Yogurt

If you’re going to take the time to churn your own ice cream, I think it should be chocolate, don’t you? This is sweetened with agave nectar instead of artificial sweetener because the nectar gives the finished stuff real unctuousness and body—almost like the real thing.

Time to go through the impulse purchases you’re storing in the attic or basement and dig out that old-fashioned ice cream maker you thought you couldn’t live without. Here’s a very good reason to unpack it.

This recipe was created for my friend Bill, who told me he couldn’t get his daughter to eat fruit. I asked him what her favorite food was and the response was “ice cream.” (Well, what would you say?) These pops are mostly fruit, with just a little bit of “ice cream” made from low-fat Greek yogurt and sugar substitute. But when the pureed fruit was mixed with it, she couldn’t tell the difference. At just about 60 calories a pop, you can eat these all summer long.

Traditional rice pudding contains cream, eggs, and sugar. You’ll find none of that here. You will find healthful whole-grain brown rice, raisins, creamy Greek yogurt, and lovely flavor from real vanilla bean and cinnamon. Eat any leftovers for breakfast.

Even though there is no sugar in the custard part of the recipe, I did decide—after experimenting with every sugar substitute out there—that it would be okay to use unrefined Demerara sugar for the brûlée part of this dessert. Considering that the fat grams are down to less than 3 from 50, I gave myself a pass.

Tiramisù is a high-calorie dessert if there ever was one. I started the makeover process thinking the lighter version should include from-scratch sugar-free ladyfingers—homemade génoise piped in perfect finger shapes and baked. Then I got my head screwed on straight and realized that no one would make this dessert if it meant making your own génoise. The fat-laden original was transformed into something even an Italian grandma would love.

When you think about adding flavor to foods in the most healthful way possible, you think about the most intense flavor vehicles you can find. That’s why this recipe calls for vanilla bean. The tiny seeds inside pack a wallop of this most delicate and beloved taste. If you can’t find good strawberries, try whole raspberries or small slices of ripe peach.

Real mayonnaise is made with egg yolks and oil—which might explain the 10 grams of fat per tablespoon. You can very easily wind up slathering at least a tablespoon or two on a sandwich. This very good approximation uses Greek yogurt as a base, rather than oil.

Few dishes are as soul-satisfying and luxurious as a buttery-rich potato puree or mashed potatoes. I love mashed potatoes, but I know that they’re not particularly good for me. Cauliflower puree makes a truly superb substitute.

Here’s a great steakhouse side dish that can do more harm than the red meat itself. Standard preparations make a bad boy out of an otherwise extraordinarily healthy vegetable. The problem with spinach is that it’s very lean and often bitter—which is why we sauté it in butter or douse it with cream. All-natural Greek yogurt has been employed here to help clean up its act.

The dirty little secret about Penne alla Vodka is not the vodka but the hefty amount of heavy cream. Vodka is colorless, odorless, and without much flavor—not really attributes of a superstar ingredient. It’s the combination of cream and tomato sauce that gives this dish its signature flavor. The traditional cream is swapped here for low-fat Greek yogurt.

Of all the dishes that were suggested for this book, mac ’n’ cheese came up most often. Everyone loves it—and everyone knows how nutritionally bad it can be. Calories start at 600 per serving and go into the thousands. It’s a dish that has become so rich that taming its fatty side proved to be quite a challenge. The base of the sauce in this version isn’t cream, but a puree of cooked onions and garlic. It gives the dish lots of flavor with not so much as a gram of fat. The very hot oven makes the breadcrumbs on top get nice and crunchy. It’s the combination of crisp and gooey textures that makes this a winning dish.

Gnocchi are small dumplings made with cooked potatoes and just enough flour to hold them together. I swapped the traditional white potatoes for far-more-healthful sweet potatoes and paired the gnocchi with broccoli. The color combo is fabulous and so is the flavor, thanks to a sprinkling of Parmigiano-Reggiano. And while many gnocchi recipes include a cream- or butter-based sauce for tossing, these are served in a garlicky broth stirred together with a bit of Greek yogurt instead. They take a little while to make, but given the great taste and the powerhouse nutritional value of sweet potatoes—and just under 350 calories per serving—they’re more than worth the trouble.

I once ate true Fettuccine Alfredo at Ristorante D’Alfredo in Rome, where a giant picture of its namesake owner hangs on the wall. The big flavors of the dish were brought to bear by combining outsized amounts of butter and Parmigiano-Reggiano. It was that simple: butter and cheese. Not so simple, though, if you’re watching your waistline. This version eliminates the cream that many American versions call for but retains a little bit of the butter for flavor. The velvety-smooth texture is re-created with yogurt and thickened chicken broth. It may not be as authentic as the original, invented by Alfredo di Lelio, but it’s a very tasty version we can all live with (for a very long time).

Swapping the traditional crown of mashed white potatoes for a topping of seasoned cauliflower puree made with Greek yogurt saves a load of calories and carbs—enough to enjoy this English pub dish with a nice pint, if you like.

Béarnaise is one of the classic French sauces. Its standard formulation includes a lot of butter and egg yolks. In this version, I kept the licorice-tasting tarragon that’s a hallmark of the sauce and let the fat and calories go.

Purists insist that skirt steak is the only cut of beef from which to make fajitas. Skirt steak is delicious—mostly because of the fat marbling through it. That’s why this recipe calls for lean filet mignon: it has significantly less fat than skirt steak. The condiments more than make up for the flavor that fat provides.

Few dishes are as tasty and flavorful as a good curry. Unfortunately, the amount of ghee (clarified butter) and full-fat yogurt used in a typical curry makes for a lot of XXL T-shirts. Here, lean, tender beef, intense seasoning, lots of fresh vegetables, and 5%-fat yogurt make for a skinny jeans day instead.

In Mexico, tacos are small, fresh, and simply prepared. I once had a taco al pastor there that was mind-bendingly good, and it had all of three ingredients! Somehow, when the taco got to the United States, it morphed into double-crust, Taco Bell Beef Supreme Chalupa with sour-cream-out-of-a-caulking-gun madness. Here I do my best to honor the Americanized taco everyone seems to love, while bringing some traditional flavors into the picture.

This was originally a rich chicken dish made with lots of cream and sherry, peas, and pimientos, and served on hot buttered toast points or in pastry shells. There are as many stories about its origin as there are versions of the recipe. It likely made its debut at the Brighton Beach Hotel in New York at the turn of the 19th century, created by the chef in honor of the owner, Mr. E. Clark King II. I went with a green-pepper version and added celery seeds to the sauce because that’s how I like my à la king. If you can’t live without the pimientos, feel free to add them—they will have virtually no impact on the fat and calorie content.