10 Holiday Eating Tips

1. Enjoy! The holidays are a great time to gather with family and friends and eat incredible foods. Don’t miss out!

2. Balance. Most people do eat more calories during the holiday stretch. Think about ways to increase your activity to balance out the excess calories. Walk more during your workday. Extend your walk or run by 5-10 minutes. Take the train or bus and get off a stop earlier.Take the stairs during your workday. Small increases in activity can make a big difference.

3. Think Mediterranean. Go for savory vegetables, beans, legumes, nuts, whole grains, yogurt and olive oil whenever possible and use spices to help enhance flavor rather than an extra pat of butter or salt.

4. Focus on colorful vegetables. Most holiday meals are rich in vegetables such as squash, sweet potatoes, green beans, spinach, turnips and Brussels sprouts. These foods are an excellent way to include a good dose of protective antioxidants. Make your vegetable portions bigger than you normally do at holiday time. Fill your plate with color. (more…)

Butter Me Up?

I keep getting asked about saturated fat after several flashy media reports about sat fat not being the cause of heart disease. The answer isn’t so simple. To me, it begs for a heavy dose of simple common sense.

Here’s an email response to a friend about this topic over the summer. It summarizes my thoughts without getting into the nitty gritty of nutrition epidemiology. I thought it would be worth sharing. Here it is: