Introduction

Healthy cooking doesn't mean that you have to become a gourmet chef or invest in expensive cookware. You can use basic cooking techniques to prepare food in healthy ways.

By using healthy-cooking techniques, you can cut saturated fats. Consider, for instance, that many of the fats used for frying — such as butter and lard — are high in saturated fats.

Adults should limit calories from saturated fat to no more than 10 percent of total daily calories. For a 2,000-calorie diet, that means no more than 200 calories from saturated fat — about 22 grams of saturated fat — a day. By switching to roasting, you not only eliminate added fat but also allow any fat in the food to drip away.

The healthy-cooking methods described here best capture the flavor and retain the nutrients in foods without adding excessive amounts of fat or salt. Use them often to prepare your favorite dishes.