Add Spice to Your Life (And Cooking)
By Sara Butler
Embracing herbs and spices in the things you cook has a lot of advantages. Not only will it make your food taste better, but it also helps to reduce added calories, salt, fat, and sugar in your food. Plus, many herbs and spices have other properties that add to the overall healthiness of the foods you use them in. Here are a few tips you need to add a little spice to your life.
A Few Good Tips
Looking to add herbs and spices to your cooking but aren't sure where to start? Easy! All you need to do is try a few of these foolproof tips:
- Start slow - You can easily overwhelm the flavor of a dish by adding too many herbs and spices. The best thing to do is to stop using two strong flavors together and slowly add things, tasting along the way.
- Know the right use - Dried herbs are a good choice when you're in the process of cooking to build flavor while fresh herbs are best added at the end to optimize flavor.
- Plan ahead - If you're making a cold dish, then add the herbs and spices in several hours before you plan to serve it so they have time to blend and truly add flavor to the dish
- Chop it up - If you're using fresh herbs, then you must chop the leaves very finely. This allows the maximum flavor to be added to the dish by exposing more surface cuts to the herb.
- Don't double down - If you are batch cooking and double a recipe, you may not need to add double the herbs and spices to get the same results. Use just 50 percent more instead of going double.
- Dry is stronger - As a rule of thumb, dry herbs are much stronger in flavor than fresh. That's why, if you substitute dried herbs for fresh in a recipe, you don't need to use nearly as much as the recipe may call for.
A Few Good Herbs
What spices and herbs should you try? Well, here is a quick guide to help:
- Bay leaves - These are good to use in soups and stews for flavor, just make sure to take them out before serving
- Dill - Goes great with seafood, cucumbers, green beans, potatoes, yogurt, and beets
- Chili powder - A great addition to bean dishes, soups, and stews
- Cumin - Try this with fish, beans, poultry, and curries
Spices and herbs are a good way to add flavor without adding anything that takes away from the healthfulness of the dishes you cook.
To learn more about your health, wellness, and fitness, see your local chiropractor at The Joint Chiropractic in South Jordan, Utah.