One of the best ways to lead a healthier lifestyle is by being more conscious of what you eat. How you cook your meals plays a huge factor in your everyday diet. Therefore, it is important to practice healthier cooking methods—like steaming your food—to create an overall healthier lifestyle.
In this article, we will be discussing the benefits of steaming your food and while steaming isn’t the most common cooking practice in many parts of the world, we will also be guiding you on how to steam your food without a steaming basket.
But if you do decide to get a steaming basket, check out our recommended baskets:
Before getting into the best ways to steam your food, let’s take a look at the nutritional value steamed food can bring to your life. Here’s are the top 5 benefits of consuming steamed food.
1. Steamed foods are lower in cholesterol
Unlike grilling, frying or baking cooking methods, steaming red meat, pork or chicken helps remove the fat from the meat. By getting rid of the fat, the steamed meat is lower in calories and cholesterol.
Additionally, with steaming you are no longer required to use any cooking oil or fat. And as a result, having steamed meals makes for a lighter and healthier diet.
2. Steaming helps retain the healthy nutrients of vegetables
One of the best things about steam-cooking is the fact that it is able to preserve the fiber, taste, and color of vegetables. With the ability to keep your steamed vegetables’ nutrients intact (for the most part), you’ll be getting a whole lot more out of your meal.
By steaming your meals, the food that you intake is a whole lot fresher, tastier and juicier as compared to sauteing or baking them.
3. Steaming your food retains its vitamins and minerals
When it comes to conventional cooking methods such as frying, baking or grilling a lot of the food’s vitamins and minerals are completely lost. Steam-cooking however, ensures that the nutritional value of the food your cooking is retained even after it has been cooked.
Vitamins like biotin, B12, vitamin C and niacin as well as minerals such as potassium, calcium, and zinc are retained with steam-cooking.
4. Steaming your food is uncomplicated
Unlike other cooking methods, steaming is pretty straightforward and completely hassle-free! When you steam, you’re only using a single heat source where you can have different layers of food stacked on top of each other, all cooking at the same time.
Not only are multi-tasking you’re also saving time, money and energy—all at once!
5. Steaming is a fuss-free cooking method
With no oil required, no smoke and minimal mess produced, steaming as a cooking method is a super fuss-free way to cooking a full course meal.
How to steam your food without a steaming basket at hand
As mentioned earlier in this article, steam-cooking is a huge life-saver when it comes to maintaining or integrating a healthier diet. So, if you’re looking for a healthier way to prepare and cook your everyday meals, steam-cooking might just be the right cooking method for you.
Before you start cooking, one of the first things you need to learn about is how to exactly steam your food. While the most convenient way to steam your meals is through an electric steamer or a steaming basket, these aren’t the only ways you can steam your food.
Here’s how to steam without a steamer
While kitchen gadgets like electric steamers or steaming baskets are miracle workers, it isn’t necessary to shell out a few bucks for these cooking tools. Especially, if you don’t steam food that frequently.
Before going out and buying yourself a steaming basket, you can try out other methods of steaming food with cooking tools that are already available in your kitchen. Look through your cooking tools and see if you have either a baking rack, a pot and some aluminum at your disposal. With these supplies, you’ve got everything you need to steam your food.
Steam with Plate On Tinfoil
This steaming method only requires three things, a plate, a pot, and some aluminum foil.
- Grab a medium-sized pot and fill it with ½ inch of water.
- Take your aluminum foil then form three golf-ball-sized balls of foil and place at the bottom of the pot.
- Then place a heat-proof plate on top of the foil balls and turn on the heat.
- Add in the vegetable or protein onto the plate, cover and let it steam until cooked.
- Once the food is perfectly steamed, carefully take the lid off and remove the ingredients from the hot plate.
Steam in a Microwave
Using the microwave to steam your food is one of the most convenient ways to prepare your meals.
- In a microwave-safe container, add in a tablespoon of water and your ingredients.
- Cover the microwave-safe container with plastic wrap and set your microwave’s timer to 2 minutes.
- By keeping an eye on the microwave, let the food cook until crisp and then serve.
Steam In Water
This steaming method is best with firm vegetables like broccoli, carrots, and cauliflower.
- Fill a medium-sized pot with 1/2 an inch of water.
- Place the vegetables in the pot, cover the bring to a boil
- Once the vegetables are cooked drain the water out and set aside.
Overall, steam-cooking is a great way to improve your everyday diet. With so many nutritional benefits it offers you can’t go wrong with incorporating this life-changing cooking method into your life.
