Tag Archives: substitutions

Holiday Food and Sabotage

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Here is my blog for Holiday Food with Your Family Friends and Low-Carb Substitutions that can be made.

https://skinny-rules.com/2013/11/24/holiday-food-time-and-delicious-low-carb-substitutions/

However, today’s blog is about holiday parties–family, friends or work.  This time of year, I hear a lot about people being surrounded by parties with bad food choices, bad drink choices, alcohol and desserts galore.  I went to my chiropractor and there were many chocolate items there.

healthsabotage

5 Things You Can Do To Not Gain Weight at Holiday Parties!

1.  Take a piece of food or dessert, if you must, take a bite and then toss it in the trash when no one is looking.  A bite won’t kill your diet, but if you can’t say no to the rest, then this strategy is not for you.

2.  Just say “NO!” Seriously, how much do you love yourself and your commitment to your diet?  Most of the sugar and GMO products are not good for your health anyway.  Do you care at all about how it will affect you?  Stop poisoning yourself with white sugar.

3.  EAT before you get there.  You are more likely to nibble on healthy things because you are not ravenous.  You can nibble on fruit and vegetables, and have water or if you must, one hard liquor cocktail.  The more you have wine, beer or champagne–and especially fruit cocktails, the more carbohydrates you are consuming unnecessarily.  I have had someone tell me that they go to these things and are hungry and then, the bad food looks extra good to them  and it is harder to say, “No!”  Why tempt yourself?  Why drive yourself crazy?  Eat an egg, cheese, nuts, a piece of fruit, yogurt–something low carb and healthy before you get there.  If you know for sure that there are good low-carb food items, then you need not worry.

4.  If you know the host, you could make a request for something like a vegetable platter or low-fat meat and low-fat cheese platter.

5.  Don’t succumb to peer pressure to eat badly.  Most people NOT on a diet, who know that they SHOULD be on one, can’t wait to watch someone doing well on a diet–fall off of their diet.  It makes them feel better about themselves being heavier or enjoying thinking they are the best looking person in the room.  So, don’t give them this satisfaction.

foodsabotage

I get pleasure in telling people, “NO! Stop pressuring me!”  Worse case scenario, just blame your doctor and say you are under a doctor’s care and these are his orders.  If they are NOSEY and ask you for what–“tell them that you don’t like talking about it.”  And if they ask again, repeat what I just wrote.  If they ask the third time, then you have a right to say, “I would appreciate it if you stop trying to delve into my medical history. I like to keep it private.”  I hate nosey people.

And the same thing goes for the alcohol.  Alcohol has to be very limited to NOTHING during the weight loss process.  If your body is busy using its energy to metabolize the alcohol in your liver, then there is no energy left during that period to break down fat.  

I want to stay thin, I rarely drink.  I gain easily.  It is not worth it to me.  I prefer being thin.  Much more fun than eating something that goes inside in less than a minute.  Thin lasts longer.

Thanksgiving Post Mortem and YummybCauliflower Cheese Souffle/Casserole Instead of Mashed Potatoes or Stuffing

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I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving!  It was nice to stay home in my pajamas.  But, I was smart and I did an hour on the elliptial too!

Now, let’s get down to business.

My dinner was about 15g of carbs and my dessert, which will be one of my six proteins for the day, will be about two hours after dinner for another 16g of carbs.

Not bad.  Remember, I want to keep my carbs between 50 and 100g a day.

Some people can do about 200g of carbs or more on Thanksgiving without blinking an eye.  A piece of pie is over 50g of carbs, in of itself.  The potatoes, casseroles, bread, stuffing–will kill anyone’s diet or make someone need to go on one.

My Diet Soapbox:

My belief is that Halloween starts the cycle and following guilt of over eating of sweets, and this puts people in a tailspin of weight gain.  Then,  Thanksgiving really does them in and then they say, “screw it”,  and keep up the damage with a bad Christmas dinner, parties with a lot of bad food, alcohol and candy, cookies and cakes all month long at work.

This is why the diet industry is so big.  You have to learn how to do a holiday wisely and then be ok most of the year and not mess yourself up.  The cycle of putting on the weight and then losing it half the year, not only sucks, but is hard on  your body.

Ok, enough said, so this was my T Day dinner:

Salad (not shown), sliced turkey breast and a touch of gravy with a dish of twice-baked cauliflower cheese was quite enough food.  I was stuffed.  Looking forward though to my low-carb dessert later sugar free pumpkin cheesecake flavored frozen yogurt.

The recipe that I posted for the twice-baked cauliflower needs adjustment.  In my opinion, it was missing some things.  So, here is my adjustment.  (forget the bacon bits-yeck)

MISTAKE IN THE PICTURE:  I SHOULD HAVE USED SHREDDED CHEESE, ALL OVER THE TOP.  MORE CHEESY WOULD HAVE BEEN SO MUCH TASTIER.  It was good, but I love cheese!

Here is the picture of the two that I put back in the oven and put enough cheese on top and boy, can’t wait to eat those.  Looks like cheese souffle!

Aylene’s Twice Baked Cauliflower Recipe

1 medium head of Cauliflower

Sour Cream, 1/4 to 1/2 a cup.  Depends on how milky you want it

Chopped Chives or onion, 1 tsp

1 cup of shredded cheese (you choose the cheese.  I think Cheddar is great)

If you love bacon, cook a couple of strips and break it up in it.  I am skipping bacon.

Butter, salted, 1 tbsp

Garlic powder,  1/2  tsp
Salt, 1 dash
Pepper, black, 1 dash

Directions

Cook cauliflower until tender (10-15 min.).
Preheat oven to 400F.
Chop fine with pastry blender, potato masher or knife.
Add all ingredients together in a medium bowl, fold until mixed.
Use cooking spray on 4 seven ounce ramekins or other small oven safe dishes and spoon mixture into dishes.
**IMPORTANT**  If you want this sucker to be totally delish, you have to put extra shredded cheese on the top of the mixture so that when it bakes, it is extra cheesy on the top.  If you don’t do this, it is kind of boring.
Place all small dishes on a cookie sheet for easier handling.
Bake for 15 minutes on middle rack and then broil for a few minutes until top is golden brown.
Makes 4 servings.
Number of Servings: 4
I hope that if you did any damage, you try not to continue the damage with leftovers.  Give them away.  Be good to yourself and learn to make adjustments to meals that are better for you and you can wake up in the morning and fit into your clothes.

Thanksgiving: Time to be with friends and family, not time to pig out!

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It is Thanksgiving time.  I will devote the next few blog reports on how to deal with Thanksgiving and your diet!

You are going to be surrounded by holiday candy, pumpkin bread, pies, etc.  I meet a lot of people who give up on their diet at the holidays or don’t even start with the excuse that they will start after the holidays are over.

Don’t do it!

You need to take control of your life.  You cannot have this excuse again.  You have had it for years and it is the reason you are heavy or gain the weight back.  Something has to change.  How you view food has to change.

So, it is the holidays.   You think that the Thanksgiving pilgrims thought that you should gorge yourself with carbs at the holidays for them?  NO.  The message behind these holidays is about being grateful and celebrating a special day.  It has nothing to do with sugary carbs.  Thanksgiving was about sitting down and “breaking bread”, so to speak,  with the American Indians, in the spirit of cooperation.

WHAT THE PILGRIMS ATE:

The first Thanksgiving feast would have looked very strange to our modern eyes, consisting mainly of corn and meat. The spirit of the celebration would be easy for us to understand, because then, as now, Thanksgiving is a reminder of the bounty of the Earth and the importance of hard work and cooperation.

Cheese:

You might be surprised to know how different the first Thanksgiving dinner was from what we enjoy today.  They might have had cheese made from goat’s milk.

A Variety of Meats

The pilgrims and the Indians had some type of fowl and venison. The pilgrims often hunted fowl for a special feast follwing the harvest. Wild turkeys are native to New England, as are pheasants. Both were enjoyed by the pilgrims and Native-Americans alike and were included in the feast. The Native-Americans brought venison; some of the braves went hunting and brought back five deer to share. Other meats that may have been on the table include lobster, seal and swans.

The food was placed on the table, and people helped themselves to it.

Fruits, veggies without sugar, meats, and corn

Thanksgiving today includes many vegetables available, but in the 17th century, vegetables were not always plentiful. Special meals, even the Thanksgiving meal, centered around many different kinds of meat.

Common fruits and vegetables included pumpkin, peas, beans, radishes, carrots, onions, lettuce, plums and grapes. Walnuts, chestnuts and acorns were also plentiful. Though there was no pumpkin pie, the Pilgrims did make stewed pumpkin. They had cranberries, but no sugar, so they did not make cranberry sauce. Sweet potatoes were not common, so those were probably not on the Thanksgiving table.

No  pies or other sweets.

They did not have an oven to bake pies, and even though they brought sugar over on the Mayflower, it had all been used by the time of the first celebration.

The Pilgrims had little in the way of grain, they only had wheat flour.

So, try to eat more like a Pilgrim than a Piggy for the holidays!  Tomorrow’s blog will show the carb chart on so-called “Thanksgiving” food.  You must choose wisely.