Soul food recipes continue to make quiet changes. If you listen close enough you can feel and hear sighs of relief from people who love to cook and eat this comfort food, but had concerns about the health issues. Many publishers continue to work feverishly to include healthier ingredients and cooking techniques.

In addition, another goal of many publishers is to make the southern recipes more user-friendly. Today’s users come from the fast food generation, most who were not raised or taught how to cook by parents like past generations. So, the challenge of today’s popular recipe makers is to create more dishes with the beginner in mind, many who are recipe challenged to say the least.

“This is one of the fastest growing markets to target,’ according to Randall Hughes a Recipe Publisher from Miami, Florida. Now that the generation X’ers, who were the first generation in history to grow up on fast food, have their own families – more have to learn how to cook. Combine that fact with the economic downturn, making it cheaper to cook your own meals at home, and you’ll see why more people continue to flood recipe websites. In addition, more cookbooks are being purchased, checked out at public libraries and more cooking shows popularity have spiked.

This all points to evidence of more people cooking meals at home and saving money, instead of eating out at restaurants and fast food establishments. Soul food recipes have made a sharp change from the traditional heavy-ingredient recipes of the past. This is another change made to adapt to a generation more concerned with their diet, weight and over-all health than past generations. You’ll find more ways to stir-fry, steam and sauté’ southern food. Adapting these cooking techniques and phasing out the deep fat frying, boiling and barbecuing of the past makes for healthier recipes by preserving more vitamins and nutrients in the cooking process.

Lighter ingredients, oils and seasonings is the trend for southern cooking of today. You’ll seldom find fat back, ham hocks or even bacon in many of today’s free soul food recipes. Instead smoked turkey and other natural seasonings and herbs get the most attention. The results have made southern food in style again, not only to consumers but to the medical professionals – who frowned on the ingredients contained in most traditional southern recipes of the past.

Now with the careful and successful changes to healthier ingredients, southern food continues to make a strong comeback. When you think of the words southern comfort, you know good eating is close by. Now with healthier ingredients and cooking methods you can enjoy the comfort of soul food recipes without the health concerns of the past.