Tag: benefits

properties, benefits and how to use them in the kitchen – Italian Cuisine

Rich in nutrients and excellent supplements, thanks to their innumerable properties they are very useful to our body in many different ways. Let's find out together

Sunflower seeds are nothing more than i fruits of the Helianthus annuus, an annual plant belonging to the family of the Astaraceae. As well as flax seeds, pumpkin seeds or chia seeds, due to their numerous nutritional properties they are considered as a natural supplement able to make health benefits of our body.

Why are sunflower seeds good for you?

These oil seeds are very rich in vitamins, especially of groups B and E, and of folic acid. THEto vitamin E is the most powerful antioxidant and helps our body to fight premature aging of tissues, while lFolic acid helps the most pregnant women, Favoring and contributing to the healthy development of the fetus.

sunflower seeds

These seeds are also rich in fiber, magnesium, potassium, phosphorus, selenium, zinc, manganese and linoleic acid

Let's use them in the kitchen

In addition to using them to garnish dishes, salads or smoothies, it is also possible to make an excellent one sunflower seed bread or biscuits, buns, crackers and even breadsticks. To make them crispy and enhance their flavor, they can be toasted for a few minutes in a non-stick pan or in the oven, at a temperature not exceeding 160 ° C. On the market they are often also already toasted and salted, but in order not to frustrate their many benefits the advice is to buy them naturally and then toast them.

Not easy to find, it is always better to choose seeds from organic farming, to be certain that the flowers from which they were derived have not been treated by the use of pesticides.

3 easy recipes with sunflower seeds

Chickpeas: legumes with unexpected benefits – Italian Cuisine

Always called the meat of the poor, the chickpeas hide unexpected healthy properties: they help lower bad cholesterol, prevent hypertension, as well as promote protein and lipid metabolism. In short, we should never let them miss our tables

Chickpeas have a high protein content and energy properties that make them the most common legumes after beans. Present in the traditional kitchens of many regions, they are rich in fiber, carbohydrates and unsaturated fats that help the functionality of the cardiovascular system. They supply magnesium, iron, calcium, phosphorus and folic acid and are a good source of B and C vitamins.

They are available all year, both in dry and in box versions and can be black, green and brown. They lend themselves to many preparations: in the south they are mainly used in soups, soups or to season pasta. In Liguria, the use of chickpea flour is widespread, for the preparation of the famous farinata.
Here are some of our suggestions for preparing them.

Teasing little glass

This is the recipe for an Apulian dish that can become a tasty appetizer. It is a preparation that requires some time, but the result is assured.
You have to mix about 60 g of durum wheat flour with the same quantity of whole wheat flour, water, and then wrap the dough in a sheet of transparent paper and let it rest for 30 minutes in the refrigerator.

Meanwhile wash and cut into cubes a heart of celery, a ripe tomato to which you have removed the seeds and the skin, 2 onions and fresh chilli. Separately whisk 300 g of boiled chickpeas, season with oil, salt and freshly ground white pepper. If you want to obtain a more homogeneous result, pass the cream through a sieve.

At this point, roll out the previously prepared pasta and cut it into strips as wide as noodles and a finger long. Fry in plenty of peanut oil and then dry with absorbent paper.

Prepare the glasses: on the bottom place the tomato, celery and spring onion salad seasoned with a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil, wine vinegar and a pinch of salt. Pour the chickpea cream over it and garnish with the freshly fried dough sticks and a few parsley leaves.

Quinoa, chickpea and ginger salad

Fresh salad, fast and very nutritious. Boil the quinoa in salted water. When it is ready, drain it and place it in a bowl, adding a pinch of olive oil. Add 200 g of boiled chickpeas, a few halved cherry tomatoes, stoned taggiasche olives, minced mint, an untreated lemon rind and fresh grated ginger. Season with salt and oil and serve.

Chickpea cold cream with fried vegetables

For this recipe you can use canned chickpeas. Blend them after draining them with oil, salt, pepper and enough water so that the result is a velvety cream but not too thick. Apart from cleaning a carrot, an eggplant and an onion, red or white does not matter. Reduce the vegetables in sticks and dip them in a batter that you have obtained by mixing 100 g of rice flour with 140 g of water. Plunge the vegetables in plenty of boiling peanut oil, brown them and then drain them when the batter becomes crisp. Dry them on kitchen paper. Serve the chickpea cream with the vegetables still warm and crunchy.

A more delicate version requires the addition of flambéed scampi and some rosemary needles to the cream.

Codfish pie in chickpea sauce

For this dish you will need small baking molds. Start with the preparation of the confit tomatoes: cut 20 small tomatoes in half and arrange them with the cut side up, in an oven dish. Sprinkle with a pinch of salt and sugar and cook in the oven at 100 ° for an hour and a half.

Meanwhile, boil 100 g of chickpeas which you will then blend. In the meantime work for a few minutes with a fork 300 g of cow's milk ricotta, roll out a small amount in each well-oiled mold and at the bottom you will have minced some fennel leaves. Put the molds in the oven at 200 ° for 10 minutes.

Boil the cod, drain it, dry it and make small pieces seasoned with extra virgin olive oil.
Decorate the dishes with the chickpea sauce, the ricotta pie and above the cod garnished with tomato confit and untreated lemon zest.

Sautéed chickpeas, garlic crumble, walnuts and raw porcini mushrooms

Excellent autumn appetizer. Fry about 300g of boiled chickpeas with a drizzle of oil and two or three cloves of garlic. Cook until the chickpeas have a soft consistency, add salt and pepper and add chopped parsley. When the cream is lukewarm, shake it and pour the mixture into small bowls that you will keep warm. Meanwhile crumble 2 slices of homemade bread without crust and toast them in a pan with a drizzle of oil, poached garlic and 100 g of chopped walnuts.

Garnish the chickpea cream with this mixture of bread and nuts, and add small slices of fresh porcini mushrooms.
For those who do not like them, they can be replaced with parmesan flakes, ham or speck cubes.

Potatoes: benefits and nutritional values – Italian Cuisine

Often feared for their starch content, potatoes are actually a low-calorie food, rich in vitamins and mineral salts, which helps to drain excess toxins and liquids. Here are the nutritional values

Baked, boiled, pan-fried, fried, roasted: there are many ways to use them potatoes, a versatile food all to discover. Also perfect for i celiac and gluten intolerant.

Energy source

Many try to stay away from potatoes (especially if they are struggling with slimming diets) for their content starches. But the potato is actually a low-calorie food. Just think of it for every 100 grams of raw potatoes they are hardly counted 79 kilocalories. It is clear, therefore, that much depends on the type of preparation or seasoning: le potatoes fried, for example, I am a high calorie food, to avoid when you want to lose weight or get rid of cellulite. Boiled or steamedinstead, potatoes are an excellent dish that can provide power the body and, at the same time, help weight loss and drainage of toxins and liquids in excess. The merit is of the potassium, a mineral whose potatoes are very rich.

Vitamins and proteins

Their content protein it is modest, yet the potatoes, originating in Latin America, they promote a sense of satiety. Also, potatoes are rich in vitamins of group B, vitamin C and mineral salts such as copper, iron, chromium and magnesium, while the carotene, contained in discreet quantity, determines, according to its minor or greater presence, the coloration more or less intense yellow.

Never eat them raw

A rule to remember absolutely when talking about potatoes is to never eat them raw. They can cause head pains and fever. This is because in potatoes it is contained (in a small part) the solanine, a toxic alkaloid also present in eggplants, which however can be reduced by more than 50% through the process of cooking. In this regard it is useful to keep the tubers in unlit rooms. periodically removing the buds which tend to form on the surface: this is where the presence of solanine is concentrated.

Not just gluten-free

Easily digestible and assimilable, the potatoes are finally gluten and cholesterol free. They are made up of 77% water, they contain good doses of carbohydrates complex, favor the increase of serotonin cerebral (and therefore improve mood) and are able to neutralize gastric juices. Not by chance are often recommended to those who suffer from ulcers gastric and heartburn.