Can soups be considered a necessary component of proper nutrition? Today, one can increasingly hear the opinion that this excessively heavy food is not suitable for a balanced diet. Are all soups equally difficult to digest? Or can you find their easy and healthy varieties that do not interfere with the process of losing weight?
The role of soups in proper human nutrition
Speaking about the benefits or dangers of first courses, one should take into account their enormous variety. Nutrition of modern man is represented by soups on meat, fish, vegetable and mushroom broths. They can be dairy, sweet, cold or hot. Such a variety allows you to choose options that are fully consistent with proper nutrition.
Most nutritionists and nutritionists have unanimously agreed that light soups are great for lunch and dinner. They not only contribute to satisfying hunger, but also provide an additional supply of fluid to the body.
It should also be noted that the concept of “proper nutrition” largely depends on the health status of each individual person. Therefore, choosing the most useful version of the first dish, it is necessary to take into account the individual characteristics of the body:
- in the presence of high blood pressure, diseases of the cardiovascular system, liver or pancreas, one should refrain from fatty soups on meat or fish broths;
- persons suffering from phosphaturia (high phosphate in the urine) should, on the contrary, often include first courses in meat broths;
- people with diabetes need to abandon sweetened fruit soups or okroshka on sweet kvass;
- in the presence of a large amount of excess weight, a healthy diet should be represented by light soups on vegetable or light chicken broths;
- persons with impaired protein metabolism should give preference to cereal, fruit or vegetable first courses;
- with a tendency to edema, it is recommended to use milk and rice soups, and pickle and cold soups on a sour-milk basis should be excluded from the diet;
- after exacerbations of gastritis or peptic ulcer disease, it is necessary to include low-fat dairy and vegetable mashed soups in the diet.
Healthy Food: Slimming Soups
Proper nutrition is one of the indispensable conditions for maintaining good health and maintaining a normal weight. The quality of the prepared food and its benefits for the body is of great importance to the correct cooking technology. Compliance with the basic principles of cooking the first dishes will not only achieve the perfect taste, but also facilitate the process of losing weight. These include:
- Keeping the right amount of ingredients
A rational approach to the selection of the components of the first dish can significantly facilitate proper nutrition. When preparing soups, this primarily concerns the ratio of liquid to solid components. It should be borne in mind that during cooking, the broth partially evaporates, and the volume of some products can significantly decrease. To get a light and tasty dish, you should consider these properties of the products.
- Product Bookmarking Procedure
Compliance with this principle will ensure the simultaneous readiness of all products and will avoid the loss of vitamins and other useful substances (in herbs and vegetables) during cooking soup. The process of preparing the first dishes is preferably carried out on low heat, by languishing.
- Cooking process control
The preparation of the first dishes must be controlled. Since during the cooking process a foam may form which is recommended to be removed. In addition, you should monitor the intensity of boiling, and (if necessary) lower the temperature.
- Salt use
Although the abuse of salt runs counter to the basic principles of a healthy diet, it is still necessary to add it to the first courses. There is a widespread opinion that salt should be done at the end of cooking. However, nutritionists argue that in this case, the salt does not have time to connect with all the components of the soup.
Balanced Nutrition: Easy Soup Recipes
A healthy diet must include light vegetable soups. There are many recipes that will allow you to cook a really healthy and nutritious dish. Below are a few options that are most relevant to the principles of balanced nutrition.
Cold beetroot soup
For this soup, you need to take 0.5 kg of young beets with leaves. Peel the tubers, cut them, add water and cook for half an hour. At the end of cooking, add beetroot leaves to the pan and cook for another 5-7 minutes. Then, you should discard the contents of the pan into a colander (save the broth) to drain excess liquid, and grind it. Separately finely chop a few fresh cucumbers, 2 boiled chicken eggs and a bunch of green onions. Mix with beets, slightly salt. Pour a liter of kefir and chilled beetroot broth. Before serving, put chopped greens of dill and parsley, and a spoonful of low-fat sour cream in each plate.
Pumpkin Puree Soup
Take half the medium peeled pumpkin (about 500 g) and cut it into small pieces. Grind separately 1 large onion and 250 g of dried rye bread. Grease the bottom of a deep stewpan with butter, put onions on top, and then, alternating, pumpkin and bread. Pour 1 liter of boiling water and simmer over low heat for an hour. Beat the soup with a submersible blender until smooth. Add salt, a glass of low-fat cream, a bunch of chopped dill and bring to a boil again. Serve hot.
Green onion vegetable soup
Finely chop a large bunch of green onions and simmer for half an hour over low heat in a pan with the addition of 1 tbsp. l butter. Boil a liter of ready-made vegetable broth, add 3-4 chopped potato tubers, 1 carrot chopped into strips. Salt and cook for about half an hour. Add the stewed onions. Boil. Remove from heat and serve with sour cream and herbs.