How to Make Your Healthiest Meals Taste Like a Cheat Day
Making nutritious meals taste as good as the food you eat on your “cheat days” is notoriously challenging. If we’re honest, nobody has really worked it out fully.
However, there are some options you can use. These are great for when you want to carry on eating well but don’t want to be disappointed when clearing the last morsels from your plate or bowl.
Use Umami Ingredients
Our first piece of advice is to make your meals more umami. Adding mushroom, miso or broth from Broth Masters best sellers can work wonders.
What’s great about umami is that it has an uncanny ability to replace salt. Usually, you won’t miss those deep and rich flavors as much if the meal as a whole is umami.
Start Roasting
Another approach is to start roasting more of your food. It skips some of the harms of frying, but also has the effect of really bringing out the flavors.
If you’ve ever had real roast meat, for example, you’ll know the difference. It just tastes so much richer and better than anything you’ve had before.
You can also do the same with vegetables. Roasting tends to bring out more sweetness and depth of flavor. Just think of the difference between a roasted and boiled carrot. It’s remarkable!
Use A Healthier Version Of Cream
Another pro tip is to look for healthier ways to make your meals creamy. Creaminess is something that transforms your food and makes it taste a lot better. However, it also comes with a lot of fat and calories that you don’t want.
However, you can often mimic most creams by using nuts, nut milks, and nut butters. Obviously, you’ll want to incorporate them differently from regular cream since they have different cooking characteristics. However, they can be a great way to make your meals so much more delightful.
Naturally Sweeten
A lot of recipes call for you to add a lot of sugar. But what should you do if you have a sweet tooth but want to be healthy at the same time?
The best way around this problem is to use so-called “natural sweeteners,” like dates or ripe bananas. These are delicious when used in baking.
You can also get something called “date sugar,” which is kind of what it sounds like. It’s essentially dried, crushed dates, so it’s still a whole food. You just add it to recipes like you would regular sugar, only remembering that it won’t dissolve (because it still has the date attached to it).
Plate Up Better
You could also take a psychological approach and just plate up better. Presenting your food in a nice, colorful way, is often the best way to make it more enticing. It can even change the flavor of it, improving the sensation on the tongue.
So there you have it: some of the ways to make your healthy food tastier in the kitchen. Usually, small substitutions are all you need. You don’t have to completely rethink everything.
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Hey! I’m Renata!
Your intuitive nutrition coach and fellow food lover. I’m here to help you find the foods that work best for your body, without feeling deprived or starving.
