How to Enjoy the Holidays Without Alcohol

A lot of people find themselves drinking more this time of year than any other, with the intention of balancing things out by doing a detox in January. The holidays can be a difficult time to start a more mindful approach to alcohol but there are still lots of ways to enjoy yourself with little or no alcohol involved. If you’re trying to avoid putting on weight this holiday season, it’s a good idea to limit how much alcohol you drink. Liquid calories from alcohol (and mixers such as pop) can mean that you consume far more calories than you intended and it’s not great for your health either. By cutting back, your waistline and your health will thank you!

Know why you’re doing it

What’s your main reason for ditching alcohol? Maybe you want to get healthier or lose weight. Or maybe you don’t enjoy the headaches and fatigue the next day if you’ve over indulged. Whatever the reason(s), write it down and pin it somewhere obvious. To really reinforce it in your mind, you can put stickies in lots of different places to keep reminding you whenever your motivation takes a hit.

It’s also helpful to think about why you tend to reach for alcohol in the first place. Is it a confidence booster? Do you feel better about yourself when you start drinking? Or do you feel obliged to drink because your social circle does? This can help you to work out whether you’re drinking alcohol because you really enjoy it or because there’s something deeper going on that you need to address.

Be selective with accepting invitations

If you know that alcohol is going to be the main part of an event and you don’t want to drink much (or any) alcohol, you might want to think twice about accepting an invitation. It can be a lot harder to stick to your guns when you’re not drinking alcohol, although there is often the option to swap alcoholic drinks for non-alcoholic versions and still get involved in the party atmosphere. If you can see potential for going easy on the alcohol and still being part of the event, go ahead and accept the invitation.

Stick to true holiday pleasures and avoid the rest

Love a bit of mulled wine or rum and eggnog over the holidays? Treat yourself to the odd glass and ditch everything else alcoholic. You can look forward to these little pleasures much more and really savor it. Chances are, the rest of the alcohol you’d normally drink isn’t such a lovely treat and may even just be a habit.

Visualize yourself having fun without alcohol

It can be hard to imagine yourself having fun without alcohol if you’ve previously used it to boost your confidence to help you to relax. One tip that can work well involves visualization. More specifically, you can visualize yourself effortlessly enjoying holiday events without any alcohol at all. Visualization can be a powerful mental tool – so much so that elite athletes use it prepare for sporting events. If you can “see” yourself having a great time without alcohol, it’s much easier for this to happen in reality.

Get like-minded friends on board

Holiday events can be super hard if you’re the only one not drinking, but it’s a whole different ball game if you have supportive friends on board to get you through. Depending on why you’ve decided to ditch alcohol, you might be surprised how easy it is to encourage your friends to join you in your efforts.

Keep a drink in hand

Keeping a non-alcoholic drink in your hand at holiday events can stop any well-intentioned offers of an alcoholic drink. If you have a drink already, there’s far less chance that you’ll end up caving due to peer pressure. If you’re still offered an alcoholic drink, just say “I’m good, thanks!” and move on. There’s no need to explain why you’re not going gaga for another drink or a top up. This can work well in situations where you don’t want to make a big deal about not drinking but you don’t want to feel obliged to drink either.

Commit yourself to being truly present at events

If you’d normally drink for social reasons, get into the habit of not hiding behind alcohol and really committing yourself to being part of the event. This can be super hard if you’re not used to showing your real self and you know there will be strangers at the event. But if you’re just catching up with friends or family, give alcohol a miss. You’ll probably find that you enjoy yourself a lot more than you think.

In Health & Happiness
Dr. Tara Clapp, ND

It has 14 healthy recipes to either bring to a party or to serve at one you are hosting!

How to Eat Healthy & Still Have Fun This Holiday Season

Trying to eat healthy can seem like a monumental challenge over the holiday season, especially if you’ve been invited to parties and are worried that the food will ruin your healthy eating efforts. Party food can be super tempting and it can derail all of your good intentions but here’s the good news: you’re much more in control than you might think and there’s plenty you can do to stay on track and still have fun.

Get plenty of sleep

On paper, you might not think that the amount of sleep you get the night before will matter too much. In reality, a bad night’s sleep can mean that you eat hundreds more calories more the next day. And that’s bad news if you want to avoid calorie heavy and unhealthy party food! Try to get to bed early the night before parties and you can cut out the potential for overeating.

Don’t turn up hungry at parties

If you’ve ever found yourself picking up junk food in the grocery store while shopping hungry, you’ll know the negative impact it can have on your food choices. And this is why you don’t want to show up to holiday parties on an empty stomach either.

If you’re tempted to eat little (or nothing!) before you go out this holiday season, think again! You might assume you’ll be “saving” your calories for later but you’re more likely to be giving yourself the green light to eat a lot more than you intended.

It’s fine to leave a bit of room for festive food but you definitely don’t want to be ravenous when you turn up. This is a surefire recipe for wanting to eat everything in sight!

Eat a filling snack 20 to 30 minutes before you leave home, such as nuts and a piece of fruit. This can be super helpful for stopping you snacking at the party.

Don’t restrict yourself

Tempted to eat less or work out more in the run up to a holiday party? This can work against you as you’re more likely to overeat when you get there. You’re usually better off sticking to your normal eating and fitness plans and trying to make good food choices.

Go for healthier options

If there’s a mix of healthy and not-so-healthy choices at the buffet table, it’s the perfect opportunity to make sure that you can enjoy some guilt-free party foods.

Spot some cut up veggies? Grab a handful. They’ll help to fill you up and won’t pile on the calories. Just make sure that you don’t dunk them in high calorie dips that are also likely to be loaded with fat too. Guacamole or hummus are good choices, but most other dips will be a calorie bomb.

Research suggests that you’ll eat more calories on your first trip to the buffet table, so you can do yourself a big favor if you go for healthier and low calorie options then.

Eat mindfully

It takes around 20 minutes for your stomach to let your brain know that you’re full. In that time, you could easily have eaten the equivalent of a meal without even thinking about it.

Taking a more mindful approach to your eating can help to avoid this. To start things off, go for small helpings of the party food you fancy and really savor eating them. Small bites and chewing your food thoroughly can be super helpful for this.

When you’re done, distract yourself for a bit. Work the room and get talking to other party guests to stop mindless snacking and check in with yourself 20 minutes later to see if you’re really still hungry. Chances are, you’ll find that you’re not.

Don’t forget about liquid calories

It’s not just what you put on your plate that you need to think about – liquid calories also count and they can add up more than you think. Alcohol and pop are empty calories and don’t add nutritional value at all. That’s not to say that you can’t drink – just be mindful of what you drink and what it’s contributing in terms of calories, sugars and so on.

Try drinking a glass of water in between alcoholic drinks in particular to pace yourself and keep yourself hydrated. That way, you can still imbibe, but you’re not going to go overboard.

Sit away from the buffet

Really don’t trust yourself not to keep making trips to the buffet? Position yourself so that you’re not standing anywhere near it. If the food is within reach, there’s so much more potential for mindless snacking even when you’re not at all hungry. The further away you are, the more you have to make a conscious decision to walk over to the buffet.

^References:

^{https://www.forbes.com/sites/alicegwalton/2016/11/02/the-vicious-cycle-of-sleep-deprivation-and-overeating/#1f3fbfa3af02}

In Health & Happiness
Dr. Tara Clapp, ND

It has 14 healthy recipes to either bring to a party or to serve at one you are hosting!

Is Raw Food Better Than Cooked Food?

Raw Food vs. Cooked Food – Which Is Healthier?

Do you already eat a variety of healthy foods, and want to know how to get the most vitamins and minerals out of them?  You’re probably not surprised that there isn’t a “one size fits all” approach to maximizing the vitamins and minerals your body absorbs from foods.

And I’ll tell you that the answer isn’t as simple as “raw is always better” or “cooked is always better.”  As with most nutrition science, it depends on several factors. Some vitamins are destroyed in cooking, while others become easier to absorb (a.k.a. more “bioavailable”). Of course, in the grand scheme of a well-balanced, nutrient-dense, varied, whole foods diet, the cooked vs. raw debate isn’t that critical for most people.

Let me go over which types of foods are best eaten raw, and which ones are best eaten cooked to maximize their nutritional benefit and put an end to the debate of raw vs. cooked.

 Foods to Eat Raw

As a general rule, water-soluble vitamins, such as vitamin C and the B vitamins, found mostly in fruits and vegetables, are best eaten raw.

There are two main reasons for this:

First, when foods are heated (be it steaming, boiling, roasting, or frying) the water-soluble nutrients tend to be destroyed. Vitamin C and the B vitamins are a bit more “delicate” and susceptible to heat than many other nutrients.

Of course, the obvious way to combat these nutrient losses is to eat foods high vitamin C and B vitamins in their raw form (like in an awesome salad) or to cook them for as short a time as possible (like quickly steaming or blanching).

FUN FACT: Raw spinach can contain three times the amount of vitamin C as cooked spinach.

The second reason why foods high in vitamin C and the B vitamins are best eaten raw is that they’re “water soluble.”  So, guess where the vitamins go when they’re cooked in water?  Yes, they’re dissolved right into the water.  This is particularly true for fruits and veggies that are boiled and poached but even for foods that are steamed as well.

Of course, if you’re a savvy health nut, you’ll probably keep that liquid to use in your next soup or sauce to preserve those nutrients that are left after cooking. Just don’t overheat it or you may lose what you were aiming to keep.

But, how much loss are we talking about?  Well, of course it ranges, but can go from as low as 15%, up to over 50% nutrient content loss.

In short, the water-soluble vitamins like vitamin C and the B vitamins degrade with heat and some of what’s left over after they’re heated dissolves into the cooking water. So be sure to cook your fruits and veggies as little as possible and keep that cooking water to use in your next recipe.

Tips for raw nuts and seeds: it may be beneficial to soak them for several hours at room temperature.  This allows some of the minerals to become “unlocked” from their chemical structure, so they’re more absorbable.

Foods to Eat Cooked:

Cooking certain orange and red “beta-carotene rich” veggies (e.g. tomatoes, carrots, & sweet potatoes) can help make this fat-soluble pre-vitamin A compound more absorbable.

FUN FACT: One study found that absorption of beta-carotene was 6.5 times greater in stir-fried carrots than in raw carrots!

Of course, eating your fat-soluble vitamins with a bit of fat will help you to absorb more of them, so that’s one factor to consider.

In another study, blood lycopene levels increased 80% more when people consumed tomatoes sautéed in olive oil rather than without.

One vegetable that’s best eaten both raw and cooked?

Spinach!

And I’m not just saying this to get everyone to eat it any way possible (although, I would love for this to happen…unless you’re allergic, of course).

Spinach contains so many beneficial compounds that it’s great eaten both raw and cooked.

Eating raw spinach preserves the water-soluble vitamins C & the B vitamins.

However, eating cooked spinach allows the pre-vitamin A, as well as some of the minerals like iron to be better absorbed. Not to mention how much spinach reduces in size when it’s cooked, so it’s easier to eat way more cooked spinach than raw spinach.

So, the old nutrition philosophy of making sure you get a lot of nutrient-dense whole foods into your diet holds true. Feel free to mix up how you eat them, whether you prefer raw or cooked just make sure you eat them.

Recipe (cooked spinach): Sautéed Spinach

Serves 4

2 teaspoons olive oil
2 cloves garlic
1 bag baby spinach leaves
1 dash salt
1 dash black pepper
Fresh lemon

1. In a large cast iron pan heat olive oil.
2. Add garlic and sauté for 1 minute.
3. Add spinach, salt, pepper and toss with garlic and oil.
4. Cover pan and cook on low for about 2 minutes.
5. Sauté cook spinach for another minute, stirring frequently, until all the spinach is wilted.
6. Squeeze fresh lemon juice on top.

Serve & enjoy!

Tip: Enjoying the cooked spinach with the vitamin C in the “raw” lemon juice helps your body absorb more of the iron.

References:

https://authoritynutrition.com/cooking-nutrient-content/
http://www.precisionnutrition.com/10-ways-to-get-the-most-nutrients/