Not Letting Food Go To ‘Waist!’

Nathalie’s Healthy Cooking Tip!

My Mum, Nathalie, has taught me heaps about healthy cooking, which is why this post is dedicated to her. Every time my Mum cooks, it is healthy and full of flavour. With the right amount of ingredients, you really don’t need all this fat in cooking. My Mum has many great ideas, with regards to healthy cooking, however, I will just touch on a few of the main ones.

Make a habit of removing all the skin of chicken, prior to cooking it, in order to eat more healthy. Skin is full of fat, which may make your food go to your ‘waist’ i.e. don’t let food go to ‘waist.’ (Nathalie’s Cooking Tip)

Whilst cooking or frying food in a pan, it is advisable to only put the smallest amount of oil required to cook your food. Olive oil is one of the best oils to use, if you would be using oil. Better still, steam or boil your vegetables, rather than frying them, unless you’re attentively watching the fat content in your fry pan. (Nathalie’s Cooking Tip)

Whilst baking, use fruits in order to naturally sweeten your bakes. This way, your bakes will still taste great and will also taste sweet from the natural sugars coming out of the fruit. (Nathalie’s Cooking Tip)

Try to use as little butter as possible in your baking and cooking. Try to replace butter with olive oil or another healthy cooking oil. Your bakes and cooking will still taste great, with nowhere near as much saturated fat contained in your cooking. If the recipe really needs butter, try replacing at least 3/4 of the butter for olive oil, then put the rest butter. Alternatively, you can experiment by using olive oil spread, which still has less saturated fat than butter. (Karina’s Cooking Tip)

Whenever you make a pasta dish, try to avoid cooking white sauces, as these are usually high in saturated fat. If you really would like to use a white sauce, then make your own and use low-fat cheese, low-fat milk and olive oil spread instead of butter. (Karina’s Cooking Tip)

There are many more tips I can think of, however, I will leave you with all this for now.

Enjoy!

Karina x

Copyright © 2015 by Karina Teuma

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What a ‘Cover Up!’

Karina’s Environmental Cooking Tip!

My Mum taught me from a young age: save electricity! As far back as I remember, she has taught me how to conserve electricity in the kitchen. Being brought up with a combustion oven, for about 10 years of my teenage years, I instinctively acknowledge the significant environmental, financial and wellbeing advantages of cooking from a combustion oven. The environmental advantage is that you are saving electricity. The financial advantage is that you are saving money from not needing to utilise as much electricity. The wellbeing advantages is that during the winter time, this combustion oven acts as a heater. You also get to chop fire wood, which will help burn those calories! Win-win!

Without telling you my life story, I will get to the point. Actually, I will get to a few points, as listed below:

– Always cook with the lids on all your pots and pans, unless you really want to make your food crispy, or if the method in the recipe requires the lid to remain off. Keeping the lids on will save you money and save the environment by creating shorter cooking periods and using less electricity.

– Turn the oven off about 5 minutes prior to your food being completely cooked. This way, the residual heat from the oven will continue to cook your food, hence helping the environment and saving money by reducing the time the oven is on and by using less electricity.

– If you have a combustion oven, do all your cooking in this oven and on the combustion stove top, which will save you money and will really help the environment in a huge way!

– Use your combustion oven to heat your house, instead of using the heater. This will save you money and will also help the environment.

– If you have a combustion stove, use the top of the stove to heat your stove-approved kettle (should be all made out of a material which would not melt when exposed to high temperatures). Since we no longer have a combustion oven, we still have a combustion stove, which we use all the time during the winter months to heat the house, boil the kettle and occasionally cook food.

I have many other environmental saving tips, however, I will keep this post brief.

Have fun in the kitchen!

Take care!

Karina x

Better ‘Hop’ to it!

Karina’s ‘Fresh’ Environmental Cooking Tip!

Pictured far left: Tamie, my Dog.

Pictured far right: Floppy.

My brother has a rabbit. His name is Floppy, however, he has many nick names. Apart from Floppy’s lovely nature and beautiful looks, he is also good for another thing. This thing is fertilisation for the garden!

I only started using rabbit poo for fertilising the garden about a few weeks ago, however, we have had Floppy for around ten years! The benefits to my vegetable garden have doubled! The crop is greener, fuller and tastier! The best thing is, you don’t need to pay for a fertiliser! This one is a very green environmental tip, since the rabbit poo goes straight from the ground, into the garden, by one scoop from the shovel! Beware not to over-fertilise, a very small amount of rabbit poo is sufficient, otherwise, you may do more harm than good!

Rabbit poo is one of the best manures for your gardens, since it is rich in many nutrients! One added benefit is that rabbit poo does not have an offensive odour, as some manures do.

Thanks Floppy, you’re the best!

Have fun in the garden!

Enjoy!

Karina x