Staying Healthy During the Holidays

Staying Healthy this Thanksgiving

By Jennifer Livingston−

The holidays are a tricky time of year, wrought with peril in the forms of decadent desserts, fat-laden gravies, and deep-fried everything. All of these things are an affront to your waistline and your health, but thankfully, you can avoid or at least mitigate the damage Thanksgiving brings by following these steps.

Use Healthier Fats, And Less Fat Overall

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Years of ill-deserved bad press has left butter with a terrible reputation, but recent research suggests it’s not the demon that it’s made out to be. The real danger lies in manmade fats, like margarine, that are typically filled with trans fats. These fats are unstable and are directly linked to heart disease and obesity. A better option would be the aforementioned butter, particularly grass-fed butters, which are high in heart-healthy omega 3 fatty acids. In addition, you can try cooking with coconut oil, a saturated fat that tastes wonderfully like coconut, and if you’re not into that flavor, refined coconut oil provides the health benefits with a neutral taste. Speaking of health benefits, coconut oil is loaded with them because it’s composed nearly entirely of medium-chain triglycerides, which are immediately used for energy, raise HDL cholesterol (the good kind), and is very satiating, keeping you less hungry for longer. Just keep in mind that even with healthy types, fat still adds a lot of calories, so use it sparingly to help keep off the pounds.

Keep Your Carbs In Check

Thanksgiving dinner is often filled with stuffing, breads, pies, and cake, along with a host of other high-carb, delicious treats. Though they’re wonderful at the time, the combination of fat and sugar means a big rush of insulin and a subsequent addition of pounds. A few tweaks to favorite recipes – crustless pies, sugar-free pudding, cauliflower mash instead of mashed potatoes – will help you reduce your sugar intake. Small amounts of change to each dish can mean a big drop in calories over the course of the meal, meaning you’re saving a lot of guilt when you wake up the next day.

Make Your Meals With Whole Foods

A lot of what comes out on the shelves during Thanksgiving is pre-boxed, canned, or frozen. Often times, these things are sitting in oil, sugary syrups, or are filled with extra sodium. By using fresh vegetables, meats, and dairy, you know exactly what’s going into your dishes, where it came from, and how much you’re using. Though it might take extra effort, you’ll be saving calories and a slew of chemicals by opting for built-from-scratch recipes over boxed or bagged solutions.

Be Sure To Have A Backup Plan

Memories of Thanksgiving are often memories of a meal that found you strapped for time. In that instant, it’s often starchy breads, fatty dips, or sugary treats that hold your guests over while you finish up. Having healthy emergency foods on hand will go a long way to make sure nobody is famished and you’re able to stay on-track with your diet. A veggie tray with a Greek yogurt dip, a delicious soup as a first course that can be made the night before and sit to simmer on the stove, or a pan full of roasted vegetables hot and crispy from the oven, can mean the difference between satisfied guests and frustrated guests. For your own personal day-to-day during the rushed holiday season, roasted almonds, apples and peanut butter, or real dairy cheese sticks can all serve as a deterrent to eating from the drive-thru or grabbing a toaster pastry.

Ultimately, the holidays present us with a lot of food temptations. It’s up to us to ride them out and stick to our healthy commitments, but having sensible food prepared, taking a bit more time to cook real food, and knowing the difference between good fat and bad fat will all add up to a healthy new year.

 

Jennifer Livingston is a freelance writer who specializes on topics related to health, fitness and family. When she is not writing she likes to bake, read and travel.

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Staying Healthy During the Holidays
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