Did you know that the average American gains between 5 to 8 pounds between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day? It isn’t really too surprising with all the calories that come with turkey, stuffing, pie, candies, and even the delicious holiday drinks. You don’t have to gain weight though if you follow some simple tips for trimming the fat this holiday season.
1. Avoid the high calorie snacks like nuts and cheese balls. One cup of nuts is about 400 calories! Instead look for the fruit and veggie platters or bring your own. Just remember not to overdo the dip.
2. Try to stay away from alcoholic beverages and drink unsweetened fruit juices or water instead. If you just can’t imagine celebrating without a few drinks, remember the calories add up fast. For example, ½ pint of beer is 115 calories, 1 single measure of spirits (gin, rum, whiskey) is 52 calories (plus the calories in the mix), and 1 small glass of wine is 68 cal.
3. Cut the calories in stuffing and mashed potatoes in half by using calorie butter sprays instead of butter or margarine.
4. Trim the skin and fat off the turkey and eat only white meat. If you prefer the dark meat, it will add on about 30 calories for a 3 ounce serving.
5. Skip the cranberry sauce – ½ cup is 200 calories! Or just use a small amount (1 tablespoon) if you just can’t imagine your turkey without them.
6. Instead of making candied yam, which is about 400 calories per 1 cup serving, serve baked yam with a just a bit of butter or margarine. If you are invited out for dinner, offer to bring a low fat yam dish.
7. Choose a fruit salad instead of the pumpkin pie with whipped cream or the pecan pie. If you don’t believe one piece will be that fattening, check out these stats: One slice of pumpkin pie with topping is 450 calories; one slice of pecan pie is 650 calories! If you really must have the pie (or die!), choose the pumpkin pie without the topping and skip the potatoes (about 300 calories per 1 cup serving, if made with butter or margarine).
8. Remember to eat slowly. By slowing down, your body will have time to notify the brain that you've had enough and you'll end up eating less because you'll actually feel full!
9. Plan to eat the big meal for lunch and then skip supper or eat very light. Your stomach will need a few hours to digest that big meal.
10. Use a natural appetite suppressant to help you through the food pressure season. The Diet Patch or Green Tea with Hoodia will help you reduce your food cravings and food consumption by up to 55%!
Trimming the fat doesn’t have to mean no flavor and no fun. You can still enjoy your time with family and friends and not gain unwanted weight. It just takes careful planning and learning to adapt to new versions of the high fat favorites.
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2 comments:
YIKES now that's a scary thought! When you think that we're looking at just about a 5-6 week period of time--that's a lot of high calorie eating going on!! I appreciate the tips and I'm thankful that hopefully my own preferances will help cut down my gain this winter. I don't enjoy alcholic beverages other than a very rare and small glass of wine. However I love nuts of all type and the only way I can keep from going overboard on those is to simply NOT buy them or if I do at the request of others, buy them IN shell as that will slow down and force me to be aware of how much I'm eating. Another idea for cutting some fat along with using the butter sprays is to use the little "butter buds", generally found in the spice aisle here, they're little beads/buds of butter flavored additives you can use to help flavor your hot veggies, potatoes etc. Personally I'm also not making a regular pumpkin pie , I'm making instead just the pumpkin custard (aka the filling for the pie with no crust) and I"m using the artificial brown sugar and splenda to sweeten with (DH is diabetic) we'll top it with a fat free version of whipped topping instead of my traditional homemade whipped cream and family consensus says we omit all bread from the table, no bread no crackers or breadsticks and per personal choice we have baked sweet potatoes (yams) even the children prefer baked over candied (they say too sweet). I've also made ahead my own cranberry sauce again using splenda instead of sugar---the cran sauce is the one thing that I personally can NOT not have, the taste of the sauce with a bite of turkey or dressing is what to me makes the meal!!!! I make gravy for the family I personally don't care for gravy but the kidlets do and hey they only get it once or twice a year so it's a real treat to them :-)
Your "tip" #9 is one that our family started doing a good ten years ago and not due to weight concerns but because several family members have GERD and the meal is so "rich" and indeed does take a long time for digestion that some folks in the family were having a really hard time at bedtime and during the night with reflux. Moving the meal up to a "late" lunch time (generally between 1 and 2 pm for us) allows everyone to enjoy the meal, cleanup is done before dark, the kids get a long evening to play around, the adults get time to just sit and relax and enjoy conversation with each other and much less a problem with reflux at night!! Most of us skip supper and have just a very light snack such as a small bowl of cereal or yogurt topped with a "grapenuts" type cereal or some sunflower seeds or other lower calorie crunchy.
LOL this started out as a simple thanks for the tips and man did I get carried away or what?? Thanks for letting me ramble on and on like this.
This is what I'm trying to do, making a focus on NOT gaining right now and not obscessing on losing (tho I do need to drop a good 30lbs or so) but at the moment I'm going to be grateful if I make it to Jan 01 and don't gain any weight---like a comprimise with myself ya know. Another thing I've done is to focus on low cal, low fat soups esp during regular week days (homemade soups that is) they fill me up, they're like a comfort food for me (cozy on an icy day) and then when there's a special day or an office party or family gathering during the season, I can allow myself some little indulgences here and there. I'm not talking pigging out but a taste of this or that so I don't end up feeling so deprived that I DO wig out and go bonkers and eat an entire pie or ice cream log cake or something else equally insane :-)
Anyway these are great tips and I thank you for sharing!!
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