First for Women: Comfort Foods Can Actually Be Healthy — Tasty Ingredient Swaps Are the Secret, According to Nutritionist

By Alexandria Brooks
February 28, 2023

Get tips for making family faves good for you!

You might think that maintaining a balanced diet means limiting comfort foods. Indeed, foods like flaky biscuits and corn chowder are laden with butter and heavy cream. However, there are ways to make family favorite meals minus the unhealthy ingredients. It’s merely a matter of finding the right substitutions.

If you’re wondering how to swap traditional ingredients for health-boosting alternatives without losing the flavor you love, you’re not alone, which is why we consulted with Maya Feller, MS, RD, CDN, a registered dietician nutritionist and author of Eating from Our Roots. Feller’s specialty is putting a healthy spin on classic comfort food dishes (so they can be enjoyed without the guilt). Below, she shares nutritional insights and advice that will help you health-ify your family’s favorite recipes.

How To Make Healthy Comfort Food
Feller’s food expertise fuels her desire to make healthy eating less restrictive. Rather than making drastic changes to your eating habits, she recommends using lifelong comfort foods as a starting point for introducing new and healthy ingredients to your diet. Using her new book Eating from Our Roots (Buy from Amazon, $25.99) as a guide, we asked her some questions. Here’s what she had to say.

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