Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, Hanukah, New Year’s Eve—these holidays have several things in common, including family togetherness and food. While the family togetherness aspect is a wonderful part of the holiday season, it is unfortunate that the average person gains seven pounds during this time frame due to too much energy intake and not enough energy output. Food is at every event, and is usually the center of it. As human beings, we have gotten into the habit of making every holiday about the food. The trick-or-treating candy, Thanksgiving pie, and every meal and drink associated with the other holidays have really gotten out of control. While there is probably no immediate societal solution for this food-centered tradition, we can choose to make different lifestyle choices individually by making family bonding more important and food preparation and consumption less important.

By focusing more on the actual family relationship-building time rather than sitting around a table and eating, we can be sure to get the most out of the time we spend with our loved ones. According to Kelley Lindberg, a member and chapter president of the Utah Food Allergy Network, food has become the essential part of our parties and reward systems. “This has contributed to why America has more obese and overweight people today than twenty years ago,” she said. Lindberg has a son with food allergies and says it has been an important aspect within their family to teach the fact that not every celebration needs to revolve around food because that leads to bad eating habits. In Lindberg’s family, they try to focus more on the actual conversations or achievements going on in each other’s lives rather than a special meal that comes as a result of some special award or holiday.

Instead of eating second courses, replace the extra food-eating time with games, exercise and conversation. Of course, food must be served over the holidays; consumption of food is an essential part of life, however it should not be the core of and reason for family get-togethers. Try exercising together. For Halloween, walk the neighborhood as a family instead of driving the car. On Thanksgiving, have your family run a Turkey Trot. For Christmas, participate in a family football game. There are all sorts of fun sports that can be played as a whole family. And if you are not the sports type, consider playing an indoor game like Balderdash, Charades or Pictionary—get everyone involved! And if nobody wants to participate, get out of the dining room, into the living room and have a good, old-fashioned conversation.

Another idea to reduce food consumption is to prepare less food. There are always leftovers at my house over the Holiday season. The result is that we continue eating rich, bad-for-you foods for a week, not just one holiday. Another unfortunate aspect of making food is that if you prepare it, you feel obligated to try it when it is done. The person cooking always eats more than the party-attendees. Try delegating some of the meal responsibilities so that you are not stuck sampling everything. By preparing less food, your company will feel less obligated to load their plates up too; they will realize there might not be enough food for everyone to eat three servings at one meal, so maybe they will only eat one or two servings. Try reducing the amount of desserts too; instead of having an assortment of pies and cakes, just offer one or two different types.

The holidays are really wonderful. I love them. But just like many of you, I am tempted by food. It is important to note that you will feel much better about yourself if you listen to your body as you eat; do not eat until you are ready to explode, stop when you feel satisfied and not when you are full. Most importantly, remember to focus on the family—not the food.

Courtney Lewis attends Utah State University and is a writer for http://www.sweetlyyou.com where you can create unique, customized bath and body gift sets.

Article Source: ArticleSpan

Healthy eaters know that easily the best way to please someone dear to you is to make him a Romantic Dinner. We’ve gone one better and prepared a special collection of Romantic Dinners.

See pictures of delicious recipes and other details at:

Romantic Recipes They Love

Overview

No event is complete without turkey being served. Thanksgiving, Christmas and even simple family gatherings become a one of a kind celebration with a sumptuous turkey gracing the dining table. If one is preparing for an occasion or quiet time with family and friends and would like to know how to prepare the best turkey in town, one has to realize that it starts with knowing what the best turkey stuffing is.

The best stuffing really depends on what kind of ingredients would tickle one’s fancy. While many perceive the best turkey stuffing to be exactly like the turkey they had for Christmas or Thanksgiving, many try to innovate and add new things to make the dish tastier.

Traditional Best Turkey Stuffing

When we speak of the traditional kind of turkey stuffing, we require three kinds of herbs in addition to everything else. These three herbs are marjoram, sage and thyme and these can be in either dry form or fresh. Chop celery, garlic and onions and fry these using butter in a large frying pan until it gives out a pleasant aroma. Add a dash of salt and pepper to lock in the flavors and throw in vegetables of choice. Many use diced carrots and peas but one can certainly throw in there vegetables that one feels would make the turkey taste much better. Add the herbs.

Once the vegetables are cooked, it is a good idea to put it in an airtight container and leave it in the fridge overnight. However, if one is pressed for time, just let the vegetable mixture cool down before mixing it with bread cubes. The traditional best turkey stuffing is ready to be placed inside the bird.

Innovative Best Turkey Stuffing

For those who are a little more adventurous, aside from the usual ingredients, some add a bit of ground meat to the stuffing and use potato instead of bread. Potato absorbs the taste of the cooked ingredients and this carbohydrate makes up for the bread stuffing. Because the turkey is baked with the stuffing inside, there is no need to cook the potato separately but if one wants it a little mashed, boiling might be necessary.

The best turkey stuffing is best complimented with turkey that is of the right texture and just the right size so that it cooks evenly. Before making the stuffing, one should make sure that the turkey is ready and that it fits in the oven.

Visit these sites if you want more information about best turkey stuffing or using a tube turkey call in particular.

Healthy eaters know that easily the best way to please someone dear to you is to make him a Romantic Dinner. We’ve gone one better and prepared a special collection of Romantic Dinners.

See pictures of delicious recipes and other details at:

Romantic Recipes They Love

Of course, when it comes to Christmas Gifts for Girls, there are many opportunities and not just the obvious items, like Dolls, that are desired by the young girls. For instance, there are many books and book series that appeal to girls, puzzles, word games, diaries and lots more.

Christmas Gifts for Guys has many options that go past men’s shoes and shirts. Men and older boys tend to be fascinated by gadgets and there is an endless variety. Think GPS navigation systems, wrist watches that have special functions, such as measure heart beat, video game consoles, emergency road repair kits and household goods, like barbecues and outdoor grills.

There are also many toys, games and educational systems that are much loved by kids. The classic is no doubt he video game and electrical learning systems. However, don’t forget traditional items like bicycles and toy fire engines, as well as long popular games like Scrabble and Monopoly.

Cool Christmas Gifts are probably the province of the teenager, both boys and girls. Although both will appreciate DVDs, you naturally have to consider that “Twilight” - the books as well as the movies - will more likely cause the hearts of teenage girls to flutter, whereas action movies - such as the Terminator, Iron Man, Transformer and similar will raise the adrenalin in young guys.

There is also a group that finds lots of appeal in Creative Christmas Gifts. These can vary from simple diaries and journals to the modern electrical version. Also, items are available which allow girls to design fashion, explore different makeup and hair options, combine fragrances, and lots more. Guys with creative instincts often get a lot of fun out of electronics sets which provide many useful components that can be assembled into useful objects.

However, there is much more to be obtained from the detail, so have a closer look at what has been described on these pages:

Christmas Gifts For Girls

Christmas Gifts For Guys

Christmas Gifts For Kids

Cool Christmas Gifts

Creative Christmas Gifts

If you eat fast food every day for lunch, try having it just every other day. When you start by taking small steps, it does not seem like you are cutting out all of the foods you love and you can take your time to learn about healthy foods which, believe it or not, you can love equally as well. Who would not agree to that old adage - health is wealth.

Life is so much better if you are free of disease and you can enjoy an active life style. Proper diet and adding good exercise can keep many diseases at bay.If the body receives the proper nutrition, it is better for the immune system in it’s fight against infections and free radicals in the body. When your immune system is healthy, if you get ill, recovery is much faster.

Cook at home. Home cooking provides a better control of food and noticeably reduces consumption of trans fat, sugar, salt, and numerous food additives. Commercially prepared foods like hamburgers, hot dogs, fried potatoes, chips, cakes, and crackers are probably the biggest source of trans fats in our diet. Make your own pizzas, burgers, cakes and other things you like. Sure it takes time, but what is your health worth?

cook with the seasons and use ingredients that are as fresh and locally produced as you can get without undue expense or hassle. Organic produce is desired because it is better for you and the dirt. We don’t think about it, but fertile dirt is a precious resource. Without it, we don’t eat.

Cooking at home also provides a more relaxed, laid back, slower atmosphere for the meal. Joy is a wonderful anti-aging remedy, so enjoy and savor your food! When you eat slowly, you taste the food more and you are satisfied with less. Eating slowly gradually reduces your appetite right from the time you start to eat. Mealtime is fun and relaxing. It’s a time to catch up with friends and family and enjoy each others’ company. I believe that it’s really important to be relaxed and ready to eat. Relaxation aids digestion and nutrient absorption.

The hard part about cooking at home is that you sometimes find yourself at a loss for what to make. Here you are going through the cupboards trying to please everyone with something interesting but everyone responds with “no I don’t like that” or “no thats boring” or “no we had that 2 days ago”.

Most of us never know that many of the tasty and rich dishes as well as the side dishes that we relish at parties, receptions and restaurents were in fact prepared very quickly and easily with little effort. Therefore this means that if you have the will and ideas, you too can make many delicious dishes during a special occasion with little time. The trick is to choose a simple meat dish and dress it up with more decadent side dishes. You will be surprised to know that the rich side dishes which were in greater number then the meat dish, were, in fact very simple and easily made while the main meat dish had to be prepared with great culinary skills.

I usually don’t cook with precise measurements and like to vary the dishes seasonally. After you follow a recipe once, play around with seasonings the next time to suite your own tastes better and use what you have on hand. Another useful tip for cooking for special occasions is never cook anything that is foreign to you or you don’t really know about its process as this will take a lot of your time and you may make mistakes.

When you are on a journey to healthier eating and preparing healthy meals, it can be challenging because many of the foods you prepare may seem bland and frankly, boring. To compensate, you turn to seasoning spices, which are a terrific way of adding flair to your healthy meals, making it much easier for you and your whole family to enjoy. When we are trying to eat healthy we often use spices to make our dishes more appealing and exciting.

Dinner is a great classic. That is the time when families bond; daily activities are shared; we reveal our secrets and form lifetime memories. Not enough people make the time for an enjoyable dinner with friends and family and great food. Take-out has taken over. The positive thing to cooking at home is that it’s made with all KNOWN ingredients and your not surprised by what ends up in your dish or what ends up on your waistline.

For the reader who is interested in expanding his/her horizons in the culinary field, the author highly recommends the following site for you; http://eathealthyathome2.blogspot.com/

Article Source: ArticleSpan

Easily the best way to please someone dear to you is to make him a Romantic Dinner. We’ve gone one better and prepared a special collection of Romantic Dinners.

See pictures of recipes, along with user comments and more details at

Recipes They Love

When it comes to our heart health it’s important that we follow a heart health diet, that we get enough exercise and that we learn to control our response to negative stress in our lives.

It’s true that heredity plays an important role in our susceptibility to heart health problems, but there are many aspects of our diet and lifestyle we can control, starting with a heart healthy recipe that you will enjoy.

Many studies have demonstrated the benefit of extra virgin olive oil, vegetables and garlic to overall health and wellness, yet it can be tough to combine these into something that is simple to eat, so here is a tasty pesto heart healthy recipe that will not only do wonders for your overall wellness but will taste great too.

I have to admit straight up that I have often had trouble digesting pesto recipes that I get in Italian restaurants, I’m not quite sure why, but my feeling is that there is too much oil or the garlic is perhaps too heavy.

That’s the great part about making your own heart healthy recipes such as this pesto is that you can alter the amount of ingrediants to suit your preference.

There are 2 major ingredients in pesto that make it especially healthy for the heart.

Several studies have demonstrated the benefit of quality olive oil to heart health.  By swapping other fats or carbohydrates for unsaturated fats such as olive oil you can have a positive impact on both lowering blood pressure and on lowering cholesterol.  The impact on lowering blood pressure is a relatively recent finding by scientists and just one more added benefit of a heart healthy recipe that includes olive oil.

Another great ingredient in pesto that benefits the heart is garlic.  Once again, several studies have demonstrated a beneficial impact on heart health with garlic including the ability to control and even remove existing plaque build-ups in your arteries.  Even more important is that recent findings suggest that pure garlic (as opposed to supplements) is better for your system, pesto heart healthy recipes certainly fill that requirement.

In addition, the fact that this heart healthy recipe is low in salt and includes the tasty and healthy basil herb, also makes it a superb food for our heart.

HEART HEALTHY RECIPE - BEST PESTO

To make pesto you will need a food processor to combine and even liquify the ingredients turning them into a marriage of flavors that is just simply incredible.

You will need…

1/2 cup of extra virgin olive oil (I’ve even done 1/4 cup and had good success)

2 peeled garlic cloves (move to 1 if you not garlic crazy)

1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese

1 Tablespoon of lemon juice

2 Cups of fresh Basil leaves (if you find the Basil overpowering, substitute some parsley)

Fresh ground pepper

Combine everything together except the cheese into your food processor and puree until smooth - I like it when it’s combined into a thick paste.  Finally, stir in the cheese and store it for at least a day in your refrigerator - it will keep for days and the taste will actually get better.

You can east this heart healthy recipe with thin toasts such as Melba toast or oven roasted toast that you make in your own oven.  You can also serve it with meats or bump up the flavor of many other recipes. Of course, this pesto recipe will also be great with any pasta.  Just remember, keep it cool until you pour it over your pasta.

There you have it, a heart healthy recipe that is quick and simple to make, lasts for days, is big on flavor and inexpensive to make over and over again.

Healthy, Low Fat and Quick Recipes That Will Make Your Tastebuds Water With
Anticipation - You Really Can Experience Healthy Eating Without Giving Up
Taste Or Time.  Visit http://www.rapid-weight-loss.com/diet-recipe.html

See pictures of recipes, along with user comments and more details at

Heart Healthy Recipes