20 TIPS ON HEALTHY COOKING

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20 TIPS ON HEALTHY COOKING

1. Cook with love. Remember, food is not just molecules going into our body, it is the input of life-force to s foundation of all life.
2. Life-force is more potent in food that is grown organically and made naturally. Therefore, choose organic, natural foods over those processed with chemicals and pesticides.
3. Choose natural and local produce over laboratory-engineered food.
4. Choose food ingredients that are easier to digest.
5. Fruits, as a rule, are easier to digest than other foods, so include some fruits in your daily menu. But avoid fruits, especially grapes, which have been treated with too much chemicals and pesticides.
6. Next come leafy vegetables. Get fresh palak or any other soppu, preferably from the local vegetable vendor — or, better still, grow it in your backyard.
7. Next come the creeper (gourd) vegetables. They are not tasteless, as is generally believed, if cooked in the right way. You can even make tasty salads and chutneys using raw gourds like bottle gourd and ash gourd.
8. Then come vegetables grown above the ground, such as peas, cauliflower, etc. But avoid such items if they have been sprayed with pesticides.
9. As far as possible, use fresh vegetables. The roadside vendor is likely to have more of these kind of vegetables.
10. Given the colder climate like Bangalore, it is possible to keep things from spoiling.
11. Milk, for instance, need never be refrigerated. Just bring it to a boil e long periods removes many of its healthier ingredients.
12. In particular, never re-freeze anything after taking out once from the freezer.
13. Where you have the option, slow cooking is preferable to microwave cooking. 
14. Choose whole sim ingredients make . Refrigerating it for which don't go through many stages of cooking and too many ingredients. Lesser processing and lesser easier. Stay away from factory processed foods with preservatives/ortitial flavors.
15. In the case of rice, go for the unpolished variety. Remember — rice mills process the paddy free for the farmer so that they can keep the polish which they sell to the pharmaceutical companies who convert them into food supplements and medicines. So, we end up eating white rice, developing vitamin deficiencies and then buy back the polish at exorbitant rates!
16. In the case of wheat, go for the ones that retain the bran and are ground at slow temperatures, as heat destroys the vitamins and nutrients during milling.
17. In the case of bread, don't be deceived by the 'brown' label. Look for bread really made of whole wheat.
18. Prefer jaggery over sugar — it is far healthier. The word 'sugar' is actually misleading, for it is jaggery that is much closer to sugarcane.
19. Prefer pickles made without oil. Don't believe those who say oil is essential to making pickles.
20. If you are feeling upset or irritable, postpone cooking, or ask someone else to do it. If this is not an option, order from a restaurant, enjoy the break from cooking, but also use it as an opportunity to bring back the lost love so that the next meal can be healthy as well as tasty.