Chef Kathleen can help - Highlight - healthful cooking with Kathleen Daelemans - Brief Article - Excerpt

Inside MS, Summer, 2002

Renowned chef and reformed junk-food junkie Kathleen Daelemans can be seen on her popular weekly cable TV program and in bookstores--both under the title Cooking Thin. On the air and on the page, she promotes a pain-free way to eat healthier meals that are delicious and easy to fix. These are welcome ideas for people with MS who are always seeking ways to conserve energy and combat flab.

Now Chef Kathleen has taken up the MS cause because several people who are closest to her have the disease. As one of our National Ambassadors she particularly supports the healthy exercise offered by Society Bike and Walk events. Here's a peek at her fresh approach to fine cuisine.

1. Lose the complicated entree mind-set. Keep dinner simple, especially if you're time starved. Quick oven-broiled fish with microwave veggies is dinner.

2. Who's on the saute situation tonight? Build your culinary team. Enlist help, divide up the chores, make lists, delegate tasks, and follow through. Every able body should participate regularly in some aspect of meal planning, shopping, cooking, or cleanup.

3. Build menus around naturally healthful ingredients. Three ounces of steak can be consumed in four bites and two minutes. A heaping bowl of Sesame Ginger Shrimp and Spicy Black Bean Salad will take many more bites and last a lot longer, too. Don't underestimate the psychological and emotional reasons we eat. They're just as important as our nutritional needs.

4. Cheat any way you can, but don't compromise your waistline. Any shortcut you can pull off is worth it. If something from a can, bag, or box will mean the difference between your eating in or ordering out, by all means go for it. Read product labels carefully, though, and make the healthiest choices you can.

5. Fill up on the good stuff. Increase good calories wherever you can. Can you get an extra serving of veggies by tossing a handful of corn into the salad? How about peas and mushrooms in the mac 'n' cheese? Roast asparagus in the same pan with the potatoes, and you've got two veggie sides instead of one.

6. Use of high-impact flavor ingredients is highly encouraged. Resuscitate, invigorate, acidulate--use sea salt, kosher salt, ginger, citrus, vinegar, garlic, capers, anchovies, olives, fresh spices (no, they do not have the shelf life of books), and freshly cut herbs. Grow your own. They're pretty and cheery. If the plants die, remember that seeds are cheap, and dirt is free.

7. Pare down prep. Ten minutes in the kitchen after dinner tonight is easier to pull off than ten minutes before dinner tomorrow when you' re tired and starving. Peel the potatoes tonight. Cook the noodles. Whip up the dressing. Wash the veggies. Marinate the chicken. We're not talking the whole meal here. Just a task or two.

8. Plan to morph meals. Plan tomorrow's supper today by making a double batch. A salad can become an entree if you add a piece of chicken or fish. Grill extra veggies tonight and top your pizza with them tomorrow. When you' re cooking black beans from scratch, they can morph from soup to chili and from salad to salsa. Challenge yourself. See how many meals you can make from a single recipe.

9. Supersize--make your own TV dinners. Attack an overscheduled week head-on. On nights you're not so rushed, make a double batch of something you know freezes well. Store the second half in microwave-proof containers, clearly marked, with the full title of the dish and the date. A sumptuous title will inspire you to actually take the frozen dinner out of the freezer and eat it one of those nights you're tempted to pick up the phone and call for the next-pants-size-up, er, carryout.

10. Choose the right tools. Use the right tool for the task and you'll slash culinary frustration. Dull knives, the wrong spoon, a melted spatula, a fork with a broken handle, or a pot that's too small creates kitchen stress. Who needs it? Keep your tools in good working condition and handy.

Excerpt from Cooking Thin with Chef Kathleen, reprinted with permission. Published by Houghton Mifflin. The 400-page book is $27. Amazon.com orders made via the link on our Web site benefit the Society. However, we must alert readers that the print is small and not easy to read. Check local cable listings for Cooking Thin on the Food Network--and enjoy!