Steam cooking recipes. Steamed meat dishes - the easiest recipes

Everyone knows that a double boiler is considered the most convenient appliance for cooking steamed dishes. Nevertheless, remembering the tricks and ingenuity of our mothers and grandmothers, you can completely do without it. How can I cook a steamed dish for a child without a double boiler? Yes, very easy!

How can you make a steamer?

When there is no double boiler at hand, you can make it yourself:

1. Take a deep saucepan and a bowl of the same diameter.

2. Pour no more than half of water into the pan, tie tightly with gauze folded in two or three layers.

3. Put a dish on cheesecloth and cover with a bowl on top as a lid. Inside, the dish will be steamed without a double boiler - just as fast and tasty.

In such a simple way, for example, you can cook tender ones.

Instead of gauze, you can also use a colander or a sieve and cover it with a regular pot lid. But in this case, the dishes must be enameled or stainless.

In this way, you can steam vegetables, rice, fish, meatballs and much more for your child.

Safety when steaming food without a steamer:

The main rule in the kitchen is that appliances should be comfortable, reliable and safe. You must be careful and careful when cooking in a homemade double boiler:

- the slightest contact of the skin with steam threatens with burns - do not put your hands (fingers) inside under the lid, use oven mitts and cooking spatulas,

- when using gauze as a homemade steamer, remember that it can get wet and is also very hot!

- gauze should be tied tightly, and the ends should be hidden up inside the “steamer”,

- plastic colanders should not be used for steaming any dishes without a double boiler, only if they are marked “for high temperatures”, which is extremely rare.

By the way, a very convenient thing for cooking a small amount of food is a removable folding steamer on a pan. It is very similar in meaning to using a colander, only suitable for pots of different diameters due to folding petals along the edge. For example, the Vitesse VS-1261 (Margot) model from the French brand VITESSE

Many people treat steamed food with little enthusiasm, and they can be understood: choosing between a juicy kebab straight from the grill and steamed broccoli, it is difficult to make a voluntary choice in favor of a green vegetable. Even supporters of a healthy diet sometimes criticize steam cooking to themselves - they say that food cooked in a double boiler is, of course, healthy, but it would be great if it were also as tasty as fried. Meanwhile, not too expressive taste - a common complaint that is made against this cooking method - is far from a necessary result of steaming.

Building on a theme I started a few years ago, I want to look at steaming as a cooking method that is as complete as frying or grilling, but more beneficial. I hope this article will be of interest to both those who have been on steam for a long time, and those who believe that steaming is the last refuge of people faced with a difficult choice between delicious food and their own health. How to cook for a couple, how to make the taste of dishes cooked in a double boiler brighter and richer, what stereotypes about steaming should be written off as scraps - read about all this below. But you have to start with the well-known, but still vital basics.

What is steam cooking?

Steam cooking is very close to conventional cooking, the only difference is that the temperature transmitter in this case is not boiling water, but hot steam. This is where the fundamental difference between the two related methods lies: since steaming does not involve contact with liquid and the dish is prepared solely by steam, this allows you to save most of the substances contained in them - both useful and flavoring. If we talk about the benefits, then the content of folic acid and vitamin C in products after steaming is reduced by 15%, while during conventional cooking it is reduced by 35% and 25%, respectively - what can we say about other methods of heat treatment!

I also said about flavoring substances for a reason: if you put a piece of meat or fish into boiling water, in addition to the finished product, you will also get, in most cases, too light to be of serious culinary value. However, this broth is a sure sign that the flavor compounds have passed into the water, which means that they are no longer in the product itself. Often they try to avoid this by using ready-made broth for boiling, but if there is an easier way: steaming. Without a doubt, steaming is the most delicate of the traditional culinary methods, and second only to modern ones.

There are many different devices for steaming, from Chinese bamboo steamers to modern electrical appliances, however, in principle, you don’t need any complicated or expensive equipment - you can quite “figure out” a steamer using a pan with a colander placed in it, which is covered with a lid . These are the three really necessary components of a steamer:

• a container where water will boil;
• stand for products, which will pass the rising steam;
• and a lid so that the steam does not go outside, but circulates inside.

To steam food, bring water to a boil, then place a steamer with food over it and cover with a lid to ensure steam circulation and even heating of food. Steaming, like most other healthy things, was originally invented in the east, so Chinese bamboo steamers are often used, which are set in a wok over boiling water. Such double boilers have several levels - baskets are placed one on top of the other, so that you can cook different products at the same time. I also use a bamboo steamer - in addition to the fact that it does its job perfectly, it also looks very stylish, so you can serve ready-made meals right in the steamer. In addition, you can buy an inexpensive metal steamer in the store or look for a more modern device - electric pressure cookers, multicookers and other appliances usually have a built-in steam function.

There are also more exotic methods of steaming, for example, this: products that require a particularly delicate approach (say, swallows' nests) are placed in a ceramic vessel with water, and this vessel, in turn, is placed in a double boiler, usually for several hours. Needless to say, this approach - in some ways, the predecessor, by the way - was also invented by the Chinese? ..

What can be steamed?

Oddly enough - almost anything! If you think that only unleavened vegetables can be steamed, then know that in Chinese cuisine, rice, fish, various dumplings and buns, and even meat are steamed. As for dumplings, this type of cooking has spread throughout Central Asia, it’s enough to recall manti, which are somewhat closer to us, for cooking which they use a mantyshnitsa - in fact, the very same Chinese multi-storey double boiler, only slightly modified. In China or Korea, you can try steamed buns, both regular and stuffed with vegetables, pork or beef: the dough turns out to be the most ordinary, except for obvious reasons, without a ruddy crust. In addition, Chinese cuisine invites us to steam pork ribs, duck, chicken, goose, eggs, as well as vegetables, rice and much more.

Considered a health food in its own right, fish is also often steamed: in the recipe collection that concludes this article, you'll find recipes for steaming both whole fish and fillets. Of course, you can cook seafood in the same way, and steamed shrimp will have a richer taste than boiled in water.

However, what is Asia to us? Let's take more understandable and familiar products, say, the same potatoes. If we are all accustomed to boiled potatoes, then European and American chefs and housewives mostly steam them. The reasons are the same as described above - potatoes retain more of their own taste and nutrients that would otherwise go into the water. The same goes for other vegetables: unless you're making broth, there's absolutely no reason to boil your vegetables in water instead of steaming them. Apparently, in our country, until recently, no one was interested in steaming - I can’t imagine other intelligible reasons that we are used to boiling vegetables for or olivier in water.

Steam cooking: not only healthy, but also tasty

I hope that healthy dishes are obtained for a couple, I have already convinced you. But what about the main drawback of steaming - the pale taste of finished products? .. Let's start with the fact that its significance is somewhat exaggerated - steamed dishes have a richer taste than boiled in water, for reasons that have already been described above. And if you adopt a few tips outlined in this article, your dishes will not only be healthy, but also tasty.

• Experiment with spices and spices. In such dishes, their taste comes to the fore, and to reveal the aroma of spices, they can be pre-calcined in a dry frying pan. Of course, this does not apply to salt, but you should not neglect it either: as you know, it has the ability to enhance the taste of seasoned foods.
• Marinate food before cooking. By adding soy or other seasonings with a strong own taste to the marinade, you will thereby enrich the taste of the products that you plan to send to the double boiler.
• Flavor the water. Of course, using rich broth for steaming would be a crazy waste, but adding bay leaves or dried herbs to boiling water will cook foods with aromatic steam, and this will affect the taste.
• Finishing touches. If you often eat steamed foods, do not neglect sauces. The sauce doesn't have to be complicated - combine herbs, garlic, lemon juice and zest with olive oil, or make pesto by adding nuts and blending it all in a blender until smooth.
• Cook in a sauce or marinade. This is also possible - put the fish in a deep plate, sprinkle it with soy sauce, season with ginger and green onions and put the plate in a double boiler: such a fish will have all the useful properties of a steamed product, but no one will reproach it with an inexpressive taste.

In conclusion, let's say that in addition to most useful substances, steaming also allows you to keep the fresh look of the products: they do not boil so much, change color to a lesser extent, and this opens up huge scope for creativity in terms of serving dishes to the table. In my opinion, other arguments are completely unnecessary: ​​even if you don’t take care of your own health too much (which is completely in vain), steamed dishes should definitely be included in your diet. At least occasionally.

Cooking food using concentrated moist steam produced by constantly boiling water.

Preservation of vitamins. Steam cooking is a very delicate way of cooking food. The food is not exposed to very high temperatures, as is the case with frying or baking. Thanks to this, much more vitamins and other biologically active substances are stored in the products.

Fat free. You can steam very light, low-calorie meals, since you don’t need to add any fat to the steamer (it’s possible to fry without oil, but in practice this is extremely rare, and as a result, the calorie content of fried foods is usually too high).

Without carcinogens. In addition, steaming does not lead to the formation of compounds hazardous to health, which can occur under the influence of high temperatures during frying or baking. Steam cooking also wins compared to boiling and stewing, although for other reasons (the temperature in these cases, as in steaming, does not rise above 100 ° C). However, when foods are boiled or stewed, many water-soluble compounds, such as some vitamins, trace elements, etc., pass into the broth. If in the future it is not used in food, useful substances do not enter the body. In addition, even if the broth is not drained, the biological value of dishes prepared by boiling or stewing is lower than steamed. This is due to the fact that many useful substances that pass into the decoction are less stable in dissolved form and are destroyed faster.

Nice and tasty. In addition to all the above-mentioned advantages, the use of steam allows you to preserve the natural look, taste and aroma of food as much as possible. After steaming, the products almost do not lose their natural color and shape, as a result of which the dishes look bright and appetizing. Plus, the food is really delicious.
By eating steamed food, you release your receptors, and in just 1-2 weeks of eating natural food, you will begin to feel that each product has its own unique taste.

What not to steam
Do not steam pasta, especially soft wheat pasta.
It is not very convenient to use a double boiler for cooking some types of legumes (for example, beans or peas). These foods are also too dry to be steamed without being immersed in liquid.
Steaming should not be done for foods that must be removed as much of the soluble matter as possible before consumption. Such products include, for example, certain types of mushrooms (morels, lines, etc.) and some offal (kidneys, scars, etc.). Before use, they should be boiled in plenty of water.

Who are steamed dishes recommended for?
Nutritionists advise eating steamed food to all people who care about their health. However, in some cases, the transition to a steam kitchen is especially recommended. So, the steam diet is prescribed for various diseases.
Steamed food is necessary for diseases of the gastrointestinal tract: chronic gastritis, cholecystitis, gastroduodenitis, gastric ulcer, etc. Steam food is the most gentle for sick digestive organs.
Other indications for switching to a steam kitchen are diseases of the cardiovascular system. With atherosclerosis, it is important to exclude spicy and fatty foods in order to lower blood cholesterol levels.
Steam nutrition is necessary for metabolic disorders, overweight, allergies and other diseases.

Rules for using the steamer
Let the water boil before placing food in the steamer or steamer. Since you cook, but not on water, but on steam, the boiling water should not come into contact with the food.
When filling the base of the steamer with water, make sure that the basket is at least 2cm above the water. There should be a distance of at least 2-3 cm between the surface of the water and the bottom edge of the steamer.
Use large oven mitts to protect your hands from the steam when opening the steamer lid and foil envelopes.
Place food in one layer on each level of the steamer. Fish, meat or succulent products - to the lower level so that moisture does not drip from them onto the products below.

Fried potatoes, fatty meats, sausages, semi-finished products and other foods that hit the liver and stomach, we eat every day. From such unhealthy food, a person begins to develop various problems with the stomach and intestines, often it is gastritis, ulcers, dysbacteriosis and obesity. But more recently, after the invention of steamers, nutritionists began to notice that people who eat steamed food have stronger immunity. Also, such people do not have problems with the figure.

You need to figure it out and find out what dietary dishes are for a couple of recipes with photos. Judging by the outer shell, then

such dishes look very appetizing and fresh, they can be placed in food containers and consumed during the day at work.

But food should not be judged only by its appetizing appearance. The benefit of steamed dishes is that during their processing, useful properties and vitamins are not lost, unlike boiling and frying. They, on the contrary, become more saturated in taste and vitamins. Also, they don't take long to prepare.

Calorie content of steam dishes

Now let's discuss the question of whether it is possible to eat steamed dishes for people who want to lose weight and count calories. The calorie content of steamed dishes is quite low. Having eaten a large portion of a serving, a person will not get many calories. That is, if you eat such dishes during the day, then losing weight will feel full, the body will be filled with vitamins, and extra pounds will not come.
Having found out the profitability of such food, now you need to think about the main thing. The cooking process itself plays a big role.

How to steam food?

• The first option is to purchase a double boiler, which has special compartments for cooking vegetables, fruits, meat and even cereals at the same time.
• The second option is to use ordinary pots and pans. That is, put a pot of water on the fire, and when it boils, place a steaming grid on top and close it with a lid. In fact, both the first and second options will not take much time.

Steamed diet dishes: recipes with photos

Now I need something to inspire. For example, 10 recipes for steamed diet dishes, by preparing which you can feel the beauty of healthy food.

1. Steamed fish with asparagus

First you need to peel the fish from the skin and pour the marinade to give the dish a special taste and aroma. Steam and cook until the meat is soft and crumbly. Take the asparagus, chop the onion, peel the carrots, cut the beetroot into slices and put it in the slow cooker to cook. After preparing all the ingredients, put on a plate and pour a small amount of soy sauce. You can eat at lunch.

2. Steam vegetables with chicken fillet

Hold the chicken fillet in water with salt and spices. Place in a double boiler until it becomes white with streaks. Put chopped cabbage, carrot slices, chopped garlic slices, tomato rings together with the chicken. When all the products are ready, sprinkle with parsley and add a few drops of lemon juice before serving.

3. Steamed cauliflower casserole

Let the divided cauliflower sit for a couple of minutes. Place cabbage in a small bowl and leave to cool. In the meantime, you need to make refueling. Low-fat sour cream is taken, which should be salted and spices added. Add grated cheese to sour cream. Pour the dressing over the cauliflower and pour one egg on top. Put in a slow cooker and cook for thirty to forty minutes.

4. Steam vegetable stew

Steam the potatoes cut into small pieces. Let it steam for ten minutes. Now you can add regular cabbage, which needs to be cut into small strips. After the potatoes and cabbage are almost ready, add carrots, onions, broccoli, beans, beets to them and pour over the tomato. Steam for five minutes.

5. Steamed new potatoes

This recipe is for those who love potatoes but are on a diet. It is best to take young potatoes, as they contain less starch. Before putting to steam, potatoes need to get rid of thin skins. Put on steam, spreading it prematurely with sour cream, sprinkle with herbs or add vegetables and grated cheese. This dish will take about half an hour to prepare.

6. Steamed mushrooms with cabbage

Mushrooms need to be steamed with cabbage. Add carrots, herbs and onions. When it's almost ready, add the tomatoes for a rich flavor. Sprinkle the finished dish with fragrant basil.

7. Steamed vegetable mousse

Steam asparagus, beets, peas. After they are ready, you need to place in a blender and grind. Add swollen ready-made gelatin, cream, salt and add aromatic herbs. Divide into molds and leave to chill in the refrigerator.

8. Steamed Peppers Stuffed with Cottage Cheese

Combine cottage cheese with onions and herbs fried in olive oil. Cut the peppers in half, and fill each part with cottage cheese. Put on twenty minutes to prepare for a couple. Sprinkle with cheese.

9. Diet steam cutlets

Take the minced meat of any bird, beat it off and pass it through a meat grinder. Knead as usual minced meat for cutlets. Grease molds, form cutlets and put on steam. Cook twenty minutes.

10. Steamed vegetable porridge

Steam cabbage, chopped pieces of pepper, beans, asparagus. Add herbs and aromatic herbs. When all the ingredients are ready, put on a plate and grind into porridge.

After making sure that you can cook a lot of various and dietary dishes for a couple, be sure to use some kind of recipe. If you completely switch to such a diet, you can quickly restore health and throw off unnecessary pounds. The feeling of satiety will always be present, no taste aversions will arise, since the dishes are quite tasty.