Share your low fat vegetable, bean & salad recipes here please

[fortyfour]

I thought that the recipe branch of the forum looked dead, hence I"m posting here where at least a few more people drop by.

If you've worked out some tasty vegetable or bean dishes yourself, or if you've found a way to adapt a more unhealthy recipe to something suitable for dieters please share them here.

Also feel free to share any tips to make recipes easier for dieters. I'm the sort of person would never buy something low fat salad dressing. I"d rather use more authentic products - they taste better are cheaper and its just as easy to work out alternatives.

 

[fortyfour]

How to dress a salad yourself

There are some easy and delicious ways to dress a salad without compromising your diet.

Use extra virgin olive oil. Use just 1 tsp per person
Use the juice of half a lemon. It brings down the GI loading of your meals - ie it makes them slower to digest which means it will be longer before you are hungry
Try balsamic vinegar or red wine vinegar for a stronger flavour - just 1tsp
Sometimes put a clove of garlic in your dressing
Use parley and other fresh herbs
put ground black pepper on your salads

 

[fortyfour]

Healthy salad additives

These ideas are better than things like cheese and bacon bits that people often put in to make them tasty. They are tasty because of the high salt factor which i find makes me just want to eat more. Try to get used to going without.

Along with a salad made of the usual suspects like lettuce, tomato, cucumber, try things like

1 tbsp of chopped avocardo - high fat but very healthy
1/2 cup of canned beans, rinsed
cooked vegetables pieces, chilled such as asparagus, broccoli, cauliflower, beans and so on.
boiled egg, diced
bean sprouts
alfalfa sprouts
olives

 

[fortyfour]

Ratatouille - stewed mediterranean vegetables - a delicious french dish

1 good sized eggplant, diced in large chunkes or sliced
1 zucchini, thick slices
1 red capsicum, diced in 1 inch square or more sized pieces
1 green capsium, diced as above
2 or 3 large tomatoes, coursely diced (or canned tomatos)
3 cloves of garlic, finely diced
1 large onion, finely diced
1 tsp of dried thyme or other dried herb such as oregano.
4tbsp extra virgin olive oil or more or less to taste but remember that the eggplant needs quite a bit of oil to cook properly. Actually i think this recipe will still be ok with 2tbsp oil, depending whether you cook it with the lid on or off.
A little salt
Black pepper
a bit of red chilli (optional)

Saute the onion and garlic in the oil until soft.
Put all the chopped vegetables in either a large saucepan and stew for say 45 minutes with the lid on, or for less time in a pressure cooker.
Or put it all in an oven dish, mix it well and bake it for 1.5 hours or until well stewed. I noticed that one hour is not enough in the oven. If you cook it with the lid on, it will be soupy. If you cook it with the lid off it will be much drier - i haven't done it this way lately so i am not sure how it goes. Experiment yourself. Do no ruin it with cheese. But if cooking in the oven, you can crack an egg on it and let it bake.

Serving size - 1 cup and the recipe makes about 5-6 cups.

Serving suggestions:
*You can eat this hot or cold.
*Hot, its yummy on toast without butter.
*YOu can serve it with a fried/poached egg.
*Put it through a food processor and use it as a soup base or soup in itself.
* serve with pasta
* you can put a dollop of natural yoghurt on top

A cup of this vegetable isn't really enough on its own as you need some bulking carbs to make it a satisfying meal but it certainly gives you a good supply of vegetable nutrients and its delicious.

There are many versions of this on the net but some include other things that are really not traditional.