There are many healthy cooking techniques you can use in your everyday cooking when putting the family dinners together. Here I have collated some ideas for you to try and adapt into your cooking repertoire to improve the nutrient and antioxidant content of your meals. Improved nutrition and taste can be quickly gained by simply changing the way you prepare foods and use ingredients.
Add herbs
Adding herbs to your dishes is a great way to quickly enhance flavour and boost your antioxidant intake. Green herbs are full of magnesium, essential oils and phytosterols. Some have immune and anti-inflammatory benefits, which are beneficial to overall health and well-being.
When using herbs don’t bother chopping them. Instead, rip them with your hands. Chopping herbs cause the flavour of the herb to be lost on your chopping board. Ripping your herbs for salads and garnishes will unlock the flavour and give your dishes a new texture.
Make broth from food scraps
Don’t discard vegetable and herb offcuts. Make healthy broths, soups and stews with all your vegetable, meat and bone leftovers. Collect all your vegetable offcuts, scraps of meat or raw bone leftovers and throw them into a pot of boiling water and allow them to cook for 1.5-2hours. The vegetables in the pot will release nutrients into the water making your soup more nutritious and healthy. After you have finished boiling your vegetable and bone mix, drain the water away from the ingredients. The broth can be used to make soup or stews in the future. Simply store the water in containers and freeze it into blocks. Making homemade broth will help you prevent household food waste and you may even come up with a new winning soup recipe!
Multi-layer vegetable bakes
Here’s another idea, have a multi-layer bake-off. Thinly slice all your vegetables and layer them into a pan, top with cheese and bake. No pre-cooking is required and literally takes minutes. This vegetable bake will lock in all the vital nutrients from each vegetables. The kids will love putting it all together too!
Blanch your vegetables
After a long day at work, you might find blanching vegetables as a quick way to make up a healthy meal. This method of cooking will keep your vegetables stay crunchy and will add texture back to your dinner plate. It also locks in water-soluble vitamins such as C, B’s and folate. To blanch vegetables boil a pot full of water and place your chopped greens in for a quick 1minute spa and pull them out again. Drizzle a little bit of olive oil and a pinch of salt. I love this method of cooking vegetables because it is so quick and easy,
Get cracking in the kitchen today!
Dr Gabby Maston Nutrition & Obesity Services 
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