How to stay healthy on Thanksgiving, 2014….

Today's Post:  Tuesday, 11-25-2014

There are two ways to a healthier Thanksgiving Dinner.

Last week's post was about ways to prepare a healthier Thanksgiving Dinner.

This post today is mostly on how to stay healthier eating a Thanksgiving Dinner no matter how it's fixed.

There's no perfect way to do either. 

The focus at Thanksgiving & at Thanksgiving Dinner must be on enjoying the day.  Enjoy the food.  Enjoy the company.  And, enjoy the time off work!

My Brother in Law once said at Thanksgiving Dinner that he did NOT want to hear anything about what he shouldn't eat for Thanksgiving Dinner just in case I had any ideas of doing so.

I didn't then; & I won't this year.  I agree with him.  I believe as he does that the focus at Thanksgiving & at Thanksgiving Dinner must be on enjoying the day.  Enjoy the food.  Enjoy the company.  And, do nothing to distract from that focus.  If anything, help make it happen instead!

That said, here are some ways to stay a bit healthier and leaner and still enjoy the food.

1.  Focus on the people.  Find out what people have been doing and catch up with what's been happening with them.  Enjoy the people you enjoy; and be mellow, courteous, gracious, and if necessary, a bit forgiving with the rest.

2.  Practice the strategic sandwich method.  Before and after Thanksgiving, eat a bit less food and make virtually all of it be the healthiest you know how - and, keep up your exercise routine to the very best of your ability at least two weeks before and particularly for the two weeks AFTER Thanksgiving.

If necessary, do some kind of workout in your room if you are away from home or cut the intensity a bit; but do your very best to exercise several days a week the two weeks before &  after Thanksgiving (& before Thanksgiving next year.).

This method works.  Once when I was getting the amount of exercise each week that I should be before and after Thanksgiving and eating right otherwise, I ate very well at Thanksgiving to the point of being very slightly stuffed.  And, I gained ZERO pounds for November and December both.

 A couple of years ago, blogger Vera Tweed came up with a delightful strategy for thinking about this that I read.

Her idea was to think of the Holiday Season the way an athlete trains for a competition.  Focus on eating right and exercising as if you are in training during the Holiday Season.  Every meal that isn't a holiday dinner or other event, at all your other meals, eat right and only eat right.  And, make sure to exercise during this time.

Her idea that I liked best is to start NOW to do this instead of waiting until January when all you can do is catch up and repair the damage of the holiday season as many people do!

3. During your Thanksgiving dinner, eat strategically.  Eat well from the healthiest foods; eat a small portion for one serving only of the less healthy foods that you enjoy; but have them and enjoy them; and do your best to edit out the worst for you foods.

a) The turkey and the vegetables are the best for you.  So eat well and generous-sized but not very large portions.  (You need to not overdo those so there's enough to go around and YOU have room for at least some of the other foods.) 

Cranberry sauce may have sugar and even some kinds have high fructose corn syrup; but the cranberries are a superfood you likely don't eat often; and they add a festive air and are a great pair with turkey or gravy and mashed potatoes, flavor-wise. 

Cranberries are, along with organic wild blueberries the most health enhancing berries on the planet.  (You can also ask to bring a version you make at home with thawed diced organic cranberries from the frozen food section at Whole Foods with zest from organic oranges and diced organic raisins.  That will have some sweetness and extra flavor with no added sugar or HFCS to worry about!)

Many people rarely have green beans or Brussels Sprouts or yams or sweet potatoes or cooked onions; but they are often served at Thanksgiving.  They are all good for you.  And, they fill you up so it's much easier for you to eat smaller portions of less health OK foods than you otherwise would.  If they aren't your favorites, try pairing them with a good tasting food.  Eat some green beans and then immediately eat a bit of stuffing with gravy and cranberry sauce for example.

A recent article even found evidence that the alpha carotenes in carrots, squash, yams, sweet potatoes, darker greens, and broccoli may be as effective or more in turning off cancers as raw broccoli or cauliflower do with their cruciferous vegetable phyto-nutrients.  Alpha carotene was found to be connected to a 39% lower risk of dying from any cause the study reported.  Even better, when cooked and eaten with fats or oils, the carotenes of all kinds in food become more bioavailable and likely to benefit you.

Believe it or not, that specifically means that the filling in pumpkin pie is good for you!  For this nutrient, cooked broccoli works in fact.  Yams or sweet potatoes or the filling in a sweet potato pie are also good for you.

Last year I tried making a dairy free pumpkin coconut oil pie filling.  I used two 15 ounce cans of pumpkin puree, the free flowing 9 ounces from a 13 ounce plus can of coconut milk.  I used about half a tablespoon each of allspice, powdered ginger, and cinnamon.  I added about that much dark molasses and 2/3 cup of dark brown sugar.  I stirred those together until smooth over low heat in a cast iron frying pan large enough.  I then whisked together 3 extra large raw eggs in a separate container.  Then I poured that into the rest and using the whisk, I stirred it in for several minutes until it was thoroughly cooked.

I then let it cool enough to be OK putting into the refrigerator in a glass container large enough.

When I tasted it the next morning it was delightful.  I'll serve it with a bit of pumpkin pie spice to sprinkle on top for people who want that traditional flavor.  But, just as I fixed it, it had more flavor and tasted far better than 95% of the pumpkin pie fillings I've ever had.

Serving it by itself this way makes it gluten free and grain free as well.

My wife found out that nonfat Greek yogurt plus dark molasses also work in a pumpkin pie filling as a substitute for evaporated milk.

If raw vegetables are available in a relish tray, the cruciferous ones and the ones with carotenes are the best for you.  Broccoli florets, radishes, carrots, and cherry tomatoes are particularly good. 

Have very little dip unless you know what's in it.  Some dips have hydrogenated oils.  One year my wife wanted to just buy a dip and all of them but one had hydrogenated oils!

My wife and I bring the relish tray.  One year we were bringing sour cream with nothing added and hummus with the container showing the ingredients for dips.  Hummus is good for you but avoid overdoing it to leave room for the dinner.  Sour cream is OK in small amounts occasionally; but don't overdo it.  We were bringing guacamole; but no one but me ate any before, so I no longer do that.  But if your family likes it, do bring some.  It's actually a good for you dip.

b)  Stuffing, particularly if it was cooked inside the turkey; gravy; mashed potatoes; the filling in the pies, and many other dishes have great flavor but include less than healthful ingredients.  If you are exercising and eating right otherwise and have no serious health problems to be very careful of, the strategy I use is to have some of them; but hold myself to one small serving.

That way I enjoy them but avoid overdosing my system with their less OK ingredients.  And, having had turkey and vegetables first I don't have room left to eat a large amount anyway.

c)  Soft drinks, rolls, biscuits, pie crusts, most commercial jam currently, and candied marshmallow topping for sweet potatoes are the worst foods and drinks for you in a traditional Thanksgiving dinner.  Simply don't eat many of those or to the best of your ability pass on them.  Or, if you do eat some, have tiny, quarter of normal sized portions.  And, only eat the ones that you most enjoy. 

If you've already eaten well from the healthier foods that's much easier to do. 

Here's personal example of that.  I've always loved pie, including the pie crusts. 

But I've found out since that many, if not most, of the pies I'm likely to get at Thanksgiving have crust made with refined grain flour and Crisco, which is basically massive amounts of Trans fats (aka as partially hydrogenated oils). 

What I do now is take small servings of my favorite pie or pies & only eat the fillings.  So I can enjoy cherry or blueberry pie filling, pumpkin pie filling, and/or candied pecan filling; but I leave the crust.  The only exception I might make is to have one single bite of a browned bit of crust since it has the most flavor.  Two years ago I didn't even do that as I no longer had room for it.

This year my wife is making pies with a gluten free flour she has pre-tested to work to make decent pie crusts AND she used Kerry Gold Irish butter from grass fed cows which we bought at Whole Foods. 

Butter tastes about three for four times better than Crisco in a pie crust. And though you want to avoid eating too much butter too often, hydrogenated oils are such a potent heart attack starter, butter is about ten times better for you!

4.  A relish tray with the best for you vegetables and good tasting dips that have no hydrogenated oils and pies with crusts that have no gluten and use real butter from grass fed cows, illustrate another method. 

Arrange to bring foods that you know are good for you or less harmful and which others will also like.  That way you for sure have foods at the dinner you can fill up on or eat at all when you otherwise might not.

5.  Limit your alcoholic drinks to one or two or at most three if you drink.  And, drink when you first arrive or at the start of the Dinner.  That way, if you need to drive afterwards, the effect will have mostly worn off plus it will be buffered by the torrent of dinner.

I found out the hard way once that if you drink much more than that, it prevents you from enjoying the people you really wanted to talk with.  That year I only really got to have the first half of Thanksgiving and lost the rest. 

(Some people are better off not having any alcohol.  They may be unable to stop at 3 if they have 3 or have to drive soon after the dinner and late at night and not metabolize alcohol well.)

 The Martinelli's sparkling juices in yesterday's post over ice can be a decent festive substitute. 

I love the flavors in a Bloody Mary.  So I also recommend the Virgin Mary drink as it has almost the same flavor. (Unfortunately, the Virgin Mary mixes have high fructose corn syrup and are not very good either so only get a Virgin Mary if a real bar tender is making it or you make it from an online recipe you've tried and liked.

Since I first wrote that, I have since tried Bloody Mary mixes that had bad ingredients and tasted worse!  So be sure to use or have a version with health OK ingredients and that you already know tastes good.)

Red wine is a bit better for you and goes with the dinner. 

And, if you do have more than 3 drinks, leave later or stay overnight -- or to be safest, have someone else drive.  That way you can enjoy Thanksgiving next year too!

Do the best you can with these strategies.  Enjoy the day and the people. 

Have a happy Thanksgiving!

NEWS on how to quit smoking successfully AND even MORE harms of smoking found recently!....

Today's Post:  Thursday, 11-20-2014

A.  Today is the Great American Smoke Out!

It’s held once as a year because some people do quit which helps cut our overall health care costs and saves those people a LOT of grief.

 (See our recent news on how much worse smoking is than we knew even a year ago!

It’s in this post.)

And, those who stop smoking today or at least stop smoking around other people today do achieve two things even if they aren’t quite ready to quit.  They then know they do have some control over when they smoke and how much by doing so. 

AND, since the harms of second hand smoke are dose related, the people around you will be less harmed because of your effort.

B.  Whether or not you are already not smoking today or even reading this after today, this post has some information you can use if you smoke now or help people to quit.

1.  Many smokers do want to quit now and would try if they thought they had a shot at success.

Now they do!  As of a year ago we knew how to multiply people’s ability to quit by at least four times beyond what most people have heard of and we discovered things that may make it even more likely by last year.

Recently we got information that about triples that! It’s here in this post, next in part 1.

2.  Some smokers might try to quit if they thought they would be harmed by smoking but don’t now believe they are.

If you are online reading this, you likely are informed enough you don’t think smoking is harmless as the poorest least educated people sometimes still do.

However, you MAY still believe that:  

Lung cancer is the big or even only health risk from smoking; (OMG it’s the smallest one!)

and some smokers never get it (true by the way) and you feel lucky or don’t want to bother with making the effort to quit to avoid something that you may not get even if you keep smoking.

Since the people who do get lung cancer are so slammed and harmed and it IS a risk of smoking, this is even reflected by other stop smoking messages at times.

But the BIG risk of smoking that kills far more than lung cancer AND WHICH NO SMOKER ESCAPES you may not yet know about. 

It’s worse than that we just found out!  Smoking has three dreadful ADDITIONAL harms we just discovered recently.

How does making it much more likely you’ll die of TB or get Alzheimer’s you could have escaped or being in bad pain all the time sound to you?  If you keep smoking ALL of these are much more likely.

If you don’t think making an effort to quit is justified, but you would if you thought you had that much to lose if you didn’t and it was likely or already happening to you, you should read the first part of this post.

Part 1  1.  Many smokers do want to quit now and would try if they thought they had a shot at success.

Now they do!  As of a year ago we knew how to multiply people’s ability to quit by at least four times beyond what most people have heard of and we discovered things that may make it even more likely then.

Recently we got information that about triples that! It’s here in this post.

If you need that information and want to use it to quit yourself -- or help smokers find it and use it, it’s next:

We now know enough about how people quit successfully you can use the information here to make it LIKELY you can quit now. 

The real success rate for quitting after a year has been less than 10 %.  The information we had last year we think boosted that to over 40%.  And, the information we recently got didn’t use what we had last year and 27% succeeded.

We believe that combining these methods now makes it over 80% likely people who use both sets of information will quit on their first attempt.

Even better, if you don’t quite get there this time, but you do put these things in place, next time you try it will be so much easier you are likely to succeed!  It’s like building a building.  You may not finish it in one pass.  But if you finish the foundation, finishing the rest in one pass becomes quite doable.

Since it is true that quitting smoking tends to cause weight gain and fat gain, it would be easier for many to try to quit and to succeed if they could quit smoking without that weight gain. 

Now they can!

Even if they could gain 5 pounds and take it off instead of gaining 10 or 15 pounds that stay on, many more people would try to quit and succeed if they knew how to do that and did it.

Here’s the wonderful good news for those people AND for everyone who wants to quit smoking and stop being harmed by smoking.

There are two practices that are easy to start that more than double your chances of quitting smoking!

These two changes also empower you to easily make even more changes that protect your health that you literally would not have been able to do before.

Best of all these two changes are also the essential building blocks of permanent fat loss!

Every single bit of that has been tested and found true.

New this year Adding two practices to those two before, during and after may as much as triple your chances of success!

The methods we describe below work in part because they are doable ways you can trust that show you that you are effective when you decide to be and that you are able to do things that protect your health. 

The new method starts with helping you see yourself that way right up front!

Researchers in a college in Ontario Canada systematically asked smokers to detail why they had been smoking.  That way two things happened, the smokers had some idea of what new solutions or practices they might need instead of smoking.  But the far more important one was the change in self image going though this exercise that systematically and completely gave them.  Instead of thinking something like:  “I’m a smoker and can’t quit.” this enables them to think “I’ve been smoking because of specific things.  So it’s possible I can get those things in other ways with far less harmful side effects.”

This is a huge difference!  And, their results showed it!  Instead of the less than 9% had quit after a year, in THIS program 27% did.

Best of all, by also doing the methods we had last year that help upgrade their self image as being able to take effective action and as someone who wants good health and will act to get and keep it, we think a success rate on the first pass of well over 80 is now possible!

a)  The most effective of these two changes we listed last year is to begin regular exercise you do every week.  It even works in the early stages if you only do it once or twice a week. 

Even better, you can do slow motion strength training -- 10 to 15 seconds up and 10 to 15 seconds down  or cardio where you go a bit fast until you begin to be out of breath and then stop or slow way down until you are mostly recovered before you speed up again. Even 10 to 20 minute sessions first thing in the morning at home a few days a week will do it.

And, it’s best to start at a level it’s slam dunk you can do and then build up gradually.  The key thing is to decide which day of the week is doable and then begin to do at least one set of that exercise every week once you start.  Oddly, that’s the hard part.  Once you experience doing that successfully adding more becomes easy.  And, for this even one or two days a week may be enough to enable you to quit smoking!

You can do some version of these at home.  You can and should start with a weight or cardio exercise at only a moderately hard level and build up slowly week by week.

Again, best of all, you can start getting benefits with sessions of 4 to 6 minutes each.

How to start? 

Decide which morning works best for you to block out the slightly less than ten minutes to set up and do your session and write or enter a brief note with that day’s date and what you did.

Then when that morning comes, try it out.  Plan to do a bit more next time -- or if it is a bit too hard do less next time or the next part that day.

Give yourself a big cheer of encouragement for starting and write down your exercise session on your calendar for next week.  It also helps if you make a brief note on a notebook or on your computer or mobile device each time you exercise.  Studies show that doubles your chances of keeping it up!

b)  For some people who already exercise or have an active job, the second main method may be what you want to do first.

Decide what fits you best and which one you will do first.

If it’s not exercise for any reason, the second one has been just as empowering for some people.

The second one is even easier to begin.  The second part of it is a harder for some people so the key for most people is to do the first part first.

People who have been eating foods and drinking drinks that harm their health and fatten them and who switch to foods and drinks that do not, get benefits close to as good and sometimes better than beginning to do the right exercises every week.

Pick one real vegetable that isn’t starchy that you are willing to eat or at least try out.

Go to the store and buy from one to enough to have some once a day for a week.

Then decide where you will eat it in your day.  I take my lunch, so in my own case I added it to my lunch.  But some people add mushrooms and onions to their scrambled eggs at breakfast.  And some people add a small serving to eat at dinner.

Then go buy it and try it out for a week.

Give yourself a big cheer of encouragement for starting and decide whether you want to add a second vegetable to your day or if you want to try a different one next.

Broccoli florets work and are often available in grocery stores or restaurants at the deli section or the salad bar.  You can buy some and take them home.

If you prepare food at home or are willing to do it, you can buy broccoli at the grocery store and wash it and dry it and cut off the florets yourself.

(If you find you can eat broccoli florets or cauliflower florets the good news is that they begin to protect you from the cancer risk you were running up before.)

Or, you can do something even easier that almost everyone can do and eat OK.

Buy one can of green beans at the store and eat a third of the can on three days at lunch or dinner during the week.

To get started, it doesn’t have to be hard to do.  In fact if you pick something you are pretty sure you can do or would find easy to do, that’s a GOOD thing!  The essential part is to get started.

People who just begin to do these two things do double their chances of quitting smoking and even without eating ANY less, most people will lose weight too.

And, they begin to get substantial protection from the health harms they had before.

Hope that works for you too.

(I have more to lose yet, but I’ve lost 30 pounds I’ve kept off and did this method myself. It does work!)  

The other thing you must add to keep fat off is to stop your intake of most sugars, all refined grains, and most whole grains. 

Recent research found that smoking causes insulin resistance but cuts appetite and boosts metabolism, so smokers can get away with eating those high glycemic foods without fat gain.  But once the smoking is gone, you MUST stop the fattening foods and ingredients you were eating to avoid fat gain.

Grain Brain and Wheat Belly are two books to read on why everyone should do this.  They also give you sound ideas of what to eat instead.  In addition to the vegetables and fruit that are most protective, there are even now good tasting recipes for breads and desserts that avoid these harmful and fattening ingredients completely!

The third method is to add to the vegetables and exercise or do more of them to begin to protect yourself and regain the protection from cancer and heart disease risks you were giving yourself and undo the damage.

Out of time today to cover that in more detail.  But over every month of the year we cover ways to do that in our posts here.  Scan down the list for information on protecting yourself from things you are at risk for or want to prevent happening to you.

I’ve cut my heart risk by about 15 to one for example with these methods.  Just doing part of that will cut yours at least in half I’d be willing to bet.  And, cutting the risks of cancer and mental decline are also quite doable!

2.  Some smokers might try to quit if they thought they would be harmed by smoking but don’t now believe they are.

If you are online reading this, you likely are informed enough you don’t think smoking is harmless as the poorest least educated people sometimes still do.

However, you MAY still believe that:  

Lung cancer is the big or even only health risk from smoking; (OMG it’s the smallest one!)

and some smokers never get it (true by the way) and you feel lucky or don’t want to bother with making the effort to quit to avoid something that you may not get even if you keep smoking.

Since the people who do get lung cancer are so slammed and harmed and it IS a risk of smoking, this is even reflected by other stop smoking messages at times.

But the BIG risk of smoking that kills far more than lung cancer AND WHICH NO SMOKER ESCAPES you may not yet know about. 

It’s worse than that we just found out!  Smoking has three dreadful ADDITIONAL harms we just discovered recently.

How does making it much more likely you’ll die of TB or get Alzheimer’s you could have escaped or being in bad pain all the time sound to you?  If you keep smoking ALL of these are much more likely.

If you don’t think making an effort to quit is justified, but you would if you thought you had that much to lose if you didn’t and it was likely or already happening to you, you should read the second part of this post

That information is in part two just after part one on how it’s now possible to quit and even likely if you know the things that work and do them

2.  The real and more complete dangers of smoking!

 Some people have heard that smoking causes lung cancer.  But many smokers don’t know any others who have lung cancer.  Some even know that not every smoker ever gets lung cancer.  THAT part is true.  (Even among heavy smokers only one out of four gets lung cancer.)

So, they simply expect to be one of the lucky smokers who escape lung cancer and keep smoking.

Even if they DO escape lung cancer they think they are unharmed by their smoking.

The new information TO YOU is that if you are such a smoker, you are horribly mistaken if you think that! 

That mistake could cost you your life AND 20 or thirty years of healthy life first on top of that.

The truth is that every smoker or person exposed to second hand smoke is harmed every single time at each exposure.  No smoker escapes at all!

How can that be?  Why is that true? 

Most smokers don’t know and keep smoking.

Some smokers keep smoking but do cut back to 5 or 6 a day and then think they are safe because they don’t know that they still have most of this harm because they failed to stop entirely.

Most doctors do know but don’t explain it well.

What happens is that tobacco smoke exposure damages the insides of your blood vessels every single time you are exposed to tobacco smoke.  Your body then tries to repair this damage with a small patch and puts plaque over it.  This happens every time. 

(This damage also speeds up aging of every part of you each time you breathe tobacco smoke.)

If you keep smoking or being around smokers, this plaque builds up.  If you eat too much heart attack starters in your food also this plaque build-up happens MUCH faster.  If you are a heavy smoker it happens even faster yet.

Then your body tends to calcify the plaque and you will then have atherosclerosis, hardening of the arteries, get high blood pressure, & likely will have to take the drugs for it.

You are then a heart attack waiting to happen.

You may not need to wait long.  Tobacco smoke, we now know, is also a trigger and causes heart attacks in people who would otherwise have escaped them or not had them until years later.

This damage happens a bit to every single smoker every single time.  This damage happens to light smokers.  It happens to brand new teenaged smokers.  And if you smoke it has already been happening to you for far longer than is good for you!

It’s worse than that we just found out!  Smoking has three dreadful ADDITIONAL harms we just discovered recently.

How does making it much more likely you’ll die of TB or get Alzheimer’s you could have escaped or being in bad pain all the time sound to you?  If you keep smoking ALL of these are much more likely.

Recent research found that smoking cuts your immune system so much that you are no longer likely to be able to resist TB chances are.  So if you are exposed to it, it will likely kill you; and dying of TB is a horrible way to go.

The cadmium in tobacco is so harmful to your brain smoking boosts your chances of getting Alzheimer’s disease by over 50% recent research found.

And two recent studies found that smokers tend to get daily pain or severe pain nonsmokers don’t because smoking causes brain changes that more than double how much pain you feel!

This means that people who get back pain won’t get better as long as they keep smoking.

And the most recent study found that smoking women tended to get more painful menstrual cramps and feel more pain when they do.

So, if you smoke and want to avoid these things, do the list of things here that have a real chance of enabling you to quit AND do it without fat gain!

How to exercise to lose fat and protect your health....

Today's Post:  Tuesday, 11-18-2014

If you want to keep off fat during the holidays or easily remove any you do gain after them, it will help if you know how to use exercise and what to put with it to do so:

Some people exercise and stay the same.  Some exercise and actually gain a bit of fat.  And, some people exercise and lose fat and even some peoples lose a LOT of fat they keep off.

Why?  What makes the difference?   

My nephew in New York who is knowledgeable and knows of my interest sent me this link:

“  http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/11/12/exercising-but-gaining-weight/?smid=nytcore-iphone-share&smprod=nytcore-iphone

Many people who take up an exercise regimen wind up heavier, but a simple 

strategy may improve people’s odds of actually dropping pounds with exercise.”

I sent him this reply:

“A.  Thanks!

It's really good to know what's in the national media about fat loss and exercise. So many thanks for the article!

B.  Why do a blind study before consulting with people who know the subject?!

C.  Oh well.  At least they did find out something useful.

If you add a small amount of exercise and decide to create an add-on effect to help use the extra calories burned to lose weight and make diet upgrades too -- 

or you become much more active away from the sessions, once you gain some confidence from them without treating yourself to extra goodies because you exercise, you'll lose a bit after 4 weeks.

If you wanted to lose fat from the exercise and lost none after 4 weeks, you need to upgrade what you eat and not treat yourself to extra goodies because you exercised.

B.  But since the overall goal is to help people learn how to lose fat they keep off and improve their health in several other ways besides the fitness and exercise effects, it is sure too bad they used such a weak program to test and had no idea what they were about.

Why do a blind study before consulting with people who know the subject?!

1.  The exercise program they set up burned about 400 to 600 calories a week. The people who lose fat they keep off, burn four to seven times that!  

(It is hard so far in this economy to add that much exercise.  Part of the reason I'm still fatter than I'd like is I'm at the low end of that range instead of doing twice as much exercise.)

2.  Their program had no shorter sessions of much more vigorous cardio which is more time efficient per session and can have shorter sessions. 

This is the the kind trainers who have clients who lose fat find removes it.  (The trick is to start a bit easy for safety but keep gradually increasing the intensity and amount.)  

3.   Their program had no strength training.  The most effective exercise programs to lose fat tend to include some kind of strength training.  (Oddly this is most important for women and people over 60 though men under 60 are more easily interested in doing it!)

4.  The researchers didn't take the positive self-image changes from doing even this kind of exercise as someone who is effective and able to take steps to improve their health to add on other methods!

a)  Here are the foods and drinks and the ingredients they are made of that will make you fat and sick. 

So, now you realize you can act effectively to improve your health, you'll also lose fat and have more decades of life free of disability and dangerous diseases, by learning to stop them all totally.

Here's what to eliminate 100% and why; and here's what you likely can get away with just cutting back 80 or 90%

Here are the keys to what to eat instead.  There are several styles that work.  Here's what they have in common.  Here's where they differ and what to do about it to stay healthy.  And, here are the support groups and recipes and books for each one.

The wonderful thing is that the foods that support your health have fewer calories and keep you just as well fed as the foods and drinks you give up by doing this.  

Many people lose 10 to 20% of their initial bodyweight or even more over the first two years from just this one change.  And, all the blood tests and indicators your doctor looks at will improve dramatically -- and, with very real drops in your real health risks too!

b)  Some of the treats many people mistakenly eat more of once they begin to exercise will drop off your list of foods to ever eat!  But both for those treats and for less health harmful treats you may keep, here's how much exercise it takes to burn off that many calories.

You'll not lose fat if you take in more calories every week eating such treats than you burn in exercise!

(But if you don't know that, it's quite easy to do!)

If the researchers had known to do that study including all the parts, the results would have made the NY Times front page.

Exercise can remove fat dramatically.  But only if you do enough of the right kinds and know what else to add to it.

I closed with:  That’s my take on it.”

We post often on what to stop eating and what to eat instead.

In fact, our post last week on how to fix a health OK Thanksgiving dinner listed most of the foods, drinks, and ingredients to completely avoid or reduce and why.  We also listed some of the foods to eat instead. 

The best news is that you can make really good food that is completely health supporting to eat – or at least is enough better, it’s OK to eat on such occasions.

If you want to stay healthy and lose fat, remove the harmful and fattening foods, drinks, and ingredients from your life and eat real and health giving foods instead.

Then, when you add the kinds of exercise that work, you will lose fat and keep it off.

Moreover, you will age more slowly; and get so many fewer diseases of middle age, you will live more decades of healthy life. 

Research at Stanford found this directly when comparing people who exercised regularly with those much like them who were sedentary.

Since then, it has been shown that regular vigorous exercise lengthens your telomeres and  helps keep your mitochondria healthy that enable you to move well and have more youthlike energy.  

My monthly fatloss report....

Today's Post:  Monday, 11-17-2014

This month’s report is a mixed review with some positive and some negative.

I both gained some leverage and lost some. 

That status seems like where I’ve been stuck for some time!

My hope of course, is that I’ll gradually make progress by relentlessly continuing the things that have lost and kept off the fat I no longer have;

having the things I’ve added get traction and gradually help lose some more fat;

-- AND find things with more leverage that work well when I try them -- and then keep doing them also!

1.  Here’s my immediate progress section first:

I gained another 2 pounds on the scale.  Not too bad and close to the same and close to the lower end of the range I’ve been in over the last year --- about 7 pounds over my goal weight.

NOT good either when I want to lose more fat than that 7 pounds!!

BUT my waist measured exactly the same; and so did  my chest & hips! 

Apparently, the progress in my new PACE or high intensity cardio session of 5 sets I added of abdominal exercises -- both toned my muscles and tightened them up or maybe added some of those two pounds as muscle.

I’m about half way done getting to the number of reps I plan for each of the 5 sets.  If doing it gradually burns more calories and removes more belly fat too when I get to that level, I could lose at least another inch on my waist. 

And, though it is again a bit glacial in speed I’m doing a bit better on my strength training.

So between the two I really might have gained the two pounds as muscle. 

But it’s not quite what I wanted either.  I’d hoped for a net effect of three or four pounds less fat too.  

2.  But some things are still OK including my plan to drink less wine:

The last 4 weeks I drank 29 glasses of wine, two 7 glass weeks and two 7 & a half glass weeks.

That was 7 glasses less than the 36 the previous 4 weeks!  So that part was a success.

3. I have kept up the added vegetables.  I’m actually doing well with maintaining it each week!

Losing that much more fat will mean adding even more vegetables than I eat now as Vitamix drinks.

I just got a book that suggests that both adding even more vegetables AND taking one week in four where I also eat less of many other foods, may produce net and sustainable fat losses

I’m still limited in what I can do now.  BUT, I am on the right track and will do what I can get to now and plan for much more when I can.

4.  As I mentioned above, one of the continuing good news stories is my strength training.  The progress is still VERY slow but if I continue getting stronger every week or two AS I HAVE BEEN for the past several months and continue for another few years and am able to add back more safe to do leg exercises and make that progress with them, I will keep adding muscle when most people 15 years younger than I lose that much muscle or even more in the same time period!

I now do two sessions a week for upper body strength training.  At one, I am doing more reps at the slightly faster slow speed and fewer reps with a heavier weight than I was using. The progress is a bit slow; but it IS happening.  At the second session two days later, I use a couple of notches less weight BUT I do more reps and at the slower slow speed.  In that session, I just did 20 reps with each hand in an exercise that was MUCH harder for just 9 reps not long ago.  I’m at the point I can jump the weight for those sets! 

And, in that second session, I’m now doing an instant second part of each set with a lighter weight to help force the muscle to grow more.  It’s too early to tell about those hoped for results..  But I am already doing a bit more repetitions in those second parts of each set.

At my last session, I made progress on all five sets of those exercises.

THAT is encouraging!

My leg strength training is mostly better.  My ONE substitute for the leg press on the machine is gradually doing better. 

I dropped the one that was both too hard and tweaking my knee tendons.  The other is one at a time lunges several times with each leg while holding dumbbells to add to the effort.  I was adding five pounds twice a week.  Now I’m at 89 pounds, the equivalent of adding 178 pounds or more with two legs, I’ll have to add the weight more slowly after that.  But I can begin to do more and slower repetitions.

(I was at 80 pounds last month.)

But it IS working.  I believe I’ve added some muscle in my thighs and butt and definitely feel the pumped and exercised effect the next day.

I’m now at the point I can add weights to my hands while I do the lunge style one legged squats.  If increasing the weight is as easy as I expect it to be and I get no recurrence of my left leg injury limitation, that will be great! That’s because I’ll be working my legs harder with a heavier weight one leg a time than when I was doing both sides at once.

Once I can do 7 complete reps at a superslow speed all the way down and up with each leg while holding 89 pounds – like over 178 pounds with two legs., I think I’ll add enough muscle in my legs, lower back, and butt to cut my belly fat a bit.

My one leg at a time calf exercises are still making excellent progress on my right leg. 

I had to scale all the way back to zero and more on my injured left Achilles tendon.

I had to drop from holding a 35 or 37 pound dumbbell for 12 superslow reps to doing ONE with no dumbbell at all for my left leg.  BUT now that I do five with my right leg with 37 and do a warm up set of 14 where I use both legs to go up and go down slow after reading that was a successful treatment.  So, I can now exercise my left leg without it hurting right then OR after the workout!

Once I get to 12 full and slow reps with my left leg which is finally looking possible, I can try to repeat the process with 3 pounds instead of zero and hope to gradually build back to 37 as I do now with my right leg.

So, I just keep my right leg exercises the same until I can gradually build back my left leg to do that weight again -- 35 to 37 pounds plus all my bodyweight for 12 superslow reps.

By doing the similar style with the lighter weight with my injured leg and doing the same weight with my right leg, the studies show that by doing those two things,  once the injury heals, the strength will build back just fine relatively quickly.  So even though it’s irritating to have to wait a few weeks for that to happen, my confidence in the method is as good as it was before.

Then if all keeps going well, I’ll need to buy a new 40 pound dumbbell as the 35 pound with the 2 pound wrist weight will not be enough to be challenging if this keeps up.

(I also have made enough gains in my arm exercises to go to the 40 pound dumbbell for one exercise!)

Overall, my muscles LOOK a bit bigger, particularly my arms and shoulders; and though my middle is still fat, my thighs have definition and are clearly hard and toned.

So even though I’ve not gained enough muscles in size or weight to increase how much they weigh and the calories they burn as I’d like to do ---  After another year or so, I may gain a pound or two of muscle at an age when most people lose 5 pounds of muscle instead!

4.  My progressive short sets of high intensity, interval cardio have been a mixed review. 

But the overall news is still better since last month!

(I kept my two weekly sessions of 4 sets of back to back abdominal exercises and my weekly 10 minute session of intense variable cardio on my Nordic track where I was already at a high level I’d worked up to gradually.)

My new cardio 5 sets that had gone to 50 last time on the way to 98 each that I plan, I had gone to 60 and expected now to be at 74; but at 60 I developed two minor injuries in each of two sets and am now almost to 62 in all 5 sets. Once that happens, I’ll be back on my way to 98 each.

5.  It’s just a matter of time too to the day I can get and use the Vitamix to boost my vegetable intake enough to lose some fat that way.   

And, I did just find out that removing a few things for a week once a month may enable me to lose fat that week every month.

And, by maintaining the extra vegetables all month, that plus the continuing improvements in my exercises may really get me there.

So the conclusion is that despite being hammered more than usual by outside negative influences, I’m still maintaining most of my efforts that lost fat for me to begin with.  AND, I’m still adding promising new things that are working already or might work.

AND, I plan to both continue doing that and have even more in the pipeline for as soon as I can manage to add them.   

Fix a healthier Thanksgiving Dinner, 2014....

Today's Post:  Thursday, 11-13-2014

Here is my 2014 update on the versions I posted in 2008 to 2013. 

There are two ways to a healthier Thanksgiving Dinner. (You can use all the info if you are doing it all or just for the dish or two you bring.)

1.  Today we talk about ways to prepare a healthier Thanksgiving Dinner.

2.  The week of Thanksgiving on Tuesday, we plan a post on how to stay healthier eating a Thanksgiving Dinner no matter how it's fixed.

There's no perfect way to do either.  The focus at Thanksgiving & at Thanksgiving Dinner must be on enjoying the day.  Enjoy the food.  Enjoy the company.  And, enjoy the time off work!

My Brother in Law once said at Thanksgiving Dinner that he did NOT want to hear anything about what he shouldn't eat for Thanksgiving Dinner just in case I had any ideas of doing so.

I didn't then; & I won't this year.  I agree with him.  I believe as he does that the focus at Thanksgiving & at Thanksgiving Dinner must be on enjoying the day.  Enjoy the food.  Enjoy the company.  And, do nothing to distract from that focus.  If anything, help make an enjoyable stress free dinner happen instead!

That said, there's a very large list of ways to make the dishes for the Thanksgiving Dinner either better for you or far less bad for you -- for those dishes you make yourself.

If there is a family favorite that you've made forever that has not so great ingredients, make it anyway or move it just a bit in a healthier direction to make it a bit less bad for health.  Do your best to make a version that people will still really like.

However, to the extent you can reduce or replace any of these next ingredients with healthier alternatives, it's a good idea.

1.  Sugar.

Real sugar or brown sugar or real maple syrup or dark molasses are least bad for you and most likely to be in some holiday dishes.  (Artificial sugars and agave nectar are NOT OK for health and many hate the taste of Stevia.)  The key is to use real sugar and go easy the days before and after Thanksgiving day and eat the dishes with sugar On Thanksgiving only after eating some protein and vegetables.

You can also take a cinnamon supplement a few minutes before you eat a sweet treat with sugar.  This cuts back on both the blood sugar and the insulin surge to make it less harmful and fattening.

In making the food, you can try making it half with brown sugar or real maple syrup or dark molasses because those have flavor in addition to the sugar.  (If you can get it, C & H sugar from Hawaiian sugar cane is NOT GMO nor is real maple syrup.)

You can then add organic raisins for some dishes instead of the other half the sugar in some dishes.  That adds fiber and a new kind of taste to the dish.

Or, you can use half coconut sugar to make the overall sugar lower glycemic since coconut sugar is only 45 while regular is 65 and half and half is 55 instead of 65. 

Or you can use half of one of those and half erythritol.  That has half the sugar and calories so the glycemic load is less too.  Erythritol is a sugar alcohol but is available in granules much like real sugar.  Like coconut sugar, it’s a bit less sweet than regular sugar; but by being only half the sweeteners the combination with a form of real sugar will be close to as sweet. 

The calories and glycemic load are half as much but check for taste before bringing this version or the half coconut sugar one.  (The coconut sugar has a mild brown sugar like taste & likely will pass.  The erythritol version may or may not.  Be sure to check before bringing it.)

Erythritol is OK in small amounts and only half the sweetener besides.  Unlike the artificial sweeteners, it is from natural sources and has no listed health harms reported.

My favorite suggestion is to use half the sugar as real maple syrup or brown sugar from C & H or dark molasses and half as loosely packed organic raisins.  That combination will be festive and taste sweet and be health Ok as long as you go easy on the number of servings.

2.  High fructose corn syrup.  (Much of it contains mercury and the research finds it harmful.)

Be very careful to NOT use any ingredients or foods or drinks that contain high fructose corn syrup.  Recent research finds it to be a heart attack starter and much more fattening than real sugar!)

3.  Refined grains or rice. (These spike blood sugar more than sugar!  Minimize grain and rice as ingredients and use 100% whole grains instead if the dish works at all that way.)

You can also use quinoa  instead which makes a rice like dish that both has more protein of better quality and is much lower glycemic than whole grains, rice, and brown rice.

It also ONLY comes as non GMO.  (That’s because the bitter taste you have to soak off is the plant’s natural pesticide.  So it needs no pesticide either sprayed or genetically added to the food where it cannot be removed as GMO grains do.)

4.  Salt.  (Use some but don't overdo it. And, have some salt free choices for those who need them.  For example, be sure to include some unsalted vegetables raw or cooked to counter balance it with their potassium.)

5.  Fat from grain fed animals that is also high in omega 6 oils.  (You're virtually guaranteed to have some.  But where you can, in recipes, substitute some fat from animals that are 100% grass or pasture fed or substitute extra virgin olive oil.)

6.  Trans fats (aka as  partially hydrogenated oils). (Deadly stuff! Use NONE of it voluntarily.  Use no Crisco or other trans fat based shortening. Use no margarine -- which also is high in omega 6 oils besides the trans fats.

Real butter is better!  And real butter from grass fed cows is best if you can get it.  Just use a bit less or when you can, use extra virgin olive oil.

Our Whole Foods carries Kerrygold Irish butter from grass fed cows; and it has GREAT buttery taste.)

7.  Soft drinks.  (Both regular and diet, these are the worst fatteners consumed by humans. 

The rest of the Thanksgiving dinner feast is enough already! Add no more fatteners!  Since these are the worst known, refuse to bring them or drink them yourself on Thanksgiving.)

8.  MSG.  MSG both fattens even with the same calorie intake AND is thought to be one of the many causes of the damage that causes mental decline too!  Don’t use MSG or foods or spice blends containing MSG or autolyzed yeast or “spices.”

1.  Sugar. 

(This is a separate and second bit I wrote about ways to keep enough sugar to enjoy or to have people who want it to enjoy.  It has some slightly different ideas than the one above.)

Make or serve slightly smaller portions of foods with sugar.  Even 10 % less will help.  (More than 20 % less will likely cause a request for bigger portions or a second helping.)

Make enough for 1 and a half servings each instead of two or three.

Let people serve themselves that food.  That way people who prefer to not eat the sugary food get no sugar from it all. 

Use 10 to 20 % less sugar in the recipe.  The flavored sugars such as brown sugar, honey, maple syrup, and dark molasses can make this hard to detect since there is still a good bit of sugar AND their distinctive flavor to make sure the sugar is noticed.

Substitute raisins or sugared dried cranberries (You have to make dried or sweetened cranberries yourself such as using un-dried cranberries cut in half and then simmered in real maple syrup but only use the cranberries. 

The store bought dried and sweetened cranberries use high fructose corn syrup)

Or substitute walnuts or pecans for part of the sugar if no one is allergic to the nuts.  For some foods, bits of bittersweet dark chocolate might work.  If it will work in the recipe OK, use flavored sugars, brown sugar, honey, or 100 % real maple syrup.  The flavor will make up for the sugar reduction somewhat.  If the recipe works with it, add cinnamon for the same reason.  In addition, it helps your body handle the sugar you eat it with.

Or, use 25% less sugar but replace that sugar with the natural but no calorie sweetener, erythritol.  (Using more than 25% erythritol may not taste as good and might cause your body to crave more sugar.  Try the recipe ahead of time to check it for taste.)

(In 2009, we suggested using Agave nectar or syrup. Do NOT use it!

Since then I tried it and found it NOT to be a very good substitute for sugar. I found it to have a harsh undertone.

AND it's basically straight fructose which is actually WORSE for you than sugar.  Things like maple syrup or brown sugar taste better and actually are better for you!)

2.  High fructose corn syrup.

Currently, this means no store bought pies or other desserts.  Too many of them still contain this.  Do your best to get homemade with real sugar instead even if you have to trade favors with the cook if you don't cook or haven't time. 

Make a strong special effort to not serve or use jam or jelly unless you've read the label and it ONLY has real sugar.  It's changed but at one time, over 90 % of store bought jams and jellies still had high fructose corn syrup instead of sugar. 

Similarly use real maple syrup only in recipes that call for it instead of other kinds. Over 90 % of those that just are syrup for pancakes etc still have high fructose corn syrup while 100 % real maple syrup has only sugar. 

And, either substitute a bit of brown sugar or real maple syrup with a bit of a mild tasting or bland extra virgin olive oil instead of commercial marshmallows as I've read they also tend to have high fructose corn syrup. 

(Since I wrote this section initially, it came out that about 30 % of all high fructose corn syrup including in name brand foods is contaminated with mercury.  Has this been fixed since then? I very seriously doubt it.)

(Pretest recipes before you cook the one for the Thanksgiving Dinner if you can, for best results!)

3.  Refined grain.

Use organic, sprouted grain breads (such as Food For Life Ezekiel or Genesis Bread) for bread or toast crumbs for the stuffing.  They contain sprouted whole grains and are higher in fiber and protein than refined grain breads. 

Even many diabetics find these breads do NOT spike their blood sugar like refined grain breads do.

(Make sure that if you make this that people know it does have some wheat and gluten.)

Experiment with gravy made with lightly toasted gluten free buckwheat flour &/or canned black eyed peas that have been run through a blender for refined grain wheat flour in the gravy. 

It also works to add button mushrooms or diced onion that has been sautéed in extra virgin olive oil.  (Minced garlic and sautéed mushrooms and extra virgin olive oil and pureed cooked black eyed peas and a bland extra virgin olive oil make a decent vegan gravy I found.  It also has zero gluten.)

Use gluten free buckwheat flour for pie crusts and make pies with a bottom crust only or a top crust only instead having a crust both places.  Or use the lattice style on top.

Avoid commercially baked pies and pie crusts if you can.

With the possible exception of those from Whole Foods Markets, or a custom, to-order bakery, they all contain refined grains. 

Even worse, most to almost all commercial pie crusts use shortening or other hydrogenated vegetable oil and trans fats.  That stuff is heart attack starter.  So do NOT use or eat commercial pie crust except those that only use butter or use slightly healthier oils as the special pie crust shells at Whole Foods do.   (Since I discovered that, if I'm served commercial pie, I eat the filling only and leave the crust.)

4.  Salt.  Try to use no packaged or commercial foods as they virtually all have added salt and two or three times as much as they should or have the salt when it's not needed. If you can, make it yourself instead &/or use fresh or frozen vegetables instead of canned. 

And, use a bit less in recipes that otherwise would be a bit salty.  (Unless you are making a dish just for someone who cannot have ANY salt, leave in at least a quarter teaspoon or so per serving or two as a recipe that normally has salt tastes "off" with none at all.

And/or use sea salt as it has salts of other minerals besides sodium in it. 

Of course, in many dishes, you can substitute a bit of minced raw garlic or a very small bit of cayenne pepper for some of the salt for a dish that still tastes good. (Pretest this before you cook the one for the Thanksgiving Dinner though, for best results!)

5.  Less total and more health OK fats.

Cook the stuffing on the stove top instead of inside the turkey. (Inside the turkey stuffing soaks up a lot of total fat, and in grain fed turkeys, a lot of omega 6 oils.)

Serve a small pat of butter or two on top of a dish after it's cooked and still pretty hot instead of using more in the recipe.  (You get the great taste but with a lot less of the fat and calories that way.)

Where you can, substitute extra virgin olive oil.  For example you can strain out the fattiest bits out of the turkey drippings and mix that half and half with extra virgin olive oil for the gravy.  Or you can do 2/3 strained turkey drippings and 1/3 extra virgin olive oil. 

If you include lightly toasted gluten free buckwheat flour &/or button mushrooms or diced onion that has been sautéed in extra virgin olive oil or a bit of minced, fresh garlic, the extra flavor makes up for less turkey broth.

Also consider adding dried and pitted (& checked for being pitted) dried sour cherries to the gravy and the stuffing.  They add a tasty, festive touch AND help your body process the saturated fat.  Diced cranberries also work and fit the traditional Thanksgiving taste themes.

And, to the extent you can, let the turkey drippings drip out of the turkey before it's served.

Minimize cheese dishes or make small portions and use those from grass fed cows. 

Kerrygold Killaree Irish Cheddar is one such cheese. (Kerrygold also makes a butter from cows fed only grass.)

Butter and cheese from grass fed cows do have saturated fat -- but we now know that in moderation  it’s OK for health and even may help protect your heart. 

The omega 6 oils in cheese and butter from cows fed GMO corn are NOT OK to eat if you value your health.  Use extra virgin olive oil and other protein foods instead if you can’t use grass fed. At least eat very little and do NOT cook with it.

Precut butter into small pats instead of serving it by the quarter pound.

Lastly, to the extent you can, include onion and fresh minced, garlic in the foods unless one of the guests will dislike them or be allergic.  They help your body process saturated fat and extra fat.

If you can reliably get a truly pasture raised turkey to cook, it will have less saturated and total fat and omega 6 oils even before it's cooked than a grain fed turkey will.

Use gluten free buckwheat flour for pie crusts and make pies with a bottom crust only instead of one on top as well.

Avoid commercially baked pies. With the possible exception of those from Whole Foods Markets, or a custom, to-order bakery, they almost all use Crisco which has trans fats or partially hydrogenated oils.

Use butter instead.  It's dramatically better for you than Crisco!  And, you can just make pies with only a bottom crust so there's a bit less butter in them.

6.  Trans fats (aka as partially hydrogenated oils).

Avoid buying commercially baked cookies or biscuits as most still have this junk. 

And, either substitute a bit of brown sugar or real maple syrup with a bit of a mild tasting or bland extra virgin olive oil instead of commercial marshmallows as I've read they also tend to contain hydrogenated oils. 

Use whole gluten free buckwheat flour for pie crusts and make pies with a bottom crust only instead of one on top as well. 

Avoid commercially baked pies.  With the possible exception of those from Whole Foods Markets, or a custom, to-order bakery, they almost all use Crisco which has trans fats or partially hydrogenated oils.

Use butter instead.  It's dramatically better for you than Crisco.

To repeat, most to almost all commercial pie crusts use shortening or other hydrogenated vegetable oil and trans fats. 

That stuff is heart attack starter.  So do NOT use or eat commercial pie crust except those that only use butter or use slightly healthier oils as the special pie crust shells at Whole Foods do.  

(Since I discovered that, if I'm served commercial pie, I eat the filling only and leave the crust.)

7.  Soft drinks.

Soft drinks, both regular and diet are about as harmful to consume as is smoking. 

And, on top of that, they are each extremely fattening. 

Do yourself and everyone else a favor and don’t buy any to reward the companies that still make them!

Serve Martinelli's sparkling apple juice, their sparkling cranberry, apple juice blend or a similar combination and 100 % real fruit juice instead.

Club soda and iced tea also work.

In very careful moderation, Champagne or a Sparkling Burgundy or Sparkling Pinot Noir also works.

Do your very best to avoid serving regular or diet soft drinks unless you know your guests will be extremely unhappy without them.  Or if only one or two guests want soft drinks, politely request they bring their own.  At least you won't help enable their bad habit. 

(The evidence now is that drinking abundant amounts of regular or diet soft drinks is about as bad for you as smoking.  It just makes you fat and tends to cause type 2 diabetes & heart disease – just like smoking does.)

8.  Add some good for you foods that help people fill up without the extra amounts of less good for you food components.

Be sure to include good tasting vegetable dishes and a salad or two served without dressing that people can add their own serving of dressing to; and provide a couple or three almost OK kinds in various flavors.

(There are now several dozen recipes from the Wheat Belly people and the Paleo people for really great tasting vegetable dishes that you can make.

Hope to have a few of those and some links next year. )

I’ve not tried either one.  But here are two that you might experiment with:

Curried coconut cauliflower:

Dice up some organic cauliflower and cook it over low heat, and low heat only -- until it’s just begun to soften, in organic coconut milk with turmeric powder and mince garlic and some sea salt to taste.

Try it out well before to make sure you can make a version that tastes good for Thanksgiving.

That’s a way to include a very low glycemic serving of a cruciferous vegetable in a good tasting dish that also is good for you in other ways.

No crust festive pumpkin puree:

Get a can of pumpkin puree only.  Whole Foods often has those on sale this time of year.

Mix it half and half with Maple Hill grass fed yogurt.

Then add some pumpkin pie spice, some cinnamon, and raw pecans or walnuts, and some real maple syrup or dark molasses to taste.   (As long as you go easy on the maple syrup or dark molasses, this will taste great and taste better than most pumpkin pies!)

And as another example of ways to get some health OK vegetables available, my wife and I also now bring the relish dish.  We include raw organic broccoli florets, radishes, pitted olives, carrot sticks from peeled carrots, and sometimes celery sticks or raw chunks of cauliflower. 

We take real sour cream or Maple Hill Yogurt with curry powder; hummus, and a health OK dressing from Annie’s Naturals which Whole Foods carries for dips. 

(Guacamole is OK & even good for health but no one but me used any the time we brought some.  So we stopped bringing that.  It didn't work for the rest of my family.  Yours might like it. Try it and see.)

New in 2013 and still available in 2014!  Maple Hill Farms makes a full fat yogurt from grass fed cows that is available at Whole Foods.  Try that in moderate amounts instead of sour cream from grain fed cows for dips. It’s very rich tasting.

9.  As we discuss next on Tuesday the week of Thanksgiving on how to enjoy Thanksgiving Dinner no matter how it’s fixed --

In your own eating, eat a bit more of the protein foods and a lot more of the healthier vegetable dishes and smaller servings of only the less healthy stuff that you actually like.

Eat virtually NONE of the less healthy stuff that you find OK but not great. 

That way you'll certainly be full enough to feel like you've been to a feast and eat foods you enjoy -- but with minimum damage!

Do the best you can.

Then focus as much as you can on enjoying the food and the people. 

It won't be perfect; but it can be better. 

Let yourself enjoy it; & focus on the parts that ARE going well.

Have a Happy Thanksgiving!