Healthy Holiday Food Guide

With the wonderful holidays behind and currently upon us, I am always looking for healthy alternatives to the holiday staples you will undoubtly see at the office parties, neighbor's get-togethers and friends shindigs. Read on to get in the holiday mood the right way and fit into that LBD or those skinny jeggins with booties; whatever occasion is in your holiday future.

Mixed Nuts or Olives? PORTION CONTROL
Olives - have the healthy monounsaturated fats like olive oil, which help lower cholesterol.
Nuts - also high in monounsaturated fats and a good source of fiber.

Soft or hard cheese?
Though all cheese is high in fat, soft cheese tends to have less fat and fewer calories. A one-ounce serving of Brie(soft) contains about 94 calories; while one ounce of Gruyere(hard) has 117 calories

Pigs in a blanket or mini quiche? I am a sucker for the mini quiche!

"Both are high in saturated fat, cholesterol and sodium" but quiche is the lesser of two evils gaining calcium from cheese, protein from eggs and nutrients from the veggies. The piggies are likely to be processed food and the mini quiche may be high in sodium from the crust, so please limit one :)

Roast beef or ham?

RB is less processed, contains half as much saturated fat and has 3X more iron and high in vitamin b. But both are a great source of protein - just eat sparingly.

Sugar cookie or gingerbread cookie?

Sugar cookies have about twice as many calories thanks to all the butter(no thank you) also high in saturated fat. But the GBread cookies are empty calories. If you can't resist the cookie jar, like always, one is better. Don't be a cookie monster!

Cocoa or egg nog?

"Eggnog and cocoa that is made with real milk both have lots of calcium, about 300 milligrams in eight ounces. But eggnog, as the name implies, also contains eggs and sometimes heavy cream and brandy, which translates into about 300 calories and 12 grams of fat in a five-ounce serving." Enough said. Just make sure the cocoa isn't the instant made one which contains less protein, calcium and flavanoids (which help prevent arteries from clogging - always a plus.

Candy cane or chocolate kisses?

The candy cane is just pure sugar and has no nutritional value, but it lasts longer which will keep you away from the sweets table (we can hope, can't we?) A candy cane contains about 55 calories and no fat, while five chocolate Kisses contain 127 calories and seven grams of fat.

But, if you must indulge your sweet tooth and take the chocolate, make sure they are the dark chocolate ones which contains the excellent flavanoids mentioned earlier.

Think you can make the smarter decision when you visit your next par-tay? Yes, because you are informed now! All it takes is a little bit of knowledge and I promise you wont be giving yourself a hard time the next day or kicking your own butt at the gym to run off those extra mini quiches you ate.

ENJOY AND HEALTHY EATING!!