Recently, I offered you 25 fat-cutting tips. You loved it, and many of you told me so. Since I respond well to positive reinforcement, I scurried around and found about 20 more tips that I think are really usable.
These ideas work. Give them a try. If you've got a favorite you'd like to share, send it to me in care of The Sun, and I'll pass it along to our readers. Here's my newest list:
* Create a distinctive salad that requires little dressing by adding lots of fresh herbs. Fresh chives, dill, cilantro, parsley, thyme and oregano add new dimensions to the same old vegetables. Best of all . . . fresh basil creates an aromatic salad you'll long remember.
* Use small amounts of highly flavored fats like sesame or walnut oil, extra virgin olive oil, or real butter. With intense flavors, a little goes a long way, especially when you add it at the end of cooking.
* Enjoy your morning toast with pear or apple butter, marmalade, all fruit jam or mashed banana. Measure for measure, you'll get half the calories and none of the fat of butter or margarine.
* And while you're mashing those bananas, substitute pureed fruit for fat in baked goods. Try prune puree in brownies, applesauce in cake, or figs in cookies. Use the same amount of fruit as fat in brownie and cake recipes. Use half fat and half fruit in cookies.
* Skip the butter, and top your waffles, pancakes and French toast with syrup, applesauce, fresh fruit slices or a cinnamon-rich hot fruit compote.
* Create a thick, rich shake by putting into the blender half a ripe cantaloupe . . . peeled and seeded, of course!
* For a zesty Mexican-style meal, top your baked potato with spicy black bean soup or tuna mixed with salsa. Crave the taste of butter? Switch to red bliss potatoes. Their high moisture content makes them easy to swallow without much fat. Just llTC teaspoon of butter will enhance a medium- to large-sized potato.
* Roast sweet red peppers, zucchini, eggplant and yellow squash for a change-of-pace flavor. Wash, cut into chunks, and place on a nonstick cookie sheet. Bake at 400 degrees 10-15 minutes.
* Substitute evaporated skim milk mixed with chicken stock for cream in savory recipes. Evaporated skim is a great coffee or tea lightener, too.
* Use lowfat cottage cheese instead of ricotta when you make lasagna or stuffed shells. Add a -- of nutmeg for interest.
* Get a gravy separator. The spout on this plastic cup allows you to pour off the low-calorie pan drippings from cooked meat to make fat-free gravy.
* Chill homemade soups, stews and sauces until fat congeals on top, then just spoon it off. Carefully open canned soup and spoon off hardened fat before heating.
* Order pizza with lots of vegetables and half the cheese.
* For a delicious, fat-free sauce for fresh fruit, grate fresh lime peel into nonfat vanilla yogurt. Add a -- of cinnamon.
* Use creamed corn as a topping for meats, cooked vegetables or baked potatoes. The creamy part is crushed corn, not cream.
* When cooking pasta, don't add oil to the water. Just be sure you use plenty of water, add the pasta slowly, then stir gently to prevent sticking.
* Top your pasta with white clam sauce. Clam sauce is mostly white wine and clam broth with just a touch of olive oil.
* For the best lowfat garlic bread ever, just bake an entire head of garlic about a half-hour until soft. Mash and spread on Italian bread, then broil lightly.
* Cook rice in lowfat beef or chicken broth and a sprinkle of dried herbs. Or cook in water, then season with chopped dried fruit and a -- of allspice or cloves.
* Plan and shop to assure a good supply of fresh fruit, raw vegetables, whole-grain pretzels and baked tortilla chips. Healthy snacks add needed nutrients to your day's eating. Lowfat snacking is good for you!
Colleen Pierre, a registered dietitian, is the nutrition consultant at the Union Memorial Sports Medicine Center and Vanderhorst & Associates in Baltimore.