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Cooking Without Carbohydrates: You Should Have These Ingredients at Home

Cooking without carbohydrates isn’t difficult at all: You can find tips about eating according to the low-carb principle and the most important ingredients that you should always have at hand here.

Cooking without carbohydrates: What should not be missing

With a low-carb diet, the carbohydrate content in your meals is reduced. The focus is on protein, vitamins and healthy fats. You should always have the following things at home and ready to hand if you want to reduce your carbohydrate diet:

low-carb fruits (e.g. berries, grapefruit, apricots)
vegetables
Quark
oil
eggs
nuts
butter
Cheese
herbs and spices
yogurt
dark chocolate
Sugar substitutes: xylitol, erythritol, stevia or sweetener
Protein bread
In principle, fish is suitable for a low-carbohydrate diet. The problem with fish, however, is that many species are severely overfished. So you should find out beforehand which varieties you can eat with a clear conscience.
Always remember that you should not completely eliminate carbohydrates from your diet. Examples of healthy carbohydrate sources include potatoes, oatmeal, quinoa and legumes. Better watch out for hidden carbohydrates: These are mainly found in sweet drinks. Therefore, you should primarily drink water and unsweetened tea and largely avoid lemonade, juices and iced tea.

Cooking without carbohydrates – how does it work?

When you’re just beginning to cut carbs from your diet, you might find it difficult to find dishes that fit. For example, a “low carb day” could look like this:

breakfast
You should avoid wheat rolls and croissants in the morning. Instead, you can, for example, prepare individual, delicious “Breakfast Bowls”. As the name suggests, these are bowls filled with fruit, yoghurt, nuts and seeds. You can try countless combinations and let your creativity run free.

Variant 1: Greek yoghurt, strawberries and walnuts.
Variant 2: Quark, bananas, walnuts and a little cocoa powder.
Variant 3: Natural yoghurt, berry mix and homemade muesli.

Having lunch
At lunchtime, it is best to combine lots of vegetables with a protein source (e.g. eggs or fish). Fast dishes are, for example, spinach with egg, vegetable pans, mixed salads or hearty vegetable pancakes.

dinner
Depending on whether you prefer to eat warm or cold in the evening, you should also combine vegetables, protein and healthy fats here. For example, eat tomato-mozzarella, hearty muffins or try a cauliflower pizza. Vegetable casseroles and gratins are also suitable for dinner.

Snacks for in between?
It is currently controversial whether only three meals are better than five, because the lowering of the blood sugar level during long breaks in eating is seen as positive. However, this does not play a decisive role in a low-carbohydrate diet.

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health

8 Tips for Losing Weight While Cooking & Eating

Lots of useful tips for losing weight while cooking and eating. A kitchen is a central place for successful weight loss. Here is eaten and almost all food is prepared. Therefore, pay attention to the following tips, tricks, and tricks in the kitchen, when eating, and when cooking, in order to lose weight in a healthy and long-term manner.

1) Fruits and vegetables as a base

Fresh fruit and vegetables should be eaten in large quantities every day because fruit and vegetables provide the body with valuable vitamins, minerals, dietary fiber, and liquid. The German Society for Nutrition recommends eating at least 5 portions of fruit and vegetables every day and points out that fruit and vegetables should be part of every meal. Whether you use organic vegetables or local fruit is of course up to you. However, it is clear that fruit and vegetables that have not been transported long distances usually retain more of their valuable ingredients.

When preparing, you should note that raw vegetables contain more vitamins than cooked vegetables. So it makes sense to eat part of the daily fruit and vegetable ration as raw food, e.g. salad. But be careful: Don’t make your low-fat, healthy salad a calorie bomb by drowning it in an oily or creamy dressing. Less is more! When cooking, you should make sure that you only cook the vegetables for as long as necessary so that the ingredients are at least partially preserved.

Just eat lots of fresh fruit and vegetables! Not only does it help your body stay healthy, it also helps you lose weight if you’re overweight. With the large selection offered by the shops, everyone will find something they like!

2) Eat slowly

In order to achieve long-term weight loss, one must develop the habit of never gorging on food, eating slowly, and chewing each bite thoroughly. It takes about 20 minutes for the satiety signal to reach the brain. So if you eat your meal very quickly, you eat beyond the actual hunger.

3) Don’t forget the calories in drinks

Calories consumed in beverages are not as filling as calories from solid foods that require chewing. You are still hungry even after drinking high-calorie drinks. Therefore, as part of a diet, do not forget to include the nutritional value of drinks or consume only non-caloric drinks, such as mineral water. Otherwise, you may not lose weight despite your reduced food intake.

4) Vegetable snacks for cravings

If you want to get slim again on a diet, you should always be prepared for a little hunger or even cravings. Vegetable snacks are particularly helpful here to ensure safe weight loss. For example, if you are out and about or at work, no craving for something edible can be particularly dangerous. That’s why you should always have some prepared vegetable snacks with you. Otherwise, it can easily happen that you buy sweets or snacks in between meals.

Vegetables such as kohlrabi slices, cucumber slices, peeled carrots, and crunchy pepper wedges really help a lot if you feel hungry between meals. The vegetable snack is filling, but has few calories and helps to satisfy your oral cravings.

5) Don’t eat what you don’t like

For losing weight while eating, suggested recipes from diets should be liked. It is better to choose an alternative with the same nutritional value. Otherwise, you are too easily in danger of treating yourself to something after the meal that you like. Your calorie requirement is then already covered and the consumption of another food boycotts your diet.

6) Save fat by steaming

A healthy diet includes low-fat meals. Vegetables can be prepared without fat and while preserving the valuable vitamins and trace elements by cooking with little water in stainless steel pots with lids, steaming, pressure steaming, or steaming in their own juice.

When preparing vegetables or potatoes, boiling is not always the best way. To steam them, cover the bottom of the pan with a little water and place the vegetables in a colander. In this way, the trace elements and vitamins are better preserved and the aroma and taste are retained.

7) The correct fat content in cheese

On the product packaging of different types of cheese, the fat content is usually only given in the dry state (fat in dry matter). Although the actual fat content of the product is always lower, it always depends on the amount of water in the cheese. The more water the cheese contains, the greater the fat content. Accordingly, soft cheese and cream cheese are far lower in fat than hard and semi-hard cheese of the same fat content.

8) Avoid cream when losing weight

The cream is a popular ingredient in salads, sauces, and casseroles. In order to do something good for your health, however, you should replace it with sour cream to reduce the fat content. Alternatively, you can also use sour cream, which you should mix with flour so that it does not curdle when heated.

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Cooking Tips

Preparing Parsnips: Cleaning and Cooking Tips

Parsnips can be prepared in a variety of ways. With a little know-how, you will discover your very own favorite recipe with the tasty tuber.

Parsnips are a native root vegetable that is in season during fall and winter. Therefore, the best time to buy and prepare parsnips is between September and March.

Not only do parsnips resemble parsley root in terms of their appearance, the two are also difficult to tell apart in terms of taste. They taste tart, but also slightly sweet. If you accidentally got them mixed up, don’t worry – parsley roots can be prepared in a similar way to parsnips.

Parsnips have a number of valuable nutrients: They are rich in vitamin C, vitamin E, folic acid, calcium and potassium. We’ll show you how to prepare these healthy tubers.

Clean and prepare the parsnips

How to prepare the parsnips:
Peel parsnips – yes or no?: It is not absolutely necessary to peel the parsnips. On the contrary: Since many of the vitamins and flavors are located directly under the skin, it is worth leaving the skin on. However, if you don’t like bitter tastes, you can remove the peel. In contrast to potatoes, however, the skin is not quite as different from the taste of the inside of the vegetable. Important: In order to avoid harmful substances, it is best to buy organic parsnips.
Cleaning parsnips: Parsnips can be easily cleaned with a vegetable brush. Just get rid of the rough bits of dirt. You only need to wash the parsnips if you eat them raw or if they are very earthy.
Just make sure to chop off the coarse head and rooty end before preparing.

Preparing Parsnips: Boiling, Baking or Roasting?

Parsnips can be prepared in a variety of ways: they can be boiled, baked, roasted, fried and pureed. Depending on your preference, they are suitable for a variety of dishes.

If you boil or bake them, they will get a rather soft texture, just like potatoes. If you cut them into thin slices, you can fry them crispy or use them to make chips. Either way, parsnips pair really well with other root vegetables like parsley root, beets, carrots, potatoes, and sweet potatoes. Parsnips go just as well with hearty vegetarian or vegan roasts or seitan goulash.

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Food

Chickweed: How to Use it in Cooking

Chickweed is often found in fields and gardens. Externally rather inconspicuous, the wild herb can be used in many ways in the kitchen – and is full of important nutrients.

Chickweed is also known as chicken gut in some regions of Germany. Both names are probably derived from the fact that it is popular with wild birds, but also with domestic chickens as a forage plant.

In humans, on the other hand, it is often considered a troublesome weed because it can spread like a carpet on farmland and overgrow large areas. However, chickweed does not do justice to this bad reputation, because it can be very useful: In the kitchen, it refines many dishes and also provides the body with plenty of vitamins and minerals.

Chickweed in the kitchen: salads, spreads and dips

Chickweed is hardy and grows all year round. You can harvest the fresh leaves at any time and use them in the kitchen. There are many ways to do this:
Salads: Chickweed leaves are a delicious addition to wild herb salads. The small, young leaves are particularly suitable for this, as they are particularly tender and juicy. The taste is reminiscent of young corn.
Herb butter: You can also cut the leaves of the chickweed into small pieces and use them for herb butter. You can also add other herbs if you like.
Herb quark: For a simple dip, you can mix the finely chopped chickweed with a little salt and pepper to make a herb quark. It is also suitable as a savory spread.
Pesto: For a delicious chickweed pesto, crush the leaves together with oil, salt and pepper, a little lemon juice and, depending on your taste, pine nuts or hazelnuts, for example. You can read exactly how to do this in our step-by-step recipe for homemade pesto.
Soup: You can use chickweed to enhance soups such as potato soup. But it also works well as a main ingredient.

Chickweed Soup: A simple recipe

For a simple soup made from chickweed leaves you need the following ingredients:
150 g Chickweed
1/2 onion
3 potatoes
some butter
300 ml vegetable broth
Salt
pepper
And this is how you prepare the soup:
Wash and chop the chickweed leaves.
Peel the onion and dice it finely. Peel the potatoes and cut them into slightly larger cubes.
Melt the butter in the saucepan. Add the chopped onion and sauté the diced onion for about 5 minutes until translucent. Then add the diced potatoes.
Deglaze the onion and potatoes with the vegetable broth. Then let the soup simmer on a low flame for about 15 to 20 minutes.
Now add the chickweed. Once the leaves have collapsed, remove the pot from the flame.
Puree the soup with the hand blender and then season with salt and pepper.

Chickweed and its ingredients: That makes them healthy

Chickweed leaves not only taste good, they are also rich in healthy nutrients such as vitamins and minerals. These include above all:
Vitamin A – important for skin and eyes
Vitamin B1 – necessary for the nervous system and metabolism
Vitamin B2 – promotes growth and development
Vitamin B3 – responsible for the utilization of fat, carbohydrates and protein
Vitamin C – strengthens the immune system
Iron – the body needs it to make blood
Phosphorus – the most important component of bones
Magnesium – supports muscle function and metabolism
Copper – important for cellular respiration
Potassium – ensures that the stimulus transmission of the muscles works
Silicic acid (silicon) – good for joints, connective tissue and hair
Chickweed also contains saponins. The foam-forming plant substances are also contained in horse chestnuts, for example. So far, there has been little research on how saponins affect the human body. According to studies, they should help to fight obesity.

Caution: If you prepare chickweed warm, you should be careful not to overcook it. Some of the valuable ingredients can be lost in the process. It is best to add them at the end of a soup or other warm dish.

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Cooking Tips

Instructions and Tips for Cooking Asparagus

Instructions and useful tips for cooking asparagus properly. The asparagus season has begun and with it the preparation of the most delicious dishes. But who does not know that the popular delicacy is too woody after preparation or simply not tender enough? Even if the preparation of asparagus seems very easy at first glance, you should pay attention to a few things. With the right knowledge, the preparation of the delicious vegetables is very easy.

Peel asparagus like the pros

Of course, asparagus should be peeled before cooking, unless you opt for the slightly more expensive option, namely the tender asparagus tips. First of all, the asparagus is washed and placed on a dry cloth. This makes it easier to peel during further processing.

Now the asparagus is carefully peeled with a paring knife. You should make sure that the shell has been removed all around. If the asparagus is not peeled cleanly, it can taste woody very quickly.

When buying, you should make sure that the interface at the lower end of the asparagus has not dried out. Nevertheless, the lower piece is cut off about one centimeter during processing, because this is usually a bit woody.

  1. Wash the asparagus spears.
  2. peel carefully with a paring knife.
  3. Cut off the ends of the asparagus about a centimeter.

Cooking and preparation of asparagus

If you don’t have a special asparagus pot, a simple saucepan that is closed with a lid when cooking will do. To get the asparagus out of the saucepan later without any problems, you can hold the spears together with a piece of string before cooking, which can be easily removed later. This in no way affects the cooking process. Only a little water is needed for cooking so that the asparagus is just covered with it. Now add a pinch of salt. Add a little knob of butter if you like. This once again underlines the delicate taste of the asparagus.

With white asparagus, it is advisable to add some lemon juice to the vegetables. In this way, the light color of the asparagus is preserved. To bring out the flavor, even more, you can add a pinch of sugar during cooking.

  1. Bundle asparagus
  2. Cook in salted water
  3. Season with butter and a pinch of sugar

Ideal cooking time for asparagus

After about fifteen minutes, the vegetables are done. If you are not sure about this, take an asparagus spear out of the top and check if the asparagus bends. In this case, it is done or you simply taste a piece of it. Hollandaise sauce is particularly popular with asparagus dishes. Green asparagus can also be refined with a little garlic. The asparagus water can still be used, for example in aromatic vegetable soups.

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Cooking Tips

Cooking Spaghetti: With These Tricks You Will Succeed

Cooking spaghetti is easy with our tips. The Italian classic among pasta is quick to prepare and always tastes different with the different sauces.

Cooking spaghetti isn’t an art, but it’s not enough to simply boil a pot of water and pour in a pack of pasta.

With our tips, the spaghetti succeeds like in Italy and you have a delicious meal on the table in just a few minutes.

In addition, in this article you will learn what you should consider when eating spaghetti.

Cooking spaghetti: the ingredients

The most important ingredient to cooking perfect spaghetti is a large pot. It must be large enough for the noodles to swim freely.

You need these ingredients for each portion of spaghetti as a main course:
1 liter of water
1 tsp salt
100-125g spaghetti #5
Tip:
You can buy what is known as a spaghetti measure in stores. The different hole sizes correspond to the different portion sizes. In order to portion the spaghetti correctly, however, the spaghetti measurer is not required. Use your kitchen scale so you always have the right amount.

When cooking spaghetti, use pasta made from 100% organic durum wheat semolina and from regional production. Regional products have shorter transport routes behind them and are therefore better for the climate. Traditional spaghetti does not contain eggs and is vegan.

How do you cook spaghetti?

Always cook the spaghetti fresh so they don’t stick together. You should therefore prepare the sauce first – it will be ready when the spaghetti is cooked. It is best not to put the pasta pot with the water on until the sauce is almost ready.

Fill a large pot with water and bring it to a boil.
Add the salt to the boiling water.
Now add the spaghetti and immediately turn the heat down to the lowest setting.
The spaghetti usually does not have enough space in the pot. Therefore, wait a moment until the part of the spaghetti that is in the boiling water can be bent.
Stir well so all of the spaghetti is surrounded by the water.
Now you can close the lid of the saucepan and cook the noodles on the lowest setting.
Keep stirring the spaghetti. This distributes the starch in the cooking water and prevents them from sticking. Tip: Regular stirring also prevents the pasta water from boiling over.
Let the spaghetti cook for the length of time listed on the pasta package.
Test to see if the noodles are the consistency you want. If necessary, let them cook for a little longer. You can already switch off the stove.
Pour the spaghetti into a large colander and serve immediately.

Cooking spaghetti: You should pay attention to this

These tips make the spaghetti even better:
The best guarantee for the perfect spaghetti is a large pot with plenty of water so that the pasta can cook while it is floating. When in doubt, it is better to use a pot that is too big than a pot that is too small.
Spaghetti releases starch into the cooking water as it cooks. If you don’t use enough water, the noodles will stick together while cooking in the pot.
To cook spaghetti, you need a relatively large amount of salt in the cooking water. Always salt the water after it is already boiling. Salting the cold water will leave stains on the bottom of the pot that won’t be easily removed by washing up.
You don’t need to quench the spaghetti in cold water. If you serve them right away, the noodles won’t stick together.
Surely you have already read that you should add oil to the cooking water so that the noodles do not stick together. The oil in the water serves this purpose, but the sauce won’t stick to the noodles as well later on. If you cook the spaghetti just before serving, you can skip oil in the water for better flavor.
The Italians usually mix the spaghetti with the sauce in the saucepan. This will infuse the noodles with the sauce, improving the flavor.
Use spaghetti tongs to make portioning the pasta easier.

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Cooking Tips

Cook Potatoes with Instructions and Cooking Test

This is how you simply cook potatoes. We give you tips for cooking potatoes and for cooking tests. Also for boiled potatoes with rules of thumb for the duration. Here’s our quick guide!

The cooking time of potatoes varies depending on the variety and size of the potatoes. For this reason, every time you cook, you have to carry out a cooking test to find out whether the potatoes are done or not. The cooking time also changes depending on the potato dish. Unfortunately, some people don’t know this and so the result is floury or too hard potatoes for many. We will help you and give you some rules of thumb so that the potatoes turn out well.

1) Boil potatoes

To boil potatoes you need boiling water and a saucepan for cooking. The ideal is to cover potatoes with cold water and gradually warm it up. The reason is that at around 70 degrees, the starch particles in the potatoes burst open. So if you immediately put them in hot water, the starch on the edge of the potato will gelatinize and the result will be potatoes that are cooked on the outside and hard on the inside. When the water starts to boil, you should season them with a pinch of salt. As soon as the potatoes are boiling, reduce the temperature until it is just simmering. Also, note our tips and home remedies for potatoes.

2) Potato cooking test

If you think the potatoes are good now, you should do the cooking test. To test the cooking, you take a fork or a needle and stick it in the potato floating in the water. It is best to use the largest potato for this. If the fork penetrates the potato without resistance, then it is done. However, if there is still greater resistance or piercing is difficult, the potatoes must continue to cook. Here you will find an overview of different types of cooking and cooking methods with water.

3) Potatoes and their duration

Depending on the size and saucepan, there are different cooking times for the potatoes. Waxy potatoes will take a few minutes longer. Mealy a few minutes less. Potatoes turn out very quickly in the microwave and can be ready in just 5 minutes. There are special containers or potato bags in which even boiled potatoes can be cooked in the microwave. Baked potatoes, on the other hand, take about 45 to 74 minutes at 200°C. The same time applies to potatoes on the grill. Here you will find more tips for grilling vegetables properly.

4) Rules of thumb when cooking potatoes

The smaller the potatoes are, the quicker they will be cooked and ready. Cutting the potatoes will reduce the cooking time. Small cubes don’t even take half the time. Always try to choose similarly-sized potatoes for a portion, because the more uniform the potato size, the better the cooking point of all potatoes will be reached. Salt in the water does not affect the cooking time. Peeled potatoes cook faster than unpeeled jacket potatoes. By the way, the average cooking time of potatoes is about 25 minutes. Did you like our tips? You might also be interested in our tips and instructions for cooking eggs.

5) Potato Varieties and Recipes

Potatoes have different properties. We will show you which dishes they are suitable for. The following applies here: The smaller and thinner the potato pieces are in a dish, the faster they are ready. Incidentally, a rösti in the pan only takes 15 minutes.

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Lifestyle

Types of Cooking and Cooking Methods with Water at a Glance

The water temperature is crucial for the cooking method. You have the choice of boiling, poaching, blanching, steaming, steaming, or vacuum cooking.

When preparing food, it is important that it tastes good, is digestible, looks appetizing, and contains as many vitamins and nutrients as possible. With the right cooking method, you can positively influence the result.

The water temperature has an impact on taste and cooking time

The most common methods of cooking with water are:

  • boiling/simmering
  • Poaching/simmering
  • blanch
  • steaming
  • steaming
  • vacuum cooking

These methods differ in the water temperature and the amount of water required. The hotter the water, the shorter the cooking time. Use the right cooking method so that the vegetables are neither too hard nor too mushy. The meat should not be too dry either.

1) Boiling or simmering

We usually associate two different things with the term cooking. First, we think of the activity of cooking, the whole process of preparing a meal. In the second case, and this is what is meant here, it is about a cooking process in which the water is heated to over 100°C, i.e. it reaches the boiling point. You need to use enough water to completely cover the contents of the pot. Potatoes, pasta, or soups are usually prepared in this way.

2) Poaching, also called simmering

The water temperature when poaching should be around 70-90°C. It is important that the water does not boil. There shouldn’t be any steam either. Leave the food to soak in the hot water until the desired consistency is reached. This gentle method is particularly recommended for foods that break down easily. Examples of this are fish, tender vegetables, or the so-called poached eggs.

3) Blanching

In this process, you first bring the water to a boil and then put the food into the water. After a short time, about 1-3 minutes, take it out and shock it in very cold water. With this method, many nutrients are retained and germs are killed. The vegetables stay crisp and get a strong, bright color. Blanched foods are usually further processed afterward. You can ideally freeze these to cook or fry later.

4) steaming

Here the ingredient is not cooked directly by the boiling water, but by the steam. There are special steam cookers or pressure cookers for this. But you can also use a conventional saucepan for steaming. To do this, hang either a sieve or a special insert in the saucepan. It is important not to touch the water surface. Place the ingredient in the insert and cover the pot with a lid. The ingredient is cooked by the steam generated by the boiling water. This method is considered a particularly gentle process since the nutrients cannot be lost in the water.

5) steaming

Only a little liquid is needed for steaming. You put the vegetables, fish, or meat in the pot and close it with a lid so that the steam does not escape. The temperature should be above 70°C and below 100°C. During heating, additional liquid is extracted from the food. This food’s own juice mixes with the added water. With this method, too, only a few nutrients are released into the cooking water. The remaining liquid at the end of cooking is great for making a sauce.

6) Vacuum Cooking

A vacuum sealer is required for vacuum cooking. You can use it to enclose the food in an airtight plastic bag provided for this purpose. You should season the food beforehand. Place the plastic bag in a pot filled with water and cook the food at a water temperature of around 65-80°C. This method doesn’t work as well for poultry. At the relatively low temperature in the water bath, not all pathogens may die.
During this preparation, the food retains its nutrients and natural taste.

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Cooking Tips

Cooking Brown Rice: How it Works and Why it is so Healthy

If you want to cook brown rice, you have several options. We will introduce you to two variants – a particularly quick and a particularly healthy way of cooking brown rice.

Brown rice is so healthy

Basmati rice, long grain rice, parboiled rice, black rice, wild rice: there are many different varieties and types of rice. Brown rice is popular because it is largely untreated and still has the outer layers of the rice grain. Brown rice therefore contains more minerals and trace elements than white rice – but it also takes longer to cook. We explain how to cook brown rice properly.

Cook brown rice – soak, wash, cook

If you want to cook rice, you basically have two options: the swelling method and the water method. The soaking method is particularly energy- and water-saving, but has one major disadvantage: In addition to the valuable micronutrients, pollutants also remain in the rice. This is a problem with brown rice because it is usually particularly heavily contaminated with arsenic, as reported by the Federal Office for Risk Assessment (BfR). Arsenic is a metalloid that is carcinogenic to humans. You can find more information about arsenic, its occurrence and its effects in our article on the subject.

We therefore recommend that you soak the brown rice beforehand, wash it and cook it with a higher water-to-rice ratio. In this way you can reduce the arsenic content by up to 80 percent.

Cooking brown rice – this is how the preparation works:
Soak the brown rice in water overnight. The rice should be covered with water about two centimeters high.
The next day, rinse the rice until the wastewater runs clear.
Then put the brown rice in a saucepan with five times the amount of water. In other words, there are five cups of water for every cup of rice.
Bring the water to a boil on the highest setting. Once the water is boiling, turn the heat down to low and let the brown rice simmer, with the lid on, for about 20 minutes.
Remove the pot from the stove and let the rice sit in the covered pot for another ten minutes.
The brown rice is ready. At this point you can loosen the rice grains with a fork and add a pinch of salt. But be careful: very hot steam escapes when you open the pot.

Cooking brown rice using the quick swelling method

With the swelling method, you only add enough water to the rice so that it completely absorbs the water when cooking. Therefore, the source method is particularly water and energy-saving. However, the arsenic contained in the rice is not flushed out with this method of preparation. If you have enough time, you should still soak the brown rice first to reduce the arsenic content.

Cooking brown rice using the swelling method:
Optional: Soak the brown rice in plenty of water overnight.
Rinse the rice with clear water until the waste water is no longer cloudy.
Put twice the amount of brown rice in a saucepan: for every cup of rice, add two cups of water.
Bring the water to a boil on the highest setting. Once the water is boiling, switch to a low setting. With the lid on, let the rice gently simmer for about 20 minutes.
Remove the covered pot from the heat and let the rice sit for another 10 minutes.
At the end you can fluff up the brown rice with a fork and add a pinch of salt.
By the way: If you have cooked too much rice, you can heat up the rest of the rice the next day. Alternatively, you can freeze the cooked rice and preserve it for a long time.

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Food

Cumin Seeds: Use in Cooking and Medicine

Cumin seeds are a native spice and natural remedy. Here we tell you how to use the spice in your kitchen and as medicine.

Are caraway seeds and cumin the same?

Caraway seeds are popular in German cuisine and are also used as a home remedy for flatulence due to their digestive effect. Caraway seeds, which are native to us, are often confused with cumin. Cumin is particularly popular in Mediterranean, Mexican and Indian cuisine. Although both spices belong to the umbelliferae family, they differ greatly in taste.

You should also not confuse caraway seeds with black cumin. This belongs to the buttercup family and is not related to caraway seeds or cumin. The taste of black cumin is similar to that of black pepper. Cumin seeds, on the other hand, taste mild and slightly sweet.

How to use cumin seeds in the kitchen

Traditionally, caraway seeds belong in bread spices. Not only do they improve the taste of the bread, they also help make it easier to digest. Because of its digestive effect, caraway seeds are also a popular spice for hearty dishes such as sauerkraut, boiled potatoes, goulash and roast goose.

Ground cumin seeds also go very well with salads. Caraway gives yoghurt dressings in particular a more intense aroma. In haute cuisine, the spice is an important ingredient in the brew of lobster and crabs.

Caraway seeds can be combined with many spices, for example with aniseed, fennel, coriander, ginger, pepper, paprika and chili.

Cumin seeds as medicine

Cumin has been known as a natural remedy for a long time. Cumin tea is particularly popular. You can now buy this almost everywhere. However, it is also very easy to make it yourself. All you have to do is pour boiling water over one to two teaspoons of lightly crushed cumin seeds. After ten minutes you can strain the finished tea.

Cumin seeds are known to aid digestion and relieve gas. It also helps with headaches, high blood pressure, toothache and coughs.

Which health effects of caraway seeds have been scientifically proven?

The essential oils it contains are responsible for the positive health effects of caraway seeds. Cumin seeds are scientifically recognized as an important medicinal plant. Studies have shown that they:
have an antimicrobial effect
have an antioxidant effect
can prevent diabetes
have an anti-inflammatory effect
lower blood pressure
improve fertility in women.
Cumin seeds are a local spice that, in addition to having a great taste, is also a recognized medicinal plant. Cumin is therefore a great alternative to the exotic types of spices from East Asia.

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