The boyfriend is a calorie counter, and he just moved in. Which is good for me, because it’s been making me think a lot more about what I’ve been eating (I do eat pretty well when I’m cooking, it’s restaurants that are responsible for my extra 20 pounds) but it’s been a pain to calculate calories for the stuff I usually make, and a lot of the things I like to cook best are now cheat-day only.
I need to build a repertoire of lower calorie dinners (other than the obvious stuff, of course - yes, I do know how to roast some broccoli and cook a chicken breast.) I DON’T want anything that’s got a bunch of artificial “low fat” Frankenfood things. And obviously I do want recipes that are, you know, tasty and turn out great every time. And calorie counts are a must, because it’s a serious pain in the ass to figure it out yourself.
I picked up a cookbook from Clean Eating from the library and told him to pick some things to try - the magazine is a little hit or miss, but I’ve gotten some good stuff out of it, so we’re testing that out. There have got to be thousands of diet cookbooks here at the library - which ones are worth it?
I don’t have any cookbooks from either, but I am a suscriber to Eating Well and Cooking Light, 2 of the cooking magazines out there devoted to lower calorie, healthier eating. (I believe their approach is that all of the recipes are 500 calories or less.) Oh! ETA: they include nutritional information, including calorie tally, with every recipe.
I certainly haven’t made every one of the recipes in any of the monthly issues, but of the ones that I have made, they’ve all been delicious. I don’t recall them leaning too heavily on no-fat, no-flavor tricks (like non-stick pans that you maybe use some cooking spray in, or using non-fat sour cream - what is that, even?). And if they do, it’s easy to substitute in the good stuff without breaking the calorie bank.
I’m thinking that cookbooks from either of these two would be equally as good.
I believe all cookbooks are very low in calories, given my nutrition professor told us that adding cellulose (wood fiber) to low-fat bread reduces calories due to being indigestable. If you’re a messy cook and splash food on cookbooks while cooking it probably adds a few calories, though.
Not a cookbook, but if he’s really serious, you might want to pick up a calorie/nutrition scale like this one. I use mine all the time, and it makes life really easy - you put something on the scale, type in the code for the type of food, and it gives you back calories, fat, and carb counts.
I know you said you didn’t want to do it by hand all the time, but even if only occasionally, it really does cut down the time it takes to figure such things out.
I’m only intermittently tackle such things myself, with a random recipe here and there. But I have a couple of good friends that are very good cooks and they swear by Cooking Light. Everything I’ve tried that they claim to have come from that magazine was at least decent, sometimes excellent. Just to add another voice to the chorus.
Did I say congrats? Congrats. Living with a man has its benefits. For example, if I lived with a man right now, my table legs would not be more wobbly than a sorority girl on her third Natty Light.
