The typical American food regimen is bad enough for health without partying like a college student from Thanksgiving to the New Year. Just take a look at the size of a meal when you dine out and realize it’s enough to feed a horse for a week. The holidays come and all the Hollywood shows and movies “model” the cast eating exorbitant-sized meals, drinking liquor and wine like there’s no tomorrow, and eating baked sweets like every day is their birthday.
It's tempting when sweets, potluck meals and alcohol are regularly part of the spread laid out in front of you. There are work parties, after work get-togethers, and big family meals planned. What will you do about watching out for your own health? Surely you can’t advise everyone else to “watch” what they eat and drink, at least not during the holidays. They’ll watch it alright – as they stuff it down their throats.
Top 10 tips for avoiding over-indulging in bad-for-you stuff during the holidays
#1. If baking or making sweet treats or drinks, use organic sugar, organic honey, or organic maple syrup instead of consuming GMO-sugar (refined white) and HFCS (high fructose corn syrup) – this usually means avoiding cakes, pies and cookies provided at schools and workplaces.
#2. Avoid alcoholic drinks if you can, or stick with red wine, so at least you get some health benefits from resveratrol in the grape skins. Avoid toxic liquors and mixed (and premixed) drinks that often contain sugar, artificial flavorings, artificial colorings and soda.
#3. If you love turkey on Thanksgiving, buy an organic whole turkey, and avoid lots of health pitfalls from the conventional ones. That’s right, some farmers, like on prairies, raise organic birds that are fed 100% organic feed and never get administered hormones or antibiotics.
#4. Don’t eat enormous meals, because they are usually high in fat, can put a strain on the heart, raise sugar and insulin levels, strain digestion, plus influence more drinking alcohol, vaping and smoking.
#5. Eat lots of healthy snacks throughout the day, like nuts, seeds, and fresh organic fruit, and keep your meals small, around 3 to 5 per day.
#6. Avoid foods loaded with processed oils, especially canola oil, that leads to rapid weight gain, memory loss, and even cancer.
#7. Do not over-indulge in gluten products. Gluten clogs the digestive tract, and anything that doesn’t exit your body within 24 – 48 hours becomes toxic inside you.
#8. Be careful at “potluck” meals, like at work or friends and neighbors’ parties, as you’ll have no idea what ingredients are in the products, or if someone who was sick made them, or even let them sit out too long and spoil (mold and bacteria aren’t usually visible).
#9. Find pictures of treats you want, look up the recipes, and then go buy organic ingredients to make it yourself, that way you have a little fun creating tasty treats and you don’t pay the big price on the back end of low energy, weight gain, stomach aches and headaches.
#10. Avoid dining out too much at those corporate treat outlets like Starbucks, Dunkin Donuts, and diners with mouth-watering desserts that are loaded with GMO sugar, saturated fats, and Lord-only-knows what else.
Ever had a “blow-out” meal, like at an all-you-care-to-eat meal hall? It’s easy to go overboard and feel like a fat sick dog for a few hours afterwards, especially if you pile a bunch of sugary dessert on top of that meal and try to digest it all at once. Good luck with that. Even digestive enzymes won’t save you then.
Heavy meals increase your chance of having a heart attack by four times within the first two hours after eating, because it can change the functioning of the arteries, requiring the gut to need more blood, so the heart works much harder, while blood sugar and insulin levels skyrocket.
In regard to drinking alcohol during the holidays, if you must, head for your favorite red wine, or even white wine, as they contain resveratrol from the grape skins, and that’s a bioactive compound that functions for anti-inflammatory, anti-cancer, cardio-protective, and positive blood-flow purposes.
Smoothies are always a good choice for a snack or even meal replacement, if you add some hemp protein or raw organic fiber. Tune your food news frequency to FoodSupply.news and get updates on healthy food and beverage ideas for the holiday season.
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