still a relevant source of unnecessary extra calories.
If you cannot avoid this type of food/preparation (eg when you have lunch/dinner away from home), remove the coating whenever possible and only consume the inside.
Replacing refined white sugar with sweeteners
Moving on to sweet recipes, avoid using refined added sugar, which does not bring any benefit to your health, and only add 4 Kcal for each gram added to the preparation.
As an alternative, use stevia or another sweetener with no energy value or vanilla or cinnamon aroma, alternatives that will allow you to reduce the total energy value of your recipe.