cooking

Healthy Cooking: Magazines and Cookbooks

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In the age of the internet, it may seem strange to emphasize people who want to cook well should subscribe to magazines and/or get and read cookbooks. Everything’s online, we’re up to our armpits in recipes, and you can search for anything. However, much like other forms of knowledge, there’s a value in personal curation.

That’s why I still subscribe to cooking magazines and scout books for cooking. Oh it’s rare I’ll get a new book, and I am reluctant to get too many magazines (I only get one right now), but I still do it. No matter how much I get off the internet, I get a lot out of print publications.

If you want to cook healthy, I recommend checking out the right magazines and books because they’re curated as I said – someone took time to get everything right.

That’s really one thing that’s hard to get in cooking, is recipes filtered, assessed, grouped, analyzed, and organized for maximum use and usefulness. That’s one thing a good magazine or book provides. Some one or someones made this into a coherent product for you based on theme, focus, interest, etc.

Especially when it comes to recipes? That’s important. There are themes and styles, personal touches and general truths, cultural knowledge and ingredient smarts. Those are needed to make a good cookbook or cooking mag, so when you find one you get a lot more than just some checklists of ingredients – you something focused on the big picture of cooking.

Ever looked at a recipe and gone “what the hell?” Yeah, me too. A good book or magazine helps avoid that.

When you find the right one or ones? It’s invaluable because you’ve found something that fits your needs and interests without having to wade through assorted sources. Plus you can read it in the bathtub which is always a plus.

Now with that in mind I actually don’t keep these per se:

  • With magazines I tend to go through and find the best recipes then either recycle them, or cut out the recipes for a folder and recycle them.
  • Some “bookazines” (you know those book like magazines that sum up recipe themes that big publishers release) I’m mixed on since some are so lovely.
  • With books I either have true keepers (especially historical, cultural, or collectable ones) and then when I’ve gone through them enough I donate them or sell them to used bookstores.

Really there’s few cookbooks I plan to keep long term. But using one for a year or two then giving someone else a chance is a great idea.

Not sure what to get? Hit the magazine rack at a bookstore or go to a bookstore or used bookstore for cookbooks and see what shows up. In general, your gut will tell you if something is right for you.

– Steven Savage

Steven Savage is a Geek 2.0 writer, speaker, blogger, and job coach.  He blogs on careers at http://www.musehack.com/, nerd and geek culture at http://www.nerdcaliber.com/, and does a site of creative tools at http://www.seventhsanctum.com/. He can be reached at https://www.stevensavage.com/.

Cooking Healthy; Dressings

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I’m rather enjoying writing down my cooking experiences and findings here, hope you’re enjoying reading them – and now on to dressings.  Want an example recipe?  Try this one!

Dressings are not exactly what springs to mind when people talk healthy cooking – they’re usually seen as salty, oily, and not exactly good for you. Well a lot of dressings are fatty and do have spices, but they don’t have to be that bad, and used in moderation they’re actually important to healthy diet.

To me, dressings are important in that you get a tasty, satisfying way to dress up vegetables and other foods that aren’t always exciting on your own. Let’s face it an orange on its own is great – spinach doesn’t exactly send a lot of people. Broccoli usually needs something on it for people to enjoy it (and I’m a broccoli fan). Even some things that taste good on their own in the veggie department – like carrots or tomatoes – can take off with a little dressing “zaz.”

Since a lot of vegetables are good for us, let’s be honest here – dressing is one way to get you to eat them.

However, dressings offer more than that. A good dressing can also tie together many other disparate foods if it’s done right. Think of a good salad with the right dressing, blending all those tastes together. Something that may seem a bit dull becomes something mouthwatering.

A good dressing is also quick. A sauce may need to be reheated and make cleanup. A good dressing comes out of a bottle – or in my case I make my own mix – and is good to go.

Finally, like a good sauce, the right dressings can be used all over the place and on many things (and many forms). You call it a bunch of leftover vegetables – a person with the right dressing calls it dinner.

So I’d say dressings are another secret to healthy eating, and important since they take the oft-maligned vegetables and do a lot with them fast.

Now off the bat let me say – I recommend people learn to make their own dressings. Sure there’s some healthy ones out there, but this lets you control the taste, take control of your nutrition, learn about flavors, and of course avoid unhealthy additives and preservatives,

I find dressings to be very educational to make as some of them get delightfully complicated, and are thus actually very good to experiment on. My own experiments really taught me a lot about what I liked and how to develop complex flavors (for some reasons, I think Italian and French spices are great for that). Dressings ask work with vinegars and tart flavors which can involve wonderfully complex tastes, and oils which themselves are an adventure (you have to work with Olive oil to really appreciate its power).

Finally, I use dressings to get some good fats – because I love Olive oil. So I use that in my dressings and I get a burst of taste, fat, and calories all from a nice pile of vegetables. It’s a great addition to a meal, especially if the meal needs a bit more calories or fats to be satisfying.

Of course since I know my fat content and such I don’t even feel guilty!

So if you’re going to cook healthy, I recommend turning to the spicy, fatty, oily world of dressings made yourself. You learn a lot, get ways to eat healthy stuff, and get some guilt-free enjoyment. It’s all win-win

(Oh, and dressing powder? Great gift.)

– Steven Savage

Steven Savage is a Geek 2.0 writer, speaker, blogger, and job coach.  He blogs on careers at http://www.musehack.com/, nerd and geek culture at http://www.nerdcaliber.com/, and does a site of creative tools at http://www.seventhsanctum.com/. He can be reached at https://www.stevensavage.com/.

Cooking: The Gestalt

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Last time I blogged on healthy cooking, I mentioned running your numbers – but not overdoing it. Check a few things like Sodium or calories or Iron or whatever you need, but don’t get insane about it. You had to track the right numbers relevant to your goals – Active Numbers that led to your Goal Numbers (like lower weight).

But number-tracking is really only part of good healthy cooking, and for some people it’s barely an issue. For instance I lost weight and of the weight I lost, over a third of it was from changing what I ate, no measuring calories (just sodium, fat, and protein to stay healthy). What helped me the most was The Gestalt.

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