Top 5 from the Trenches: Holiday Strategies

As we all know, the holidays are a tough time to maintain healthy eating behaviors and keep exercise in place. Here at our clinic, everyone is on overload with planning and working hard to meet their Triple Imperative goals each and every week through the holidays. Thankfully, they’re having a lot of success! We made it through Thanksgiving but everyone here knows all too well that there are several other challenging holidays to tackle in the upcoming weeks. So in class we have come up with some fantastic strategies and recipes to help all of us stick with the “to-do” behaviors rather than dwell on the “not to do’s.” Last week, we focused on some holiday-themed vegetable and fruit strategies that can help people get through holiday parties and/or events. Here’s the top 5 strategies they came up with for your reading (and hopefully eating) pleasure!

1. Bring a bowl of fruit salad to an event you’re invited to. That way you can have some guaranteed healthy foods around at the party that you can graze on. (A crudités platter works well too.)
    
2. Load up on healthy produce BEFORE you go to a party or holiday event. One (Phase 2 friendly) recipe that is a hit with the people in my class: ½ cup of non-fat plain yogurt, 4 cups of sliced cucumbers, 1 teaspoon of dried mint and minced garlic. 250 calories for 5 cups of food!
    
3. Roasted vegetables to bring on a platter or to eat beforehand or keep in your fridge. You just need to prep/cut up your veggies, spray with Pam and add salt and pepper or other spices you’d like and bake at 375 degrees for 30-40 minutes. Some suggestions for roasting:
   
   Carrots, parsnips and Brussels sprouts
   Cauliflower with parsley
   Squash (acorn, butternut, etc…) sprinkled with brown sugar Splenda^®
   Potatoes with sliced red and white onion
    
4. Sample eating a new and exciting veggie or fruit for variety: i.e. okra, collard greens, papaya, lychee nut
    
5. Sample a mango lassi shake: Your favorite HMR vanilla shake plus 1 cup of very ripe, cut up mango, 6 ice cubes, and white chocolate sugar free/fat free Jell-o^® pudding. Blend and enjoy!
    

I hope that you find these strategies as helpful as they have been for my class here in the trenches. Enjoy and happy holidays!

 

by jennyb on 12/12/2012 | Share Story With a Friend

tags: Weight-Loss, Recipes, planning, strategies, holidays