Preparing Low-Fat Desserts

There is nothing quite like a tempting dessert to finish off a tasty meal. However, you might not be fond of all the calories that accompany your final course. As a result, you might be wondering how to prepare low-fat desserts for your family. Fortunately, by following just a few common sense steps, you can make the transition from high-fat to low-fat with ease.

Glynis Albright, founder of a company called Just Sweet Enough Desserts, offers some tips for developing desserts that are low in both fat and sugar. For instance, you can cut the amount of sugar in a dish by ½ or ¼. In other words, if a recipe calls for ½ cup sugar, consider using ¼ cup instead. Also, rather than using whole butter, you should consider adding light butter.

Another interesting trick is to substitute fruit or nuts for sugar. Such a technique will add a zesty flavor to your dish. Also, considering halving the amount of fruit or nuts required in a recipe. Delete salt from recipes, and use vanilla, almond, or lemon extracts instead. Yet another effective technique is to use spices such as nutmeg or cinnamon, or herbs including rosemary and thyme.

You might imagine that your low-fat options when it comes to desserts would be limited, but nothing could be further from the truth. For instance, you might consider baking applesauce bran muffins, chocolate-banana trifle, fluffy grasshopper pie, or Irish coffee meringues. Other options include lemon ice, low-fat tiramisu, low-fat orange dream cheesecake, and low-fat mint truffles.

Let's now take a closer look at some sample low-fat desserts. Strawberries in ginger cream are made with sour cream, light brown sugar, and mint. Sugar-free pumpkin pie includes pumpkin, evaporated milk, eggs, artificial sweetener, salt, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, and cloves. Low-fat baked cheesecake is made with a graham cracker crust, fat-free cream cheese, flour, skim milk, egg substitute, artificial sweetener, lemon juice, and vanilla. Obviously, the keys to this dish are the fat-free cream cheese and the artificial sweetener, which significantly alter the calorie count.

For low-fat banana pudding, combine fat-free cream cheese with cool whip, low-fat milk, pudding mix, vanilla, bananas, and low-fat vanilla wafers. Another low-fat treat is four fruit ice, which consists of banana, an orange rind, orange juice, lemon juice, cranberry juice cocktail, sugar, and egg whites.

If you enjoy the taste of lemon, consider lemon cream cheese pie made with light margarine, fat-free condensed milk, lemon juice, reduced-fat vanilla wafers, and fat-free cream cheese. For another tasty treat, consider kiwi ice, a delicacy made with apple juice, lemon juice, kiwi, splenda, and orange rind.

In the end, it may take some patience and creativity to prepare low-fat desserts. But the good news is that you can give up calories without giving up any of the taste. You can now find literally thousands of low-fat desserts on the Internet, everything from luscious fruit concoctions to pies and cakes. Such desserts can turn your typical low-fat meal into something memorable which you will want to enjoy week in and week out.

Information is for educational and informational purposes only and is not be interpreted as financial or legal advice. This does not represent a recommendation to buy, sell, or hold any security. Please consult your financial advisor.