Personal Guide To Carving Calories, Salt, Sugar and Fat With Easy Food Swaps & Strategies.
Calories
If you were to cut 100 calories out of your diet each day, you would save up 10 pounds of calories by the end of the year! What are you going to spend all those saved calories on? Oh. . .maybe a leaner, fitter, healthier you! And you don’t have to overhaul your diet to do it. These are simple replacement food swaps and you won’t miss out on one ounce of deliciousness.
- Add cinnamon and pure vanilla extract to your coffee instead of sugar or sugary syrups.
- Leave a couple bites on your plate.
- Choose an appetizer OR a glass of wine, not both.
- Do NOT dip bread in the olive oil BEFORE dinner. Eat your healthy fats during mealtime, not before. While you’re at it, skip the pre-dinner bread dance altogether.
Salt and sodium
Americans consume nearly 3.5 tablespoons of salt each week on average! That’s A LOT! Slash sodium with this food swap list:
- Rinsing your canned beans. (You can buy no salt-added varieties, too).
- Cook at home more. What we ‘add’ in cooking and at the table only accounts for about 10% of the total sodium we consume.
- Reduce packaged and highly processed foods and you’ll reduce sodium.
- Buy unsalted nuts or mix salted and unsalted together!
- Shake something else! Lemon pepper, garlic powder, oregano, crushed red pepper, Italian seasoning or other blends. My favorite blend right now is McCormick’s Fiery 5 Pepper that I sprinkle on avocado toast, into soups, and mix into grains and veggie stir-fries.
Sugar
According to government data, Americans are eating about 270 calories of added sugars each day! That’s 17 teaspoons of added sugars.
- Reduce packaged and highly processed foods.
- Drink water—sparkling or flat, teas, unsweetened coffee and eat soups for hydration. Skip the liquid candy (sugar-based drinks like soda and fruit drinks)
- Eat fruit and other naturally sweet foods for sweetness instead of baked goods like cookies, candy and cake that have high levels of processed added sugars.
Fat
Fat is not bad, but the type of fat matters as does the amount at the end of the day. To reduce solid fats (like saturated fats in butter and meat) and eliminate the added, industrial trans fats:
- Choose foods that have the fats ‘built in’ instead of added to them. For example, nuts, avocado and cold water fish like salmon and sardines have the fat naturally present instead of spreading, drizzling or cooking in the fats.
- Use cooking methods that develop flavor without frying or using too much when it comes to cooking oils (and measure; don’t free pour those oils!). Roasting, baking, light sautéing, caramelizing and grilling can bring out flavors of various foods without adding excessive or unnecessary fats.
- Make swaps and substitutions in baking, by swapping out some of the butter or oil (usually you can substitute about 1/3 to 1/2!) with applesauce, fruit compotes, pureed prunes or plums, or pumpkin.
- Eliminate packaged foods that have ‘hydrogenated oil’ on the ingredient list.
Are you seeing some overlapping themes here? First and perhaps most importantly, focus on real, whole foods and minimize packaged foods. Cook at home more when you can and watch overall portions. Finally, when portions are modest instead of large, calories, salt, sugar and fat are reduced!
More of Dr. Bazilian’s tips for carving calories and slashing sodium can be found from her recent appearance on Live with Kelly and Michael at http://livekellyandmichael.dadt.com/live/kickstartnutrition/
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