I was asked on Laura's Wholesome Junk Food facebook fan page, "How can I eat my favorite treats during the holidays and keep the pounds off or lose the weight quickly?" What a delicious question!
There are a few quick and easy tips to help you indulge in your favorite treats and stay trim.
1) Get enough sleep -- yes sleep is important and I write about it all the time. Sleep helps you to think clearly and make good decisions about things like food and working out. We all know if we are tired that we pick the naughty foods and don't feel like going to the gym. So, keep your regular routine of getting sleep to the best of your ability. Lots of late nights with food and drink lead to lots of following days where food choices are less healthy and exercise less frequent. Leave the party at 10:00pm even if it goes to midnight. You're jeans will be happy you did.
2) Reduce your alcohol, white sugar and table salt intake and increase raw fruits, vegetable and water. Alcohol, white sugar and table salt lead most of us to feeling bloated, having low energy and retaining water. The worst part is, our clothes get tight and our face looks puffy. I drink water or juice in a wine glass to feel festive and my body thanks me the next day. If you ate over-salted food at a party or over indulged in desserts, eat mostly fresh fruits and vegetables (like strawberries, kale, green beans, watermelon, apples, etc) for the next few days. That allows your body to lose the extra water it retained from the salt and also lose the puffiness from the sugar.
3) My favorite tip is to make great holiday food for yourself. In The Wholesome Junk Food Cookbook, we have lots of holiday treats that are made in a way that taste amazing and are made with guilt-free ingredients. For example, here is a healthy recipe for pumpkin pie. It can taste great but just make it with agave or maple syrup and it is healthier. Use sea salt and organic milk or coconut milk. Certain cookbooks, like The Wholesome Junk Food cookbook, offer recipes that make great tasting treats without white sugar, bad fats and table salt. Make some of your favorite treats, bring them to parties so you know you have guilt-free ways to indulge during the holidays.
Starting Laura's Wholesome Junk Food was all about how to indulge in a way that my jeans would still fit. So, during the holidays, take great care of yourself and help the others around you indulge guilt-free as well.
There are many roads to good nutrition. My road was to eat foods I love in ways that I stay trim and feel good. To learn more about what I believe, here are some key ingredients to add to your pantry. And, learning about tasty foods is fun and making and consuming them even better. Bake decadent foods with your kids or friends and make the holidays a time of pure, "jeans loving" indulgence.