Friday 17 November 2017

How To Survive the Party Season Without Piling on Pounds



'Tis the season to be jolly! Sometimes the holiday season seems like an endless round of Christmas lunches, parties, and drinks and nibbles with friends. This can spell disaster for our waistlines and by the time New Year rolls around we’re feeling like the only solution is to go on a diet. So here are some tips to help you avoid ending the holiday season with a belly as tubby as Santa’s.

Obviously some events are so enjoyable, and no-one in their right mind would turn down the food. So realise that on some days any sort of eating plan is going by the board. With only a couple of weeks of November left, my 3 week diet is in full swing.  However, once we get to the  party season. I'm just going to sit back, put any thoughts of guilt aside and make the most of the occasion. Watching the diet will be done on other days.
Is it tasty enough to be worth the calories?

For all the memorable occasions there are also plenty where the food is a to put it politely, bit ordinary. Last year, Karen went out for her office Christmas lunch, and told me the food was terrible. The parsnips had some weird coating and weren’t properly cooked, the turkey was bone dry and the Christmas pudding had been reheated to barely lukewarm.

On those occasions, when the food isn’t good. Either pick the healthy option or just don’t eat it. Of course, be polite if required and pick at it if necessary, but don’t wolf it down. Don’t waste the calories on something which you are not enjoying. Have something tasty and healthy when you get home.

Drink wine, festive fizz or low calorie soft drinks.

Drinks are another area where it can be easy to make healthy choices. The problem with drinks isn’t the alcohol itself, it’s the sugary mixers or beer, which cause your body to pile on the pounds. Drink wine, enjoy a glass of fizz, or choose spirits with low calorie mixers, skip the egg nog and the sweet fruity  punches.

The other problem with alcohol is harder to solve. After a few drinks not only do most men look more attractive, but so do the high calorie snacks! To help combat this drink water in between the alcoholic drinks to dilute the effect of the alcohol, and help you feel much better the morning after.

Unless I’m hosting a party, I keep snacks and crisps out of the house and stock up on healthy 
nibbles. Then I don’t worry about grazing when I’m out at an event.

Make socializing your priority, not eating.

That said, try to limit your choice from a buffet to the things you’ll enjoy the most. Don’t try everything on the table as sampling too many different flavors can fool your brain into thinking you want to eat more.
Mingle and chat at parties, use the opportunity to catch up with family and friends. It’s hard to eat at the same time as talking, so make socializing, not eating your priority.

Healthier options can also be festive treats

If you are hosting a party remember that your guests are probably having the same weight issues and will thank you if you can offer some tasty yet healthy alternatives to the usual party fare.

Eat healthily in-between events. As the Venus Factor manual says: "Win the week, not the day". Preparation, a meal plan and a shopping list can really help make sure you have quick cook food in and don’t need to grab junk food as you rush between work, shopping and the inevitable Christmas preparations.

Watch your portion sizes, it’s OK to have a slice of grandma’s boozy Christmas cake, but make it a slightly smaller slice.

Tightness round the tummy is a big fat deterrent to overeating
This next tip I picked up from a BBC newsreader. She said, never wear lose clothing or elasticated waist trousers, nor buy a bigger size of jeans. Snug fitting jeans will let you know when you’re eating too much and the discomfort as they get too tight will help you stop eating before you pile on the pounds
.
And above all, try and get enough sleep. Getting enough sleep helps to regulate hormones that keep hunger and appetite at bay. The season is tiring enough without being sleep deprived and extra hungry as well.

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Monday 3 April 2017

What Is The Best Sweetener For Weight Loss?

there are healthier alternatives to sugar
I have a sweet tooth and reducing  the amount of sugar I consume has been difficult. There are however, many alternative sweeteners to sugar available, but it's not always easy to decide out which sugar replacement to use to help you lose weight.

What should we look for in a healthy sweetener?

Blood sugar levels are one of the critical factor in maintaining a healthy weight. Many diet books advocate the use of honey as a replacement for sugar, and it's true that honey is better for you than refined white sugar, eating it still has a significant effect on blood sugar levels as this tweets shows

This list gives a tiny flavor of the dozens of sugar replacements, ranging from the chemically produced aspartame type right through to the sugar alcohols like Erythritol and which occur naturally in the body.

This excellent video from Alyssia Sheikh explains the different qualities of each group of sugar replacements and covers the pros and cons for each of the different types.

As Alyssia points out, moderation is the key, so if you are eating light lunches to help you lose weight and you finish off with a cup of coffee, there may be nothing to stop you having a spoonful of regular sugar.  But if you have 10 cups of coffee a day, or you're on a diet, it might be sensible to find a substitute you are happy with.

My personal top 2 sugar replacements are both natural products:

Stevia

Stevia is extracted from a the Stevia plant which native to Brazil and Paraguay. The people there have used the leaves as a sweetening agent for centuries. Not only that but they have also used it has a herbal medicine to treat problems which we think of as relating to obesity, such as diabetes, high blood pressure and heartburn. It is naturally much sweeter than sugar so I only need to use a very small amount. however, I do find it has a slight aftertaste. This is the sweetener I carry in my handbag.

Xylitol

This is my personal favourite. It was originally recommended by my nutritionist friend Karine.  I've tried a number of other sweeteners and of all of them this is the one which leaves no aftertaste. Karine says she uses it to sweeten her children's food, not because they need to lose weight, but because unlike sugar it helps to prevent tooth decay.

Xylitol is a sugar alcohol which occurs naturally in plants. Sugar alcohols are nothing to do with alcohol you might drink, it's merely a classification to describe the molecular structure.
It is actually a type of carbohydrate, but it's one which doesn't have the adverse effects of regular sugars. When we eat it, it's only partially metabolised by the body and with it's low glycemic index of 7, it doesn't cause a blood sugar spike which can lead to fat storage.

Interestingly, humans also make a small amount of xylitol naturally while metabolizing carbohydrates, so we shouldn't have be a problem eating it as we already process it in our bodies.
The downside is that it's not cheap, however it is relatively easy to find in the supermarket (in the UK the brand name to look for is Total Sweet) so I don't have to order it from a health food shop. It comes in granular form so I add it to coffee in exactly the same way as I do sugar. However, if I bake with it, I have to cut down the amount I use as a 1:1 substitution by weight gives a much too sweet end result.  I usually start with using half as much Xylitol as sugar and adjust to taste from there.


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Wednesday 22 February 2017

Are You Talking Yourself Out Of Losing Weight?

Eating chips while reading the news
How to you like to get your news?
What is your preferred style of news feed?  Do you prefer it to be like Chinese food (or Twitter), in bite-sized chunks? Or perhaps you prefer something meatier?  Some people like to learn new things by being be spoon fed the details.

I was surprised when it was pointed out to me how many of the phrases and sayings we use in everyday conversation were related to food, eating and digestion.

When it comes to taking in or new information and learning new things, the parallels between language and eating behavior are shocking - once you start to notice them!

How do you like to take in information?

You may perhaps skim over it as quickly as possible, or do you chew it over, and thoroughly digest the details for your greater understanding.

Are you particularly picky about the source of your information? And how does that relate to what you choose to eat?

Some things, of course, are hard to swallow and you may find certain details quite unpalatable. Most of us get very annoyed when people try to force their ideas down our throats.

You may even feel like you've got too much on your plate. Then, of course, you may also feel as if you've bitten off more than you can chew. You may have been better cherry picking from the smorgasbord of available weight loss programs.

What do you hunger for?

And it goes further. Some people are hungry for love. If no love is available, then they love chocolate, or cheese, or cake, so they'll eat that instead.  It fills a void.

Is this food for thought?

It was for me. I realized that I hunger for stimulation or entertainment.  I hate being bored.  I jump from one thing to the next consuming whatever web page, news story or magazine I find as quickly as possible. Often bookmarking it so I can read the details later and then quickly move on - as if I'm going to miss something if I slow down.

I was shocked to see that I eat in very much the same way.  I gobble my food down at breakneck speed.  I notice the flavor of the first couple of mouthfuls, but after that I hardly notice the flavors and textures of the different foods on the plate.  Even when the meal is fabulous, I still finish before everyone else at the table. As if it's a race - and yes I am competitive.

I watched the latest crime drama from the BBC last weekend.  All that violence left a rather nasty taste and didn't enjoy it. Regardless, I watched it to the bitter end.  I should have stopped and switched it off and done something more fun.

But I didn't. Just the same as when I eat a meal. Once I dig in, I almost always carry on eating until my plate is clean - and why wouldn't I, since I'm not properly paying attention to what I'm eating or how it's making me feel.

I can happily watch a 24-hour news channel looping over and over the stories, grazing on news like I  graze on cookies, eating them mindlessly and not actually noticing what I've eaten until the packet is empty.

What are your relationships like?

I may have fed myself the line that this is OK.  But it's not.  The news for me is that I need to slow down and pay attention to what I'm eating and how it makes me feel.  Appreciate the nuances of smell and flavor of each dish.  Enjoy some home cooking and allow my body to properly digest each meal before stuffing more food down.  I need to take Sarah Hallberg's advice and stop eating food I don't like or eating when I'm not hungry.

I'm curious to see if that'll change my choice of words too...

How does this relate to you?  How do you take in, process and digest information?  And how does this relate to your relationship with food and eating?  Let me know in the comments below.


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