Today we are more health conscious than ever but it feels like bad timing around certain holidays like Valentine's Day. Everybody wants homemade goodies. They're as much a part as most of our lives as our favorite song or movie. So how do you keep the taste and reduce the guilt? It's easy; with a few simple tips...

Most baked goods have a few common ingredients; AKA, the usual suspects. These include types of shortening, oil, eggs, sugar and flour. This is great news for us because each of these has a substitute or alternate that is not only just as tasty, but also often saves us some cash depending on what substitutes we use.

Shortening and Oils: This is typically some sort of fat, butter or margarine, or vegetable/seed oil in the case of oils. For the most part these are just there to make a dry mix moist and add consistency. I like to use butter for it's other healthy properties and taste. However I typically like to use one third less than the recipe calls for and it always works out fine. If you really want to cut it out completely, consider select fruit juices or applesauce. Most cookie and cake mixes will provide substitution information somewhere on the package, explaining what you can use and how much you will need.

Eggs: If you have a recipe calling for more than one egg, it helps if you either replace one-half or more of the eggs with low-fat egg substitute or two egg whites for each egg being replaced. Replacing all the eggs usually cuts into the texture and consistency so leaving one or two is OK. By the way, you're saving 50 to 60 calories, 4 to 6 grams of fat and a lot of cholesterol for each egg you replace with this method.

Sugar: I don't like to drop name brands but Splenda has a pretty good foothold on sugar substitutes available in volume for baking. They also provide substitution tables so you use just the right amount. If you like actual sugar, just go for the natural type.

Flour: Flour itself is not the big problem here; the bleached all purpose white flour that is the problem. Unfortunately substituting all that processed stuff for wheat flour usually alters enough consistency that people notice. That said, I find splitting the difference and substituting half the bleached flour with half what flour does the trick nicely.

That's it. Happy baking!