#i saved all of my veggie scraps from the last 2 months in the freezer + a ham bone and alchemy'd them into soup magic

[shrimpblaster]

Powerful broths you can't even comprehend, btw

[kellylanesvault]

Simple Lifestyle Tweaks To Shed Fat Fast

This is so familiar – you pledge to honor a daily elliptical routine and count every last calorie. But soon, you’re eating chips at the office and grabbing happy hour mojitos, thinking, diet over!

There is a better way to lose weight – Swap the all-or-nothing approach for one or two healthy switch-ups in your daily routine. Doing this can lead to more weight loss than you ever imagined.

Here are 16 tricks that will help you tweak your lifestyle to a skinnier and sexier body.

1. Eat More Snacks

Skipping snack time won’t necessarily lead to weight loss: Low calorie consumption can actually slow metabolism. Eating less than three times a day may benefit those who are obese, but research shows skipping meals throughout the day and eating one large meal at night can lead to some undesirable outcomes (like delayed insulin response) which may increase the risk of diabetes. Instead of forgoing breakfast or lunch, stick to a few meals a day with healthy snacks between them.

2. Stock Your Fridge With Healthy Foods

Make an effort to fill your fridge with healthy produce and proteins. And when the crisper is empty, make sure the freezer is stocked with frozen veggie mixes or berries (and don’t forget to grab the bags that are sans added sauces or sugar). You may be less apt to order out when you’ve got the makings of a healthy dinner right at home.

3. Eat a Hearty Breakfast

Skipping breakfast in order to “save your appetite” for dinner probably isn’t a safety shield for late-night noshing. While there’s still debate on how important breakfast really is, not eating until the afternoon may lead to binge-eating later (think: a massive dinner because you’re starving). Stick to a reasonably-sized breakfast with plenty of protein, so you’re not tempted to eat unhealthy snacks mid-morning.

4. Snack Before Going Out To Eat

Grabbing an apple or a small cup of yogurt before meeting friends for dinner can help ensure you’ll eat a reasonable amount of that enormous entrée. And be sure to reach for the protein—research shows that an afternoon snack of Greek yogurt can lead to reduced hunger, increased fullness, and less eating come dinner time.

5. Do Not Watch TV While You Eat

Eating while watching television is linked to poor food choices and overeating. Getting sucked into the latest episode of “Scandal” can bring on mindless eating—making it easy to lose track of just how many chips you’ve gone through. It’s not just the mindlessness of watching televsion that’ll get us. Commercials for unhealthy foods and drinks may increase our desire for low-nutrient junk, fast food, and sugary beverages.

6. Fill Up On Fibre

Eating more vegetables and other high-fibre items like legumes can help keep us fuller, longer. Look for at least five grams or more of the stuff per serving. Snack on some of our favorite high-fibre picks like stuffed baked apples or jazzed-up oats.

7. Ditch The Added Sugar

Adding sugar to food may increase the risk for cardiovascular disease and obesity. Stick to sugar that comes in its natural form (think: fruits, veggies, and whole grains) and scrap that spoonful on your cereal or in your coffee.

8. Skip Frying

Even healthy food can go bad when it’s been dropped in a fryer. Instead, pan fry or pop a dish in the oven. Use non-stick spray to sauté foods, or rub oil onto a pan with a paper towel for a light coating.

9. Eat the Fruit, not Drink It

Juices (which are often not 100 percent fruit) provide some vitamins, but without the same fiber and phytonutrients as a real piece of fruit. Take an apple for instance: The average apple juice box has nearly double the sugar and seven times less fiber than the apple itself.

10. Use Free Weights

Strength training on its own is a great idea— but it gets even better when you set yourself free. And by that, we mean squatting with a pair of dumbbells instead of using the leg press. Working out with free weights can activate muscles more effectively, and adding muscle can help torch calories.

11. Do Functional Exercises

Functional exercise has been shown to increase strength and balance and reduce the risk of injury all while working multiple muscle groups at the same time. All that movement promotes muscle gain, which can increase metabolism, which can help shed fat. Added bonus: Functional exercises can make real-life tasks—like hauling groceries up stairs—easier.

12. Stand Up – All the Time

It may sound ludacris to peel your tush from a desk chair at work, but sitting all day has been linked to obesity, poor posture, and chromic pain. Try a sit-stand workstation to switch things up and burn more calories.

13. Have Sex – All the Time

Working up a sweat in bed can burn around 60 calories in just a half hour. Having sex also reduces blood pressure and overall stress levels (and stress can lead to weight gain). Need we say more?

14. Sleep – A Lot More Than Before

Sleep not only reduces stress, helps us heal faster, and prevents depression, it can also help shave off pounds. That’s because sleep loss is linked to changes in appetite and the metabolism of glucose (sugar in the blood). Moral of the story: Sleep is associated with less weight gain.

15. Just Get Moving

A simple phrase for losing weight is: Move more and eat less. The secret is that moving doesn’t just mean hitting the track or going to the gym. Make the conscious decision to get more steps into the day by taking the stairs, having a walking meeting, or parking the car far away from a store’s entrance.

One last thing… you should try this super simple morning ritual that burns 1 pound of belly fat per day…

“All this by a morning ritual?” I asked.

I met an old friend for lunch last year and I was super impressed with how she lost 72 pounds in 3 months.

She said, “It’s not so much about the the so called ritual but more about how it releases fat-blasting molecules that signal your brain and body to burn off pounds and inches of trapped fat quickly and naturally.”

Even though I was skeptical, I’ve been struggling with my weight over the last few years, so I gave it a shot and watched the same video she did.

Well, it’s only a couple weeks later and you know what they say about how “you can’t transform your body overnight”…

They’re right — it actually took me 14 days to lose 19 pounds.

Now it’s my girlfriends asking ME what I’M doing differently

Imagine your body being beach ready before Memorial Day.

Imagine enjoying the foods you love: pasta, wine, or even a dessert — completely guilt-free.

And imagine feeling good and living your life without obsessing about every single calorie you eat…

All while knowing your health is being protected by one of the most powerful natural healing rituals ever discovered.

Click here to see the super simple morning ritual that helped me melt away 19 pounds in just 14 days

[mythicaliz]

cheap eats tips

I got these asks last night but wanted to wait until i was on my laptop to answer them. so here are some ideas. they arent really recipes, just tips

tl/dr

Equipment

my number one way to save money is a chest freezer. obviously not everyone has the money to buy one or the space for one but you can find smaller ones on kijiji. alternatively, if you have a parent or friend who has a large freezer that you can easily access and is willing to give you some room in it that works too. we used to have a basket in my husband’s parents freezer before we got our own, and we give up some space in ours to a friend who lives near by. that being said, use whatever freezer space you have to stock up on things (more on this below)

a crockpot is also a great tool to have and you can find them cheap at thrift stores. It means spending 5 minutes in the morning and coming home to dinner already made. it can be used for so many things. there are no shortage of quick, cheap crockpot recipes on the internet but ill include some ideas below

Meat

- i pretty much only buy meat on clearance or sale. clearance meat is just a day or 2 before the sell by date so they have to get rid of it fast. it’s still fine quality. i just freeze it immediately (if you aren’t going to use the whole pack in one meal portion it out into freezer bags). This is why having a big freezer is handy. Once a pack of 3 chicken legs was on clearance for $2. we bought 24 of them and used them on the bbq, baked, in soups and stews, pulled the meat off for casseroles etc. we had like 6 months of chicken for under $50

-save your bones and scraps. have a bag on the go for beef scraps and one for chicken scraps in the freezer (do the same with vegetable peelings, ends, onion skins, etc.) throw a bag of veggie scraps and meat scraps/bones in your crockpot. cover with water and add whatever spices you like, peppercorns, bayleaf whatever. add a good amount of salt and a splash of vinegar. both of these help break down the bones and pull all the minerals from them. cook in the crockpot for 12-24 hours (you may need to add more water). strain it and you now have amazing bone broth which is incredibly good for you and a base for any soup. if you have the space you can freeze in ice cube trays and then put in a ziplock to have convenient broth chunks to throw in pretty much anything. but you can also just freeze it in tupperware, or zliplock bags or whatever.

-if you eat bacon save your grease. keep a mason jar in the fridge and drain any grease off into the jar. then you can sautee veggies and stuff in it and it’s already so delicious

-cut up meat and put it in soups, stews, casseroles etc rather than making it the centre of the dish. if you have 2 people you’re likely to cook 2 full chicken breasts if that’s the main part of your meal, but you could probably get away with one if you are making a dish where the chicken is cut up with lots of veggies and maybe some beans on top of pasta. get it? 

-not meat but eggs are always good to have on hand. inexpensive and so much you can do with them. (in an oven proof skillet: sautee up some veggies, whisk up some eggs and throw them in. top with a bit of cheese if you like. throw it in the oven until eggs are set. you have a fritatta you can eat for dinner or cut into wedges and eat hot or cold for breakfast or lunch)

Produce

-lettuce is a scam. don’t buy it. it’s expensive, has almost no nutrition and is pretty shitty for the environment. Spinach or cabbage is a better choice because you can make salads with it but if it starts to get past it’s prime you can cook it or freeze it and throw it in a soup or stirfry later

-root vegetables last a long time and are great. plus they add heartiness to any meal

-use your most perishable produce first, then move onto the heartier stuff. frozen is also great, and sometimes is more nutritious than fresh thats out of season

-apples. they last forever and if they get sad you can make apple sauce (in your crockpot! cup em up, skin on and all, add a little cinnamon and some water and cook until mush. then blend it up) or baked apples (cut em in half and scoop out the core a little. add a bit of butter and brown sugar in the hole. if you have walnuts or pecans you can throw some in there too. bake until soft)

Legumes etc

-legumes, beans, pulses are all amazing sources of protein and inexpensive. you can save even more money buy buying dried ones and rehydrating them in your crockpot. (rinse beans and put in crockpot with 2 inches of water above beans. they should take about 6 hours on high to be tender)

-lentils are also great and have a really nice flavour. you can also use them to thicken soups, one of my favourite dishes is called  Mujadara. it’s lebanese (like me!) you slowly cook a cut up onion in olive oil until it’s all caramalized and delicious. set it aside and cook equal parts rice and brown lentils. you can use water or broth for more flavour. cook until tender, top with your friend onions and it’s like heaven. i’ll cut up a tomato and cucumber and make a little salad on the side with it. 

shopping

-stock up on things when you can. say canned tomatoes are on sale. maybe you can’t afford to buy 10 of them, but even if you buy one or two extra cans then you’ve paid less and have them on hand when you need them. also, i realize room can be an issue. don’t feel like all your food has to stay in your kitchen. in college i had a bin under my bed with canned goods and pasta etc. as long as it’s nonperishable keep it wherever you can. 

-buy the largest size you can afford. for most things, it pays to buy in bulk. maybe you have a friend you can go halfsies on bigger items with. an example is rice. gigantic bags that could feed you for a year go on sale for $10. if you can, buy it.

-a lot of people live in food deserts. what that means is you live somewhere that it’s nearly impossible to walk to a grocery store so you end up shopping at convenience stores, gas stations and eating fast food. I suggest a well planned monthly shopping trip to a store that has good deals. Yeah you’ll pay for an uber, but you’ll save more than in the long run and have much healthier food. 

-don’t force yourself to eat things you dont like. so many people try to choke down kale. or rather they buy it and let it rot in their fridge. personally, i like kale, (im sure it helps that i fry up onions in bacon grease and then wilt kale in that :P) but just because it’s some super food doesn't mean you have to eat it or feel bad for not eating it. 

anyway that’s some advice!

[jeanjauthor]

This is a great thread to remind everyone how thousands of years of our farming & hunter-gatherer ancestors made their much more limited supplies of preserved foods last all winter long.  They didn’t have supermarkets with foods available from all around the world.

Most of us have refrigeration & freezers, so we don’t have to be quite so quick to use up everything all at once, but we still have to be cautious about not letting leftovers sit out on the counter.  Get it packed away as soon as possible after eating, even perhaps as soon right after serving but before eating! The US FDA recommends refrigerating leftovers within 2 hours of it being made, but I’d say the sooner you get it in there, the better.

Caveat: Hot Things!  If you’re pouring boiling hot soup into jars with screwtop lids,

1. Preheat the jars with hot running tapwater to prevent thermal shock cracks, then covering it with a clean lid and letting it sit long enough completely covered to cool to palm-warmth.

2. If you’ve just pulled a casserole out of the oven, COVER IT, preferrably with a solid lid, tinfoil / aluminum foil (be mindful: plastic wrap will melt if it’s still fresh-from-the-oven hot!) or even just enough paper towels or a tight-woven tea towel large enough to cover the container plus extra for at least a fingerlength all the way around the edges.  Wait until the container is comfortable to handle with your bare hands, then put it away.

3. Smaller containers of hot food will cool faster! If you have single-serving size tupperware containers, reynolds or ziplock tubs & containers, even those leftover deli-meat lidded bowl things or reusable cottage cheese containers with their lids that have been thoroughly washed...portion out that bigger meal into them.  You can also use ziplock style baggies, or wrap portions of solid foods in tinfoil / aluminum foil. (do NOT reheat anything in the microwave that is still wrapped in tinfoil, etc...and yes you probably know that, but if you’ve frozen a food and unwrap it frm tinfoil, make SURE there’s not a tiny torn-off scrap stuck in the food...which is something I will neither confirm nor deny might have possibly happened in my utterly coincidental presence near said microwave one time... >.>*)

As for how to reuse leftovers...presuming you have refrigeration, let’s take the ubiquitous example of the great American Thanksgiving Turkey Leftovers:

Day 1: (Big) Roasted Turkey

2 Turkey sandwiches w/gravy

3 Something Else (SE)

4 Turkey soup

5 (SE)

6 Turkey casserole

7 Turkey pâté on toast

8 (SE)

9 Turkey soup with different veg

10 Turkey gravy on mashed potatoes (if there's any left by this point).

...And just do the same thing for other foods.  Beef pot roast that’s been slow-cooked overnight can be redone as roast beef sandwiches, shredded (if you truly slow-cooked it) into picadillo beef for taco night, and of course minced and plonked into beef soup, etc.

I currently have a covered bowl in my fridge of beef & veggie soup.  I made it from the above listed pot roast (HUGE sucker, 4 pounder, BARELY bit in the crockpot, lol), which started out AS a slow-cooked-to-shredded-perfection pot roast.  My mother & father had pot roast beef sammiches for lunch the next day from some of the slices refrigeraged from the meal, and we had something else for supper.  We also shredded the rest and put it in the freezer, separated on a tray to freeze it as portionable pieces, then baggied it up.

About a month later, we used some of it for tacos, and a while after that (about a week and a half ago), I made an absolutely delicious beef soup out of the last of it, boiled up with frozen veggies, and even frozen spinach (we didn’t have lettuce in the house, but needed our leafy greens for folic acid & micronutrients, etc).  It made a delicious all-in-one-bowl meal with broth simmered overnight in the crockpot from various veggie scraps I’d tossed into a bag in the freezer.

There was enough left over from that (mostly solids with very little liquid) that I put it in a lidded bowl in the fridge, and about 5 days ago, we had smaller bowls of soup along with grilled cheese sandwiches, with the soup thinned out with yet more broth...but also with leftover veggies tossed into the pot from other containers in the bridge, and everything got boiled a full 10 minutes before I served it...after doing the sniff-test to make sure it smelled okay.

And there was enough left of THAT that I can do it one last time. (More liquid is in the current iteration than round 2 started with, but still, about a small cup’s worth of soup per person, best served with sammiches or something else.)

Tonight’s meal was a casserole made from gluten-free spiral noodles (2 of the 4 of us are celiac), frozen veggies, a mix of sauce stuff, and the LAST of the shredded turkey leftover from Thanksgiving...from a baggie that got to the bottom of the freezer and forgotten, since we accidentally used up the last of the turkey leftovers from my birthday dinner in February, thinking the November turkey was gone. (I bought a turkey that was 49-cents a pound after Christmas, and saved it in the freezer specifically because I wanted a Turkey Dinner for my birthday, lol...and it was delicious!)

We also have one leftover from my birthday Turkey Dinner still in the freezer...a big jar of the stuffing.  It’ll have to be reheated to 240F (116C) if we use it as a side dish stuffing (even frozen right away, better to be safe than sorry!)...but I ALSO know how to make Stuffing Soup.  Because we ALWAYS slow-cook the carcass in the slow-cooker overnight, covered in water and set on Low for at least 24 hours, to soak out all the nutrients & vitamins & minerals we can from the bones, skin, ligaments, and those tiny scraps of meat you can just never completely get off a turkey (or chicken, etc) carcass.  And that means we often still have frozen jars of strained turkey broth waiting to be used.

Which, after we reuse the beef soup (probably tomorrow night!), might be a soup we’ll have next week.  And yes, stuffing dumped into turkey broth and brought to a boil, with maybe a little more poultry seasoning, is surprisingly good!  Since we don’t have turkey meat leftovers, I’ll probably bake up some (frozen) chicken tenders (unbreaded) to go with it.

...For those of you wondering “she’s got people with celiac disease and she’s going to make STUFFING soup??”  Relaaaax...!  It’s a basmati & wild rice stuffing with veggies (carrots, onions, etc) in the mix, no gluten I promise!  Mother always makes cornbread stuffing for Thanksgiving Turkey Dinner...but I get so tired of it, tbh...  I love wild rice and wanted THAT for my birthday dinner’s stuffing.

And stuffing soup is really no different than making any soup with a starchy component, like barley soup, or bean soup.  It’s going to come out tasting of whatever seasonings were used, whatever it may have been stuffed into...but hey, that’s not a bad thing! After all, you probably liked it the first time around, right?

[deannawads]

Homemade chicken stock from garbage?

“Garbage?” you say.

Yes, garbage!

First let me start off by saying I am a writer, but I am also an avid gardener, food preserver, and a general foodie.

And I’m cheap.

I love preserving the old ways of cooking and putting food by, much like the character Phineas in my upcoming Men of Gilead novel, THE RHUBARB PATCH. Check out this cute scene about homemade chicken stock here.

Back to me being cheap. I love to see how much bang I can get for my cooking buck. Would you like to turn that $10 rotisserie chicken and scraps you were gonna pitch into 12-16 pints of stock? At the price of one jar of chicken broth, not only are you getting six helpings of chicken for dinner, but the leftovers gave you $20 bucks worth of FREE broth.

That’s my kinda savings.

Now some of you may compost, so what I am calling “garbage” might not be garbage to you. I compost too, but I found a better use for some of my kitchen scraps.

The “garbage” I’m referring to is the leftover chicken or turkey carcass(skin, fat and cartilage too), ham or beef bones and all your mirepoix peelings and scraps.

What is mirepoix? Check it out here: http://ift.tt/1JX4ujV Basically it’s celery, onion, and carrots. I believe Emeril called it the Holy Trinity of most dishes.

Now, if like me, you buy whole carrots because it’s cheaper and the flavor is better for cooking than baby carrots, then you have to peel them.

But don’t shove those peels or the green tops down your garbage disposal!

Bag of “garbage” scraps

Take every single one of them and stash them in a gallon freezer bag and put them in your freezer. Same for the celery butts and leaves, or just wilted celery that isn’t rotten but you don’t wanna eat. And the thick onion skins? Toss those in your freezer bag too. Just make note that the papery peels will make the stock cloudy. Personally I don’t care, but you might.

Now I take it a step beyond the basic mirepoix and save the tiny butts of my garlic and those green stalks that often grow inside the bulbs and toss those in my “garbage” freezer bag too. Also leeks and scallions are good to save. And the stems from your fresh herbs? Don’t leave those out! Heck, I’ve even saved parsnip, turnip, and beet peels too.

*NOTE* Don’t use cruciferous vegetables like broccoli or cabbage. And avoid tomatoes and asparagus. It’ll ruin your stock.There are mixed thoughts on potato peels. Adding a few will thicken the broth, but too many will ruin it. I’ve never used any of these ingredients myself. If I’m making a roasted veggie stock I will save a few hot or bell peppers, but be careful as they can overpower the flavor of your stock too.

I’ve added lemons after squeezing them too. Sometimes I freeze them separate for free pectin in my jellies (I don’t like to waste) but one or two halves in a chicken stock brightens the flavor nicely.

Now after dutifully saving all these scraps, you can roast them with some olive oil and make veggie stock. Whether you’re vegetarian or not, this broth is DYNAMITE to cook rice or quinoa in. But if you want this trendy “bone broth” (aka known to the rest of us folks as grandma’s homemade stock) the next time you have a carcass you’ll be ready to go.

Mmmm! It makes the house smell so good!

Don’t you just love having a nice reason to say carcass?

No? Just me, eh? LOL

I make my stock in a crock pot. There’s really no point in doing it any other way, IMO. It’s just sooooo easy!

For the sake of this post, I’m making chicken stock, but if you have beef bones, make sure they have been roasted first, same with the veggies.

Step 1: Save all your scraps in the freezer: mirepoix, herb stems, garlic butts etc.

Step 2: You have a carcass! Yay! Now put it in your slow cooker, skin, fat, gunk in the bottom of the pan, drippings and any of that clear jelly like stuff too. Now don’t be squeamish, there’s lots of nutrients in there which are good for body, especially your hair, skin, and nails. (Do I have your attention now?)

Step 3: Dump in some of your frozen “garbage.” Leave enough space that the cooker is no more than 2/3 full.

Step 4: Cover with filtered water

Step 5: Add 1TBS cider vinegar. This breaks down the bones and helps leech out more nutrients. Let it sit an hour.

Step 6: Add salt to taste. Don’t skip the salt, you’ll regret it.

Step 7: Turn slow cooker to low…..I shouldn’t think I have to tell you to put the lid on now, but there ya go.

Step 8: Forget about it!

I cook my broth a minimum of 24 hours and have let it go as long as four days, adding water as I needed. Seriously, the four day broth was soooooo rich! Like liquid consomme. Now you can do 12 hours, but you will see that most of the bones and skin are still intact after that, thus leaving a lot of nutrients behind.So if you want all those healthy nutrients from the bones, cook it longer. I usually do 48 hours.

Step 9: When you’re done cooking, strain the broth well, making sure to get out all pieces of bone and veggie. What do you do with all the skin, cooked veggies and bones?

You didn’t think I was gonna say throw it away, did you?

You’re so silly!

The point of not wasting anything….. is NOT WASTING ANYTHING. After you strain the stock, add all the junk back to the crock pot and make another batch for a lighter stock. I may or may not add fresh veggies in at this point. You can cook a third batch until the bones disintegrate if you want, I’ve done that too.

Step 10: Cool your stock if you plan to skim the fat. I almost never do this unless it’s ham bone stock.Your stock should be a rich brown, not yellow.

You have three options:

See how rich and brown it is?

A. Use it within a week (storing it in the fridge, duh)

B. Freeze it for up to six months

C. Can it, my usual go to.

If you’ve cooled your stock, bring it back to a boil before canning. Now its the time to taste it, see if you need more salt.

You will need a pressure canner to can any homemade stock, including the veggie stock.

DO NOT WATER BATH

Unless you are planning on poisoning your family. Then by all means, water bath away!

Here are Ball’s instructions:

http://ift.tt/2ks2qHp

Stock can keep for a year, but I promise you that it won’t last that long. You’ll never be able t have chicken soup again without it LOL

Thanks for stopping by my blog today! I hope you found this helpful. Please post a comment, share this post and check out my other fun things I’m doing on the interweb!

And stay tuned for THE RHUBARB PATCH, coming summer 2017 from Dreamspinner Press.

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from Homemade chicken stock from garbage?

[newsindiahub-blog]

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10 Healthy Cooking Hacks Everyone Should Know

I came. I slawed. I concasséd (that’s chef speak for a fancy method of dicing a tomato). And now that I’ve graduated from New York City’s nutrition-driven culinary school, Natural Gourmet Institute, which focuses on food that tastes delicious but also happens to be good for you, I appreciate a healthy cooking trick more than ever. Here are a few of the best ones I picked up during my adventures in dicing and slicing, along with tips from a few of my favorite registered dietitians.

1. Put nutritional yeast on everything.

Dare yourself to slip some “nooch” (or hippie Parmesan, as I came to call it) into your meals. This flaky food seasoning has a cheesy taste, so it’s a great way to boost flavor in your dishes, especially if you’re vegan, vegetarian, or trying to cut back on dairy.

It also offers filling protein (3 grams per 20-calorie tablespoon) and a punch of vitamin B12, which is necessary for preventing anemia and maintaining your energy levels by creating red blood cells, and also helps keep your central nervous system healthy.

“Sprinkle nutritional yeast in hummus, grain dishes, soups, and salads for a delicious umami flavor and a hefty dose of bonus nutrition,” Julieanna Hever, M.S., R.D., C.P.T., a plant-based dietitian and author of The Vegiterranean Diet and The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Plant-Based Nutrition, tells SELF.

2. Marinate your proteins.

Harissa-marinated chicken? Don’t mind if we do. “Marinate your chicken, fish, or meat before grilling it or cooking it at high temperatures,” The Nutrition Twins, Lyssie Lakatos, R.D.N., C.D.N., C.F.T., and Tammy Lakatos Shames, R.D.N., C.D.N., C.F.T., authors of The Nutrition Twins’ Veggie Cure, tell SELF. It’s a great way to add flavor via a low-calorie cooking method instead of relying on frying or dredging food in some sort of batter. And research suggests using a spice-rich marinade may help reduce heterocyclic amines, carcinogens created when you cook meat at high temperatures, The Nutrition Twins explain.

3. Make beans your BFF.

I went to a mainly plant-based culinary school, so it’s no surprise that these fiber and protein powerhouses were a staple in countless curries, soups, veggie burgers, salads, and more. Even if you’re not veg, consider adding more of this great, affordable option to your diet.

Making a creamy broccoli or carrot soup? Swap calorie-spiked cream or dairy for a quarter cup of cooked beans, and puree it in the blender to get that same rich, velvety texture without the excess fat and calories. “You can also try adding pureed beans as an oil substitute to sauces, dressings, and baked goods (like brownies) to increase fiber intake and lower fat content,” Hever says.

4. Experiment with herbs.

Before culinary school, my main interaction with herbs was the sadly limp mint plant I stored for about three months too long on my windowsill. Now I slip them into just about everything. “You can add fresh herbs to all types of dishes for a boost of flavor, and you get the benefit of added phytochemicals,” Hever says. If you have a garden, snip fresh herbs and blend big batches of pesto and sauces to freeze and save. You can also preserve herbs by slipping them into an ice-cube tray filled with butter or olive oil and popping a cube out of the freezer every time you need to enhance a blah soup or stew.

5. Sauté smarter.

If I had a dollar for every pan I kinda-almost burned, I’d have enough cash to buy all these incredible kitchen gadgets. Don’t be me.

“[If the pan starts to stick or dry out] when sautéing veggies, rather than adding more oil and extra calories, simply add a splash of water,” The Nutrition Twins say. “It doesn’t add calories but prevents burning and keeps the food moist.” This trick couldn’t be simpler, but I promise it’s game-changing, and it may just save you a pan or two along the way.

6. ABS (Always Be Stocking).

This mnemonic came in handy. Basically, use leftovers to make nutrient-dense and tasty stocks that elevate a basic dinner to ready-to-impress status.

“Save your vegetable throwaways, like mushroom and kale stems, carrot tops, and onion scraps to make delicious, basically free vegetable stock,” Hever says. “Once you’ve collected enough, throw them all together in a pot with water and simmer for 45 minutes to an hour.”

It’s beyond easy, and if you want to get really fancy, add some peppercorns, bay leaves, and thyme (or whatever herbs you have on hand) wrapped in a cheesecloth, or tie the herbs with a string like we did in culinary school. In chef’s speak, that last method is called a bouquet garni. You’re going to want to remember to strain the herbs out before you serve (unless you want five points deducted off your midterm, like a certain author of this post…). 7. Swap cauliflower for everything.

Well, maybe not chocolate, but this cruciferous veggie makes healthy eating a breeze. “Use cauliflower to lighten up your comfort foods. You can use it for a creamy sauce for mac ‘n’ cheese, in lieu of potatoes in mashed