Happy Thanksgiving! Better known as "Turkey Day." AKA "Turkey, stuffing, potatoes, green bean casserole, sweet potato souffle, pecan pie Day."
The average Thanksgiving meal weighs in at a hefty 2,000 calories, give or take a turkey slice. And that doesn't include whatever else you snack on during the day, which is probably in the family of cheese and crackers, spinach dip, etc. By the time you're done you might well have consumed a couple days' worth of calories.
Yep, Badasses. Today is totally a Pooch Pants day. And ya know what? That's totally OK. Because it's all about balance.
So in the grand scheme of our efforts toward being healthy, we're allowed to have a day in which we count our blessings in scoops of stuffing and ladles of gravy. (I'll be counting mine in scoops of green bean casserole, which is to my mouth as is a moth to a flame. I would eat the whole friggin' casserole if not for the line of friends and loved ones behind me waiting for their servings...) I'll also be eating a slice of this Milk Chocolate Toffe Pie I made. Yeah, I know you want some!
But if you are trying to lose, or not be the "average American" who points on a few or several pounds between now and New Year's, there are choices to be made right through Thanksgiving dessert. If all you want today is to stretch your pooch pants, enjoy that and the loved ones who share the meal. You're still a Badass!
If you want to keep the calories to less than a freezer of ice cream, however, here are a few tips:
Turkey: Make this the focus of your plate. It's lean, the breast meat especially, and packed with muscle-building protein. And don't drown it in gravy. A few drizzles will do.
Stuffing, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes: Depending how the stuffing is made, it might be loaded up with bacon or sausage fat. Then again it might have all kinds of good stuff in there like diced apples, nuts, etc. So have a scoop, but don't have three. And if you want to keep the carbs under pre-marathon load levels, pick just one of the potato dishes -- sweet potatoes being the nutritional superior. Then again, if it's a casserole loaded with sugar and marshmallows, you might be better off saving the sweets for dessert and picking the mashed white potatoes.
Peas, green bean casserole, veggies: Have at 'em, and hope the cook didn't drench them in butter. Sure, the green bean casserole has those fried onion things. But it's also got mushroom soup and milk in it. And it's more green beans than anything else.
Cranberry sauce: Lots of sugar, but basically fat free. And cranberries are full of vitamins and good stuff! have a hearty scoop.
Bread, rolls: Have just one if you must. There's lots of bread in your stuffing anyway.
Dessert: If you have a choice between apple or pecan, go with the apple and don't eat all the crust. You'll save yourself fat and calories (a pecan slice can have as much as 500 calories). Pumpkin or sweet potato pie is also a better choice than pecan.
And check out this nifty Thanksgiving calorie counter, which also calculates how to help walk/run it off later.
Coming up: I don't even know. I'm just thinking about green bean casserole and chocolate pie...
