Five Tricks in the Kitchen to Make Cooking Easier!

1. Smart freezing

The freezer is the best friend of anyone who wants to eat healthy and well, but doesn’t have much time for frequent shopping and long cooking. During the freezing process, products retain most of their vitamins, minerals and general health properties. The taste of properly defrosted semi-finished products and dishes can also be very satisfying.

Don’t limit yourself to freezing dumplings, meat or seasonal fruit. Here are examples of other products whose freshness can also be prolonged in this way:

• vegetables: broccoli, spinach, green beans, cauliflower, carrots, peas, zucchini,
• fruit: blueberries, raspberries, strawberries, peeled bananas, mangoes, cherries,
• meat, fish and seafood,
• baked goods: bread, rolls, tortillas,
• ready-made meals: soups, broths, stews, sauces,
• dairy products: grated cheese, cottage cheese, yoghurt,
• herbs: chives, dill, basil, mint, coriander, parsley,
• cooked semi-finished products: boiled potatoes, sweet potatoes, rice, pasta,
• purées: juices, mousses and fruit pulps.

Note: Remember that not all meat and fish are suitable for freezing. First of all, you can’t freeze products that have been frozen before. You will find the relevant markings on the package.

Tip: Prepare and freeze a portion of your favourite chopped vegetables that you usually add to your meals. This can include chopped onions, grated carrots or diced celery. Add a few spoonfuls of frozen vegetables to any meal (sauce, soup, stew, scrambled eggs) while preparing it, without waiting for them to defrost. Small portions of chopped vegetables are great for enriching the meal with vitamins and nutritional value.

To make the most effective use of home-made frozen food, don’t forget to properly label the frozen products. You will use frozen food more efficiently if you divide it into portions. Here are some tips to follow:

• You can prepare individual servings of a mixture of fruit and vegetables, which you put in zipper bags and freeze. This way you will always have the ingredients at hand for a healthy smoothie, without having to cut, peel and portion the products.
• Before freezing the butter, cut it into small portions and separate the pieces using baking paper.
• Grate the cheese before freezing and place it in a smaller box.
• For freezing small portions of herbs, puree or olive oil, ice molds that help portion these ingredients will work well.
• Before you freeze bread, slice it and divide it into individual sets (e.g. a few slices of bread each). If the bread doesn’t defrost in time, you can speed up the process by putting a single slice in a toaster or sandwich maker.

You can freeze some ingredients whole and use them even without defrosting! Ideal examples include parmesan, ginger and chili peppers. Freeze them and, if necessary, take them out of the freezer whole and grate them directly into the dish you want to season with these products.

Don’t avoid buying ready-made frozen foods, especially frozen fruit and vegetables. In the off-season, it can be a cheaper and no less healthy choice than fresh options. You will enrich your diet with valuable vitamins and minerals throughout the year.

Tip: The freezing process not only serves to extend shelf life, but can also be a step in culinary processing that will introduce the desired texture. An excellent example is tofu, which, when frozen and thawed, loses a significant amount of water and changes to a more “spongy” texture. This allows it to better absorb marinades and sauces, so it is easier to sharpen its flavour with subsequent processing steps.

2. Learn meal prep techniques

Once you start cooking, it is better to prepare a few extra servings “for stock”. If, instead of 2, you prepare, for example, 4 servings of a meal at a time, you will not significantly increase the preparation time, and thus save it on a different occasion. Of course, this does not mean that you have to eat the same thing for 2 or 3 days! Learn meal prep techniques to properly manage the portions you have prepared for stock.

Here are some examples of how to prepare meals and semi-finished products using meal prep techniques:

• You can use baked potatoes in several ways – as a side dish for lunch, a salad ingredient for dinner, or a carbohydrate addition to soup.
• You can heat-seal the finished soups in jars or freeze them.
• You can eat healthy cakes, cookies or oat bars, for example, in various forms – whole, crushed as a topping for yoghurt or sprinkled over oatmeal.
• When baking or sautéing meat for dinner, prepare a larger portion. It will serve as a protein addition to salads, a takeaway lunch or a filling for wraps.
• If you are cooking legumes, cook more than you need. Once cooled, you can turn an extra portion into a tasty sandwich spread or dip or freeze them to add to a sauce or soup.
• Once cooked, you can eat the millet groats sweet in the form of a pudding, or salty as a side dish to a salad, or a classic dinner.

Here are some practical tips and tricks for meal-prepping:

• Once a week, think about what you are going to eat for the next few days and what products or semi-finished products you can prepare in advance. Adjust the degree of detail in the plan to your own tastes and amount of free time.
• When preparing dishes or semi-finished products “for stock”, take into account that what you will store in the refrigerator should be eaten within the next 2-3 days. Place the remaining products in the freezer.
• Remember the principles of hygiene when preparing food. First of all, make sure your food storage containers and refrigerator are clean. An unsanitary environment causes food to spoil much faster.
• If you are preparing a dish in the oven, consider what else you can throw into it. Food baked in the oven “makes itself”, and it is worth taking advantage of the fact that the oven is heated up. This can include, for example, potatoes or beets wrapped in foil, or tomatoes and peppers lined on a baking tray, which you blend after baking to make a sauce.

3. Use spices and you will change any dish

Healthy and nutritious food does not have to be bland. By consciously using different spices, you can get many flavour combinations from simple products. Don’t limit yourself to salt and pepper. Reach for fresh or dried herbs and spices, which – in addition to being aromatic and enhancing the flavour of even simple dishes – are also very healthy. Spices are also a treasure trove of antioxidants. Although used in small amounts for dishes, when they appear in many meals, they can substantially improve the quality of a menu and increase its health potential. Many spices have a thermogenic effect and in some way “drive metabolism”. They also help reduce the amount of salt in the diet.

Here are some less common compositions and ways to use available spices:

• Cardamom for coffee – it will give it an interesting, exotic aroma and enhance its health properties.
• Cinnamon for dishes with tomato sauce – it introduces an interesting note and suppresses the sour taste.
• Red pepper for creamy desserts and yoghurts – it surprises and breaks up the texture.
• Mint for cottage cheese – gives it lightness and refreshing aftertaste.
• Turmeric for smoothies – conveys a distinctive golden colour, and also introduces an earthy flavour note.
• Nutmeg in the puree – emphasises creaminess and adds slight spiciness.
• Bay leaf in the compote – gives the drink a subtle, herbal note and builds a new layer of flavour.
• Cloves in stews – they give a spicy aroma and break up the flavour.

It is not only typical spices and herbs that are suitable for seasoning food. Here are some ingredients that don’t have many calories and are healthy, and when used cleverly, will enhance the taste of many dishes:

• Capers – have an intense, salty flavour with a hint of acidity that perfectly accentuates fish dishes, salads or pasta. They add character to even simple dishes.
• Olives – both green and black – bring a rich, slightly bitter flavour to the dish. They go great with salads and pasta dishes and will work well as an addition to sandwich spreads.
• Sun-dried tomatoes – they have an intense, sweet and sour flavour with a hint of umami, which enriches one-pot dishes, sandwich spreads and all sauces.
• Lime juice – has a fresh, sour taste with a slight hint of bitterness. It is an ideal addition to salads, marinades, fish dishes and cocktails, adding lightness and clarity to them.
• Horseradish – is characterised by a sharp, spicy taste. It perfectly enhances the flavour of meat, cold cuts, sauces and cold dishes, but when mixed with yoghurt, it will also make a perfect dressing for any salad.
• Mustard – depending on the type, can range in taste from mild to pungent, with noticeable acidity. It goes great with meat, sauces, marinades and sandwiches, adding character to dishes without the unnecessary calories inherent in most sauces.
• Sauerkraut – has an intense flavour that can enrich many dishes: from salads to soups to sandwiches. In addition, it is rich in natural probiotics.
• Pesto – adds intense flavour to dishes. An excellent substitute for butter in sandwiches, a flavour enhancer for sauces and a base for salad dressings and marinades.
• Yeast flakes – have a delicate cheesy flavour with hints of precious umami. In vegan cuisine, they serve as an alternative to cheese. They are rich in protein and B vitamins.

Tip: When using ready-made spice blends, always read the label carefully. Some of them can have great ingredients and create unique flavour compositions, very useful in cooking, while others are based on salt or sugar.

4. Master the healthiest cooking techniques

It’s not just the ingredients that determine the quality of a meal. Also extremely important are the culinary techniques used, which can emphasise the health and flavour qualities of the ingredients used, or, conversely, work against them.

The dominant cooking technique in Polish homes is frying. Everyone knows that it is healthier to avoid frying, but it is nonetheless in the skillet that most of the fastest dishes are prepared. It is not necessarily a dietary mistake or “sin” if you follow a few tips:

• Use the right fats for frying. Olive oil, for example, is good for this.
• To avoid excess fat in your dishes, carefully control the amount of fat used for frying. You can get, for example, an atomiser, which allows you to better distribute small amounts of oil around the pan.
• To avoid burning the ingredients, you can pour water, broth or sauce (such as tomato sauce) over the contents of the pan. It is not always necessary to use more fat.
• Braising in own juices or sauces is also a healthy cooking technique using a skillet.
• Fat-free (dry) frying is also possible with the right equipment.

Read also: Fats in the Diet of an Athlete

Don’t limit yourself only to this most popular method of preparing dishes. The healthiest cooking techniques include roasting (in an oven or airfryer), steaming, grilling on an electric grill or braising.

5. Don’t be afraid of substitutes

The real science of cooking involves kitchen experimentation and adapting recipes to the current contents of the refrigerator, seasonality, health, or simply personal preferences. Approach culinary recipes with some flexibility and use substitutes boldly.

Here is a list of product groups with similar culinary properties and nutritional values that can be used as their substitutes:

• Milk, plant-based drinks (soy, almond, rice, oat, etc.), whey, drinkable yoghurt, buttermilk, coconut drink.
• Cream, coconut milk, Greek yoghurt, mascarpone, ricotta, soy cream, cashew cream.
• Butter, olive oil, oil (rapeseed, sunflower, flax, coconut, grape seed), peanut butter, margarine, avocado, ghee fat.
• Cheese, tofu, yeast flakes, vegan cheese, feta cheese, tempeh, miso.
• 1 egg: ½ banana, 100 g of apple mousse, flaxseed gruel, whipped aquafaba, ¼ glass of yoghurt, silken tofu, egg powder, pumpkin puree, avocado puree.
• Chicken, turkey, tofu, tempeh, mushrooms, jackfruit, seitan, fish, shrimps, crabs, clams, soy tenderloin, seitan kebab.
• Ground meat, ground soybeans, lentils, chickpeas, crushed tofu, peas, beans (white, red, black), mushrooms (such as oyster mushrooms), plant-based meat.
• Flour (almond, chickpea, rice, coconut, buckwheat, oat, spelt, tapioca, corn, chestnut and millet flour).
• White sugar, honey, maple syrup, agave syrup, stevia, xylitol, erythrol, coconut sugar, date syrup, molasses, rice syrup.
• Potatoes, beetroot, celery, sweet potatoes, carrots, Jerusalem artichokes, parsley, parsnips, turnips.
• Spinach, arugula, lamb’s lettuce, beet greens, any leafy greens, kale, cos lettuce, iceberg lettuce, savoy cabbage, bok choy, chard.
• Broccoli, kohlrabi, cauliflower, pattypans, carrots, Brussels sprouts, kale, cabbage, fennel, celery, zucchini, eggplant.
• Apples, pears, plums, apricots, peaches, nectarines, figs, mangoes, pineapple, papaya, bananas, grapes, kaki.
• Strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, blackberries, currants, goji berries, gooseberries, cherries.
• Rice, groats (buckwheat, barley, millet, bulgur, couscous), quinoa, pasta, pasta from legumes, amaranth.
• Nuts (walnuts, hazelnuts, peanuts, cashews, almonds, pecans, Brazil nuts), seeds (sunflower, pumpkin, chia, flaxseed, sesame, hemp), peanut butter, tahini.