In this post, I’m going to be laying out some modernist cooking techniques, also known as molecular cooking, that have really helped me during my cut. Modernist cooking may sound a bit daunting, but what I’m really trying to convey is a how to use a few key ingredients like xanthan gum, psyllium fibres, guar gum and agar-agar – staples in modernist cuisine – to create low-calorie dishes.
A note on rheology
First, some science is in order. In order to understand how the various modernist ingredients affect the outcome, we need to understand a little about a subdiscipline of continuum mechanics: rheology. Continuum mechanics is the study of matter at a bulk level. Materials are studied from a high level, ignoring the constituent atoms and molecules. So we’re not talking about H2O molecules floating around, we’re talking about liquid water and how it flows. And we’re not talking about Fe atoms vibrating in a lattice, we’re talking a solid slab of iron that springs back when we bend it. For liquids, viscosity is typically considered the determining physical property, while for solids the elasticity is probably the most important property.
Elastic deformations are characterized by returning to their original state, and the resistant force ramps up with the extent of the deformation. A spring or a rubber band are perfect examples. The further you pull out a spring, the more force you’ll have to exert; the force is directed towards relaxing the spring, returning towards to its original state.
Purely viscous behaviour resists speed of deformation, but not the deformation itself. That is, the resistive force becomes greater the faster it goes, but once the deforming force stops, it’ll just stay in the deformed state. Think of water or syrup. The faster you try to move your hand through water, the more force it takes. If a liquid is viscous enough, it will basically stop dead once you stop moving your hand.
Rheology is the science of things that fall kinda in between solids and liquids. They have both viscous and elastic properties. Think for instance of jello. If you shake it a bit, it’ll give you a little jiggle. That’s elasticity. But if you stress it enough, for instance by dropping it on the floor, it’ll flow out and spread all over your kitchen floor. Note that it doesn’t shatter into a million pieces like glass might. It kinda stays together in bigger chunks. That’s viscosity. In this way, jello has both elastic and viscous properties. The ingredients we’ll be discussing all have a profound influence on rheological properties.
Modernist ingredients
There are several common techniques and methods in modernist cooking, some of which are very accessible, others not so much. I will stick to a few very commonly available ingredients that are easy to work with. Already, they offer quite a lot of versatility. I’ll be focusing mostly on xanthan gum and agar-agar (also called agar for short). They are known as hydrocolloids, because when inactivate they tend to form small bunched up globules or spheres. Activating them causes the fibres to stretch out, creating a loose network of fibrous material. They are strongly hydrophilic, resulting in an increase in viscosity. In plain English, they make liquids thicker when properly used.
With just xanthan and agar, you can already make a plethora of modernist staples: syrups, foams, gels, fluid gels, sheets, pearls, etc. Both consist mostly of soluble fibres, and are therefore very low in calories. They are both very strong thickeners; agar even being able to bind. Modernist cooking recipes typically specify a 0.1% to 1% per weight range. To illustrate this, you can noticeably thicken 100 ml of water with just 0.1 gram of xanthan gum, adding about 0.18 calories. For a thick syrupy consistency at 1%, we’re talking 1.8 calories per 100 ml. Agar will result in a completely set gel at about 1% per weight concentration, adding a similar amount of calories.
Xanthan gum
Xanthan gum is a universal thickener that works for water-based liquids pretty much regardless of acidity or temperature. It’s completely flavourless, which means anything can be thickened without compromising on taste. It is activated by opening the globules with a shear force, which is usually achieved by whisking or mixing; this often requires the use of a blender or electrical mixer. Xanthan predominantly increases the viscosity, but it doesn’t increase elasticity a whole lot. As a consequence, it can result in very thick fluids, but it never really sets. It’s wise not to go to too high concentrations, as most people don’t consider the texture and mouthfeel very pleasant much beyond 1% by weight. Aside from this, having too much can cause some gastric distress. However, at lower concentrations, it tends to improve mouthfeel, and it can even improve palatability. This last one has to do with a secondary property that xanthan gum has: it stabilizes emulsions. So any kind of flavourful particles, such as spices or dried herbs, will be dispersed better throughout the liquid. You can make an amazing spiced coffee with just a tiny bit of xanthan gum, because the spices stay evenly suspended in the coffee rather than accumulating at the bottom of your cup.
| Xanthan-stabilized spiced coffee 1. Brew coffee just the way you like it. 2. Add any ground spices of your liking. Some suggestions: cinnamon, ginger, cardamom, nutmeg, cloves, anise, black pepper, etc. 3. Optional: add sweetener to your liking. 4. Add a tiny sprinkle of xanthan – 0.1% by weight or more if you like it thicker – and mix it in. 5. Enjoy! Note To create a creamy, frothy, and rich-feeling concoction, try adding a little bit of whey protein and about 0.2% or 0.3% xanthan. The protein from the whey will froth up quite a lot if you use a blender. |
Guar gum
Guar gum is in some contexts explained to be a “natural” alternative to xanthan gum, as it is extracted from the guar bean. Xanthan gum is produced by a certain type of bacteria, fermenting sucrose and glucose. I don’t see how a plant is a more natural source than a bacterium, but whatever. Either way, it’s neither more or less natural, nor can it be used as an alternative to xanthan. As we now know, viscosity and elasticity are more or less two independent components of a rheological fluid. And whereas xanthan tends to increase viscosity without affecting elasticity too much, guar increases elasticity much more. If you’d use a lot of guar gum in any fluid, it will eventually set into a loose gel. However, much like xanthan, most people don’t enjoy the texture that guar produces when used over 1% by weight. As with xanthan, going much more than this might also cause some gastric distress.
Psyllium fibre
Psyllium fibre powder (I’ll just say psyllium for short) kinda does both what guar and xanthan do. It increases both viscosity and elasticity, so that it will eventually set when used in high amounts. The resulting texture is a little coarser, or maybe a better way to put it is to say that it has some texture, whereas xanthan and guar produce completely smooth textures. Like xanthan, psyllium is also activated by simply mixing it in, but it tends to mix in quite easy. However, unlike xanthan or guar, it does have a flavour of its own, which is kinda earthy and vaguely reminiscent of sourdough bread. Some people don’t like the flavour very much, but I enjoy it in combination with certain things, like coffee. An example application would be to thicken up yoghurt, or even bind it to a pudding. Psyllium is quite commonly used in gluten-free baking to increase the viscosity of the dough. Psyllium is only sporadically used in modernist cooking because of the flavour.
Agar-agar
Agar-agar – I’ll say agar for short – can be also used as a thickener, but in higher concentrations, it binds water-based liquids completely. Sometimes it’s called vegan gelatin, since it produces a similar effect, but it is in fact an extract of a particular seaweed. It’s practically flavourless, though at very high concentrations it can give a slight hint of its seaweed origins. It’s activated by boiling, which makes it easier to work with than gelatin in my opinion, as gelatin should only be heated to 80° C or so. Starting at concentrations around 1%, agar completely binds the liquid into a gel. I keep saying liquid, because using agar is also a great way to make jello shots out of any alcoholic beverage you might like. When I just started with modernist cooking, one of my first creations was White Russian gel cubes with Kahlúa syrup. Agar is very versatile, you can use it to make gels in any shape, obviously, which opens the door to sheets and pasta-like shapes made of any flavourful liquid. Again, as an experiment when I just discovered modernist cooking, I made coffee-flavoured tagliatelle with a milk foam; a cappuccino with a very different delivery system. There are two basic techniques for creating a gel. The second method I give is particularly useful for gelling liquids that don’t tolerate heating them to a boil, such as yoghurt or alcoholic beverages.
| The ranges of agar: 0.3% by weight for a very loose gel, 1% by weight for a tight, but still jiggly gel and more agar for a stiff gel. It’s not recommended to go beyond 2%. Simple gel, method 1 1. Add agar to the liquid you wish to gel. 2. Bring to a boil and stir vigorously, preferably with a whisk. 3. Lower heat and let it simmer for 3 to 5 minutes. Stir vigorously every now and then, more often for higher concentrations. 5. Chill until it sets. Simple gel, method 2 1. Have the liquid you wish to gel ready in a heat-proof container. Add water and agar to a pot. The amount of agar should now be a percentage of the total weight of both liquid and water. 2. Bring agar-water mixture to a boil and stir vigorously, preferably with a whisk. 3. Lower heat and let it simmer for 3 to 5 minutes. Stir vigorously every now and then, more often for higher concentrations. 4. Slowly stream in the hot agar-water mixture into the to-be-gelled liquid while stirring vigorously. 5. Chill until it sets. Note 1 The time to chill depends on a couple of factors: the quantity of gel you’re making, the temperature at which you’re cooling it (leave it out at room temp, fridge, or freezer), etc. Method 2 can be quite a bit faster to set, depending on the temperature and quantities of the to-be-gelled liquid and the agar-water mixture. Note 2 Once set, the gel can be reheated and won’t melt up to about 80° C or so. Note 3 When using method 2, the resulting gel is slightly diluted, depending on how much water you’re using to activate the agar. In comparison to method 1, the liquid should be more concentrated in flavour starting out. |
Combination and imagination
As you can imagine – and of course from the examples I’ve mentioned – modernist cooking techniques can make some of the weirdest, most exotic food. And it’s not even that hard to do at home. Now, I understand most people who are interested in health and nutrition are not looking to create apple sauce spaghetti with raisin-infused syrup and a caramel cookie crumble to provide a deconstructed-reconstructed apple pie experience. However, that doesn’t mean modernist cooking techniques are entirely without merit in the fitness space. The basic properties of modernist ingredients can prove to be very helpful, they can thicken and bind any water-based liquid, so that almost anything can be turned into something that feels more substantial to eat.
Modernist cooking isn’t limited to using a single ingredient; many times combinations are useful. Let me give a couple of examples. First, consider making a gel (a jelly pudding) out of a suspension. In the time it takes for the gel to set, the particles may settle to the bottom of the container. To counter this, a small amount of xanthan stabilizes the suspension to the point where the particles are evenly dispersed during the setting phase. In another example, suppose we’d like to make a fluid gel – something that kinda has both the properties of a gel and a fluid – the general recipe is to bind something with agar, and after chilling and setting, blend it to create the fluid gel. Next, the fluid gel is corrected for thickness; adding xanthan to thicken or water to make it thinner.
When it comes to equipment, I recommend, in order of importance: a whisk; a precision scale, something that can measure tenths of grams or less; an immersion blender or regular blender; and an electrical mixer of some sort. The whisk is absolutely necessary, the others are technically optional, but extremely convenient. Xanthan, guar and psyllium aren’t too hard to eyeball, as you can add them incrementally. With agar, you can probably get away with a regular food scale, given the typical quantities of liquid to be bound will be in the several hundred millilitre range; meaning grams of agar.
Salad dressing
In certain cases, you’ll want to use a zero-fat, low-calorie salad dressing. For example, if it’s a side salad and the main meal already meets your fat goals, use a zero-fat dressing. On the other hand, if you’re having a salad as a meal, it’s typically wise to add some fat to the salad. However, this can also be done with nuts or seeds. A sprinkle of roasted pine nuts is one of my favourites in a salad. Hence, I typically go with a zero-fat dressing regardless. This is a matter of preference; fats, especially oils, are great at carrying flavour. Some flavour components are only carried by fat, which is one of the reasons why salad dressing conventionally contains oil. The other reason being stickiness. By adding some oil and making an emulsion, the dressing coats the salad and doesn’t accumulate in a pool at the bottom of your bowl. Clearly, by using a zero-fat dressing, we’re losing some flavour-carrying capacity of our dressing, but this not a huge deal in my opinion. Low-fat dressings can be made based on yoghurt, ketchup or ajvar. These come with their own distinct flavours, and sometimes you want something else.
So let’s imagine we want a simple vinegar-based dressing. To make it slightly more sticky, we can thicken it just a tiny bit using xanthan gum. I recommend only a very small amount, say 0.1% to 0.3% by weight. The first time I used a xanthan-thickened vinegar dressing, I was blown away; the intensity of the flavour with every bite, the improved mouth feel; it was amazing. Not to mention the fact that you can use a wealth of dry ingredients, like spices or herbs, much more effectively than with oil-based dressings. So, even though some flavour-carrying capacity is lost by removing oil, other flavours can be carried by virtue of the more stable emulsion. As an example, consider this very simple, practically zero-calorie, vinaigrette.
| Basic xanthan-thickened vinaigrette 1. Pour vinegar of your choice into a bowl. Add your choice of dry flavourings, such as: cardamom, curry powder, smoked paprika, etc. Don’t forget seasoning with salt and pepper. 2. Optional: add sweetener of your choice. 3. Sprinkle in a tiny bit of xanthan, about 0.1% by weight, and stir in vigorously with a whisk. 4. Pour over salad, toss if you like, and enjoy! Note 1 The calories will depend mostly on your choice of vinegar and sweetener; the dry ingredients or the xanthan will not contribute a noticeable amount. For instance, balsamic vinegar and honey both have quite a few calories, while apple cider vinegar and sucralose have practically zero. Note 2 Mustard is also a nice addition to a vinaigrette. |
Soups
Soups and stews are typically very satiating per calorie, due to their high volume. You’re taking in a lot of water with every bite, which obviously increases fullness, but there are also some changes in how soups and stews are digested compared to solid food. I love making soups when in a cut, it’s just such a great way to stretch a meal to the fullest. Furthermore, by using a bit of xanthan gum, you can also thicken soups and stews, virtually without adding calories. Let’s take a simple broccoli soup as an example.
| Simple brocoli soup 1. Cut up a stalk of brocolli into a pot and add at least enough water to just cover. 2. Bring to a simmer and let it cook for 10 minutes or so. 3. Blend (an immersion blender works great) until just before desired smoothness is reached. 4. Sprinkle in some xanthan gum and use the blender to mix it in. Keep doing so until desired thickness is reached. 5. Season to taste with salt and pepper and enjoy! |
The same roughly holds for stews, which I also like to thicken (partially) with xanthan gum. Using xanthan gum instead of, say, cornstarch has the benefit that it’s much lower in calories. For instance, to thicken a litre of stew, you’d need some 20 to 30 grams of cornstarch, adding 100 or so calories. However, you can use 5 to 10 grams of cornstarch and 2 to 3 grams of xanthan gum to achieve the same result, amounting to only 20 to 30 calories. It may not be much, and even less per serving, but in the long run these things add up. Many small tricks like this result in quite a difference over a day or week.
Puddingify!
Next, I’d like to discuss one of my favourite ways of consuming whey protein after a workout on a cut. First off, whey protein is great. It absorbs quickly, so it’s especially good post-workout to provide the muscles with the necessary building material. It’s typically very convenient, and contains hardly anything else besides protein, so it’s super easy to hit your macros. However, one issue I had with it during a cut is that those 100 or so calories don’t really do anything for satiety.
You see, liquid calories are processed differently by the body; they hardly increase satiety at all. This has led to another nutritional myth: “soda makes you fat.” No. Again, too many calories is what makes you fat. The grain of truth here is that you can drink a huge amount of calories in a day, next to eating a regular diet, thereby adding a ton of calories. Consider the fact that a single can of full-sugar coke contains some 140 calories; some people drink a six-pack per day or more, amounting to some 840 calories. That’s basically another large meal per day. Cutting out all that soda cuts out a truckload of calories, and for some people this is so much that they might actually start losing weight.
Anyway, I wanted the whey, but I didn’t want to drink it. Enter agar-agar. I could turn my protein shake into a jelly pudding, and eat it instead. This is definitely my preferred way now of consuming whey post-workout. Lots of people will also process their whey into a post-workout snack like yoghurt, or something more substantial like a muffin. However, those calories have to come from somewhere in the budget, too. By using agar, and turning the shake into a jelly pudding, you get the feeling like you’re eating something, but the increase in calories is negligible. For a jelly pudding consistency, I recommend using agar in the 1% to 1.5% per weight range. This amounts to only 6 to 9 additional calories. There’s some slight amount of trickiness here, as agar is affected by acidity, for instance. So if you’re adding, say, some lemon juice for flavouring, use the higher end of the range I gave. For whey jelly pudding, I recommend using the second agar gel method.
| Whey jelly pudding 1. Combine whey and dry flavourings of your liking to a small bowl. If using dry ingredients, add a bit of xanthan and dry blend. 2. Add a part of the water to the dry ingredients and mix with a blender or whisk. 3. Bring the other part of the water to a boil, add agar (about 1% by weight of the total amount of water). Lower heat and simmer for 3 to 5 minutes. 4. Pour hot agar-water mixture into the whey mixture and blend or whisk to combine. 5. Chill until fully set, serve cold. 6. Enjoy! |
Recently, I’ve also tried agar to thicken or even bind oatmeal, creating a kind of suspension of oatmeal in a jelly pudding. The idea is to increase volume while using less oatmeal. I can attest that it’s very effective. It took me way longer to finish the bowl, and it felt like much more food than it actually was. When I’m not cutting, I eat around 100 grams of oats per sitting, yielding maybe 800 ml of oatmeal. But by binding it with agar, you can use way less oats, say half, and still get something with the same consistency. So that’s pretty much half the calories, while preserving the volume and consistency. And pretty much the satiety, too. Only downside: it really requires meal-prepping because it has to chill and set. You can still eat it warm, though, as a set agar gel will only melt at 85° C.
| Agar oatmeal jelly, or agar-thickened oatmeal 1. Make oatmeal as you usually would. 2. At the same time, bring some water to the boil and add agar, about 1% for a jelly, and about 0.6% for a thickened oatmeal – both by total water weight. Lower heat and simmer for 3 to 5 minutes. 3. Add hot agar-water to the prepared oatmeal and mix well. 4. Chill until set. 5. If you like it cold, enjoy! If you like it warm, and are making the jelly version, just reheat in the microwave. If you’re making agar-thickened oatmeal, stir the oatmeal while reheating, for instance microwaving for 1 minute at the time and stiring in between. Note 1 I like to mix in some fruit like apples or pears, or vegetables like carrots or beetroots, together with some spices like cinnamon or ginger for flavouring. Note 2 Make sure you don’t get the oatmeal too hot if you reheat it, as the agar may melt again. Note 3 Just like in baking, it’s good practice to dry-blend the dry ingredients before adding water. So if you’re using spices (or whey), just give them a bit of a stir with the dry oats. |
Mousse and foam
The final strategy I’d like to discuss increases volume, sometimes quite significantly, but potentially doesn’t add any calories at all. What’s this sorcery, you may ask? Whipping in air. In modernist cooking, this is often achieved by using a whipping siphon: a pressurized vessel with a particular kind of spout that foams up any liquid inside. This liquid can also be some fluid gel made with agar, so that pretty much any flavour of foam can be made. Now, I don’t own a whipping siphon (yet). A good alternative, I’ve found, is an electrical mixer of some sort; a hand mixer or a stand mixer. It’s slightly more limited in applications, but I don’t think that’s a huge deal in the fitness space.
The most famous mousse or foam that seems to be a staple in fitness culture is the protein fluff: a whipped up casein pudding. I don’t typically have any casein powder in my pantry, but I got the next best thing: zero-fat quark (sort of like a smooth cottage cheese). Some alternatives are zero-fat Greek yoghurt or skyr (an Icelandic thing that’s somewhere in between fresh cheese and yoghurt). Just by itself, these things can’t really be whipped up. However, I’ve found that adding some xanthan gum, and maybe some water, does allow these things to be whipped up. What is a foam, but an emulsion of air bubbles in a liquid? And yes, xanthan will indeed stabilize this “emulsion” just as easy. I’ve managed to increase the volume to about a factor of 3, possibly a little more. Now that’s massive. It’ll take way longer to eat, but it’s also much more filling. Not to mention a little bit more satiating due to the added fibre from the xanthan.
| Protein foam 1. Combine your protein of choice and flavourings in a big mixing bowl. Options for protein are all fresh cheese and yoghurts, for instance: quark (a smooth type of cottage cheese), zero-fat Greek yoghurt, skyr (Icelandic yoghurt), casein protein powder with water, etc. 2. Flavouring can be anything you like, though I have to caution on using fatty things, as they tend to destabilize the mousse. Some examples of flavours that work fine: vanilla, coffee, chocolate powder, açai powder, pumpkin spice, you name it. Also, don’t add anything acid like lemon juice, as it will tend to curdle the protein. If you want lemon or lime flavour, use the zest. 3. Optional: sweeten to your liking using your favourite sweetener. 3. If your protein is very thick, add some water to the consistency of a thin yoghurt. Add about 0.5% to 0.75% xanthan gum by total weight of the mixture. 4. Whip it up! Gently at first to avoid splashing, but gradually build to the highest setting on your mixer as the xanthan is incorporated. Stop when you reach your desired volume or when the foam doesn’t increase in volume any more. This can take a while, mixing for 5 to 10 minutes isn’t uncommon. 5. Thicken the foam using xanthan or psyllium to the consistency of your liking. 6. Optional: chill. The additional time will further hydrate and slightly set the foam. 7. Enjoy! Protein Mousse Continuing from step 4 of the protein foam. 5. Bring a small amount of water to the boil and add agar; anything with about 0.75% to 1.5% by total weight (water plus foam) will result in a fixed mousse. Lower heat and simmer for 3 to 5 minutes. 6. Slowly stream the water-agar mixture into the foam while whisking constantly. Make sure the resulting foam has uniform texture. 7. Chill until set. 8. Enjoy! |
As you may have noticed, I don’t consider there to be an end-all be-all protein foam or mousse. It’s a general technique that can create quite a wide range of outcomes. If you want to make something that resembles marshmallow, then you’d make a foam using vanilla flavouring and maximum volume. If you just want a slightly aerated yoghurt, don’t add any flavourings, add very little water, and stop after only a minute or so of whipping. The same goes for the protein mousse. If you don’t whip it at all and go with sweet or fruity flavours, a protein mousse can even be a bottomless vegetarian cheesecake (or vegan cheesecake if you use a vegan fresh cheese substitute). If you like, you can also pour the mixture into a pie shape with a prepared bottom – Graham crackers or whatever – making an actual cheesecake. However, it can also be a something similar to a crème bavaroise; for instance, using coffee flavour and whipping until just aerated. Both protein foams and protein mousses have three basic variables that influence: flavour, volume, and thickness. Together they allow a wealth of choice.
Your turn
I’ve provided some basic techniques here, and a few example recipes using those techniques, to hopefully get you underway with modernist cooking. The context I’ve sketched is dieting for fat loss, but of course, most modernist cooking isn’t applied at all with the idea of fat loss. So go crazy! Make some incredible food that boggles the mind. Use your imagination and creativity. Or just stick with the basics and make your cut a little easier. Whatever you do, I hope you try some of the things I’ve mentioned here.
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