By Emma Weitnauer
Every year most of us make a New Year’s resolution: ” I won’t eat as much next Christmas”. But one year later, the Christmas party season starts. One year after we promised never to overindulge like that again there we are eating and drinking excessive (but delicious and fun) amounts.
Christmas foods are fantastic and on Christmas Day, over-eating starts early with champagne
brekkie and ends late that night with a supper of Christmas lunch and dinner leftovers. And don’t
forget about all the extras in-between, gifts of chocolate, nougat, fudge, bon-bons and of course you have to taste a little bit of each.
Enjoy the party season. Enjoy Christmas Day. To limit the negative of effects of Christmas-time excesses, restrict the indulgence. You don’t need to get drunk to have fun, you don’t need to overeat to enjoy the tastes of party food on offer. And then, on Christmas Day, don’t feel guilty about what you eat and how much you eat, eat whatever you want, one day doesn’t matter, as long as it is only one day - December 25th.
What about recovery? How do you recover from Christmas-time partying?
Most importantly, drink lots of water to rehydrate your body, and increase your vitamin B intake to soften the impact of alcohol on your system, take a vitamin B supplement or eat potatoes, bananas, lentils, turkey or tuna.
Increase your Vitamin C intake to boost your immune system, eat lots of kiwifruit and oranges. Eat more foods containing antioxidants such as red, green, yellow and orange coloured fruit and vegetables.
Enjoy some light summer meals. Here are some summer salad ideas:
- King prawn salad with snow peas and cherry tomatoes
- Smoked chicken breast salad with roast sweet potato or kumara with baby spinach leaves and toasted pine nuts
- Avocado salad with shaved parmesan, rocket and pepitas.
- Greek salad with feta and kalamata olives.
You will feel good about eating these salads for lunch or dinner. Add some low-GI bread with low-fat dip.
Summertime is great for light, refreshing guiltfree deserts:
- Sorbet/gelati with fresh melon or berries
- Fresh fruit salad
- Fruit iceblocks made with juice or low-fat yoghurt
- Berry smoothies made with sorbet and crushed ice, or with low-fat milk and low-fat frozen yoghurt
- Homemade fresh fruit jellies
Eating well after Christmas will help you to feel better, but you also need to get yourself going and do some exercise. Burn off those extra Christmas kilos by getting outside and being active. Get into shape for summer.
- Go camping and bushwalking
- Go walking with your partner, your kids, the dog
- Hit the bike track and ride your bike or rollerblade
- Go to the beach and swim, surf or body board
- Play tennis, soccer or other fun games with your kids
- Make a resolution to enter the fun run or triathlon that you have always wanted to complete and start training
- Finally, fulfil your New Year’s resolution from years ago to join the gym and get yourself a personal trainer.
Get out there, do some exercise and have fun. Enjoy Christmas time. Just don’t overdo it - you don’t want to work too hard to repair the damage!
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