Eat Out Eat Well

Snacking, Noshing, Tasting

Why Is It So Easy To Gain Weight Over The Holidays?

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Doesn’t it feel like you gain at least seven pounds of weight, all of it blubber? A lot of us start indulging at Thanksgiving (some at Halloween) and don’t stop the free style calorie fest until those onerous New Year’s Resolutions.  Then, because we feel guilty about indulgences, we swear we won’t touch another cookie or piece of cake or candy until we lose massive amounts of weight.  And then comes Valentine’s Day.

Some Facts

A study of holiday related weight gain published in The New England Journal of Medicine found that the average weight gain between Thanksgiving and New Year is slightly less than a pound.

The problem is that most of us don’t lose that extra pound that attaches itself in unwanted places and accumulates year after year. And, although the average holiday gain is only one pound, people who are already overweight tend to gain a lot more – one study found five or more pounds during the holidays.

Something To Think About

You need to eat 3,500 extra calories to gain a pound. According to the Calorie Control Council, Americans may eat more than 4,500 calories and – oh my gosh — 229 grams of fat from a combination of snacks and a traditional “turkey with all the trimmings” holiday dinner. And, that doesn’t include breakfast or leftovers!

All together, that’s more than twice times the average daily calorie intake and almost three and a half times the fat since 45 percent of the calories in the typical holiday dinner can come from fat. A scary fact: the average person may eat the equivalent of three sticks of butter during a holiday meal.

The average holiday dinner alone carries a load of 3,000 calories with many of us nibbling and noshing our way through another 1,500 calories of chips, dips and drinks and the like before and after the big meal. According to the chief exercise physiologist for the American Council on Exercise (ACE), a person who weighs 160 pounds would have to run at a moderate pace for four hours, swim for five hours, or walk 30 miles to burn off a 3,000-calorie meal. That’s a whole lot of exercise!

Where Do Extra Holiday Calories Come From?

Most extra holiday calories don’t come from the “day of” holiday meal but from unrelenting nibbling during the holiday season. It’s way too easy to add on 500 extra calories a day — which translates into a pound in a week (7 x 500 = 3500 calories, or 1 pound).

Here are some common holiday indulgences that weigh in at around 500 calories:

  • 12 ounces of eggnog
  • 1 piece of pecan pie
  • 3 ounces of mixed nuts
  • 22.5 Hershey’s Kisses
  • Starbucks’ Venti Peppermint Mocha with whipped cream
  • 4 glasses (5oz.) of wine
  • 10 regular size candy canes
  • 2-3 large Christmas cookies
  • 2.5 potato latkes
  • 4 fun-sized Snickers and 20 pieces of candy corn

What To Ask Yourself Before A Holiday Indulgence

— or for that matter, before indulgences any time of the year:

  • Do I really, really want it or is it because it looks good, smells good, or just means Christmas (or Halloween, or thanksgiving, or Hanukkah, or Valentine’s Day?
  • Is it worth the calories?
  • Do I need all of it (or any of it) to be happy or satisfied?
  • How will I feel after I eat it – both physically and emotionally?
  • What is important to me: the food, how I feel while I’m eating it, how I feel after I eat it, what the scale might say to me tomorrow morning?

Once you’ve had the conversation with yourself eat whatever is yanking your chain and love it — or be pleased with yourself that you didn’t.  Either way, you’ve made a mindful decision.

 

For more holiday eating strategies check out my soon to be released ebook:  How Not To Get Fat Over The Holidays.  I’ll let you know when it’s available from Amazon, Sony Reader, Nook, and iBooks.

Should You Blame The Turkey For Thanksgiving “Food Coma”?

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The Bird And The Berry

Turkeys and cranberries, part and parcel of our modern Thanksgiving (and Christmas) menus, are both native to the Americas.

About 46 million turkeys landed on US dinner tables last Thanksgiving, around  736 million pounds of turkey meat.  US farmers produce 735 million pounds of cranberries, 1.9 billion pounds of sweet potatoes and 931 million pounds of pumpkins.

Thanksgiving “Food Coma”

Urban myth is to blame the bird for your Thanksgiving “food coma.” Wrong.  You may have post-meal fatigue, but the turkeys are getting a bad rap.  The amount of sleep-inducing tryptophan in most turkey meals isn’t responsible for your coma-like state – blame the number of calories, the booze, and your relaxed state instead.

What Was on the First Thanksgiving Menu?

American Indians, Europeans, and cultures around the world often feasted to celebrate the harvest and to thank the higher powers for sustenance and survival.

We know that the first Thanksgiving dinner in the Plimoth (Plymouth) Colony, in October 1621 in what is now Massachusetts, was attended by about 50 English colonists and 90 Wampanoag American Indian men.

The Wampanoag killed five deer, the colonists shot wild fowl, and maybe some geese, ducks, or turkey. Some form of Indian corn was served and probably supplemented with fish, lobster, clams, nuts, wheat flour, pumpkin, squash, carrots, and peas.  They were true seasonal eaters and it was harvest time.

Was The First Thanksgiving The True Thanksgiving?

Although the 1621 Plimoth Thanksgiving is thought of as the first Thanksgiving, it was really a harvest celebration. The first “real” Thanksgiving didn’t happen until two centuries later. (In the 17th century a day of Thanksgiving was actually a day of fasting.)

What is known about the three day Plimoth gathering comes from a letter written by Edward Winslow, a leader of the Plimoth Colony in 1621.  It had been lost for 200 years and was rediscovered in the 1800s.

In 1841 Alexander Young, a Boston publisher, printed Winslow’s description of the feast and called it the “First Thanksgiving,” which caught on.

In 1863 President Lincoln declared Thanksgiving Day a national holiday. The current date for the observance of Thanksgiving, the fourth Thursday of November, was established in 1941 by President Franklin Roosevelt.

9 Easy Ways To Eat Less

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As the holiday season goes into full swing, here’s some helpful tips:

  1. Fill your plate once, whether it’s from a buffet or just from the stove top.  That’s it.  No seconds – and double-decking isn’t such a great idea, either.
  2. Use the smallest plates, bowls, and glasses you can to help you feel full even when you’re eating less. The smaller the plate the less food that can go on it. You probably won’t even know the difference because your eyes and brain are registering full plate. According to the CDC, a study looked at how adults reacted to four different portion sizes of macaroni and cheese given to them on different days. The larger the portion, the more people ate, eating 30% more when they were given the largest portion compared to the smallest one, yet they ranked their hunger and fullness similarly after both meals.  Only 45% noticed that there were differences in the size of the portions they were served.  The same optical illusion applies to glasses.  Choose taller ones instead of shorter fat ones to help cut down on liquid calories.
  3. Keep the serving bowls off of the table.  Put food on your plate and then sit down to eat it.  Serve reasonable portions on individual plates instead of helping yourself out of bowls on the table. According to an article in the May 2011 Nutrition Action Healthletter, when serving dishes are left on the table men eat 29% more and women 10% more than if those serving dishes stay on the counter.
  4. Leftovers lead to overeating so make only what you need. If you do cook enough for multiple meals pack up the extras and put them away immediately. Avoid eating the little bits of leftovers in the pots – those calories really add up – as do all of those tastes while you’re cooking and preparing.  Do enough nibbling and tasting and you come close to eating two meals.
  5. Distractions equal mindless eating. Excess calories and the size of the package your food comes in influence how much you eat. The larger the package, the more you tend to eat from it.  If you have a bag of chips in your lap as you watch TV or surf the net you don’t even realize how much you’re eating – and, in many cases, don’t gauge whether you’re full of not – so you keep eating.  If you do watch TV or work at the computer while you’re eating, don’t eat straight from the package.  Divide up the contents of one large package into several smaller portions. Put it in a bowl or on a plate.
  6. Don’t eat off of your kid’s plate, your spouse’s plate, or your friend’s plate.  The calories from someone else’s plate still count – and are oh so easy to forget about.
  7. Hide the stuff that tempts you.  Out of sight, out of mind is really true. We all tend to eat more when it’s right in front of us.  Food we like triggers cravings and eating.  So, keep the veggies in the front of the fridge and the rice pudding in the back.  Get rid of the candy dish and the stash of pop tarts in your desk drawer. If you buy jumbo size packages, put the excess somewhere inconvenient so you’ll have to work to get at it.
  8. Don’t feel obliged to eat out of courtesy – even if you don’t want the food or you’re full – just because you don’t want to hurt someone’s feelings.  Get over it – the calories are going into your mouth, not theirs.  If someone really hounds you about trying something you can always claim an allergy or that you’re eating heart healthy (claiming an upset stomach might buy you an early exit or other guests avoiding you like the plague).
  9. Pick your dining companions carefully. A study published in the New England Journal of Medicine seems to indicate that if you’re struggling with your weight, there is a good chance that your friends and family are, too. You also tend to mimic your table companions.  If they eat fast, you eat fast – if they eat a lot, you eat a lot. In his book, Mindless Eating, Brian Wansink, PhD cites a study that shows how strong the tendency is to increase the amount you eat when you eat with others.  Compared to eating alone, you eat on average:
  • 35% more if you eat with one other person
  • 75% more with four at the table
  • 96% more with a group of seven or more.

 

Are You Using The Holidays As An Excuse To (Over)Eat?

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Gotta have the Christmas cookies, the candied yams, the stuffing with pecans, both pumpkin and pecan pies, the peanut brittle, eggnog, and whatever else your particular holiday, culture, and family traditions dictate.

Really???

Ask yourself why.  Are your groaning table and edible holiday delights really because of tradition – or, in part, an excuse to surround yourself with the food you love and want to eat?

There is nothing wrong with tradition and wanting to share your memories and love through food.

Are Holidays An Excuse To (Over)Eat?

The big question to ask yourself is:  am I really sharing/holding to tradition and memories of the season – or am I using the holidays as an excuse to make and eat a whole lot of food that I really would prefer not to eat – or eat in such quantity?

Most people who know me also know that I bake really good Christmas cookies – for a lot of events, not just Christmas.  I baked them for a party for my son’s July wedding (not a Christmas tree in sight) and as I brought them out there was a chorus of “Christmas cookies” from his friends who have eaten them many times before.  Didn’t matter that it was July.  The recipe was the same, they tasted the same, and they came from my kitchen.

What’s my point?  I love baking these cookies, and I love sharing them.  There are a whole host of emotions wrapped around these cookies.

I also know that I love eating them.  Have I ever used an occasion as an excuse to bake them – even though things would have been fine without the cookies?  You bet I have.

Why?  I love those cookies.  I love to eat them.  I love to eat the dough (I’m really not endorsing that – It’s a bad habit and the dough does have raw egg in it).

The bottom line is that I end up eating hundreds of calories – delicious, but not healthy ones – that I certainly don’t need.  And, even though I’m sharing what I consider to be “a little bit of love from my kitchen,” I still, very frequently, use the holiday or the event as an excuse.

Some Helpful Hints

I’m certainly not advocating giving up baking Christmas cookies or whatever your specialty or tradition is.  What I am suggesting is that you ask yourself the reason for doing so.  Recognize and be mindful of your reasons.

  • If you do make your specialty – plan for it.  Make it and then keep it out of sight (out of mind).  Eat it with everyone else – not in a constant stream of tasting and little snatches from the fridge or cupboard.
  • Store your amazing food out of sight and, hopefully, out of mind.  Far away, too.  Usually if we have to work to get food it may take some of the desire out of it.  So store the food in the basement or someplace out of the kitchen.
  • Leftovers?  Send them home with your family and friends.  I’ve fed lots of college dorms and offices with my leftovers.  Freeze them and store them in the back of the freezer where you can’t see them (although I can attest that frozen Christmas cookies are great – my sons once ate a whole container of them out of my downstairs freezer without my knowing about it.  Had to bake another batch before Christmas dinner.)

Traditions are important and food is nurturing.  Traditions, family, and holidays can also be stressful.  Cook away if that’s your pleasure. Just ask yourself if you are using holidays, traditions, guests, and family as excuses to (over)eat. 

Free Food Is Hard To Resist (And A Caloric Nightmare)

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Morning meeting.  Right in front of you: platter loaded with bagels, danish, and doughnuts parked next to giant coffee urns.  A freebie breakfast and the beginning of a blood sugar roller coaster ride.

No worries if you miss the morning carb fest – if all the platters aren’t picked clean the remnants will surely end up in the snack room next to the birthday cake (it’s always somebody’s birthday) or the leftover cookies from someone’s party the night before.

Costco on the weekend.  There are at least three tables manned by people offering you samples of hot pizza, luscious cheesecake, or tooth-picked pigs ‘n blankets.   Just the right size to quickly and neatly pop into your mouth – especially when you circle back for seconds.

Errands. Stops at the cleaners, the tailors, the veterinarian, the hair salon.  On the desk or counter:  giant bowls piled high with freebie candy.  You can dig deep for the kind you like – Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, mini Snickers, Tootsie Roll pops.  You name it — it’s usually there for the taking.

Party or wedding.  How do you escape the platters of salami, cheese, mini quiches, and then the desserts covered with icing, whipped cream, and powdered sugar?

What’s The Problem With Free Food?

Not a thing if you don’t care about calories, nutrition, and how you’ll feel after an overload of sugar, fat, and salt.  Tons of “starving” students and young (and not so young) adults have chowed down on ample quantities of free food.  Here’s the question:  are full bellies with no impact on the wallet ultimately the best choice?

Occasional dips into free food are probably not going to hurt anyone in reasonable health.  But, on a consistent basis, there is certainly a downside to your health.  There could me a more immediate concern, too.  A whole bunch of non-nutritious (junk, processed, and high calorie) food eaten right before a time when intense concentration and focus is necessary (translation:  exams and presentations) could certainly have a negative impact.

Why Do We Find Free Food So Attractive?

Most of us find it pretty darn hard to ignore “free food,” the food that’s just there for the taking. It’s everywhere – and we’ve become accustomed to valuing cheap calories.  Think about it:  when was the last time you resisted the peanuts, pretzels, or popcorn sitting on the bar counter?  What about the breadbasket – that’s usually free, too.

We don’t have to eat any of this stuff.  But we do.  Why?  Some of us have trouble passing up a giveaway regardless of what it is.  Some see it as a way to save money – despite possible negative health consequences.  And a lot of us use “free” as an excuse or sanction to eat or overeat sweet, salty, fatty junk food.

And the calories?  Free doesn’t mean calorie free.  But it’s all too easy to forget about those calories you popped in your mouth as you snagged candy here and tasted a cookie there.  Yikes.  You could eat a day’s worth of calories cruising through a couple of markets and food stores.

Before The Freebies Land In Your Mouth

How about creating your own mental checklist that, with practice, can help you figure out whether or not it’s worth it to indulge.  Even f you decide to go for it and taste the salami, butter cookies, and cheese cake, at least you’ll have made a mindful decision rather than mindlessly shoving food in your mouth.

Ask yourself:  Is the food you’re so willing to pop in your mouth . . .

  • fresh and tasty, with some nutrition?  It might be if you’re at a wedding or an event, but the odds go down if it’s food handed out at the supermarket or grabbed out of a large bowl at the cleaners.
  • clean?  How many fingers have been in the bowl of peanuts or have grabbed pieces of cheese or cookies off of an open platter?
  • something you really want – or are you eating it just because it’s there?
  • loaded with fat, sugar, and salt that adds up to mega calories?  Every calorie counts whether it’s popped in your mouth and gone in the blink of an eye or savored more slowly and eaten with utensils off of a plate.

Choices, Choices

Just because food is free doesn’t mean you have to eat it. No one is forcing you.  Beware of the cascading effect:  if you let yourself sample the candy, pizza, cheesecake, popcorn, or cookies, perhaps you’re giving yourself permission to continue to overindulge in food you probably don’t want to/shouldn’t be eating.

Highly caloric, sugary, and fatty foods can act as the key to opening the flood gates that cause you to continue to indulge for the rest of the day (weekend/week). Loading up on simple sugars – the kind found in candy, cookies, cake, and many processed foods – causes your blood sugar level to spike and then to drop –leaving you hungry very quickly and pretty darn cranky — and isn’t great for your waistline, either.