PROMISE MAGAZINE  September 2005
A HEALTHY NEW YEAR AND A PRAYER FOR RECOVERY
by Ronni Lizt Julien, MS, RD/LRN


A happy and healthy New Year to all. Most importantly during this secular New Year, please continue to say a prayer for those who lost their lives, their loved ones, and their entire world in Hurricane Katrina. It continues to be a long and grueling road to recovery.

Yet, we are the lucky ones. We get to celebrate the beginning of another year, hopefully, healthy and with our loved ones. On a lighter note, as we speak about a healthful holiday, do you think Aunt Helen will taste the difference when we prepare our favorite holiday dessert with half the amount of fat or sugar? I bet not. Challenge yourself this year to experiment with your favorite holiday recipes. Here are a few substitutions you should try when cooking and baking:

• Decrease the number of egg yolks—use two egg whites in lieu of one whole egg.

• Decrease the amount of sugar—for instance, if the recipe calls for 1 1/3 cups sugar, cut back to ¾-1 cup. Take it one step further, use Splenda.

• Decrease the amount of oil or butter—up to 1/3 less. In fact, depending on the recipe, instead of butter or margarine, use canola oil.

• When baking, use whole wheat flour, or mix the white with the wheat flours.

Give this delightful dessert a try:

White Trifle (Dairy)

1 low fat pound cake (prepared)
4 oz. package of sugar-free vanilla pudding
8 oz. fat free condensed milk
8 oz. water
12 oz. container Lite Cool Whip
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 pint strawberries
2 bananas
2 T lemon juice

Mix vanilla pudding, condensed milk and water together. Refrigerate 1 hour until set. Fold in vanilla and Cool Whip. Layer in a trifle dish: pound cake, pudding mixture, berries and bananas (place in lemon juice). Repeat. The top should be the berries and the banana. Chill and serve. Serves 15-20.

One final suggestion, and this will probably sound the most foreign to us, the Jewish people. When preparing your celebrations, make adequate amounts of food, not enough to feed your entire neighborhood. I promise, there will be enough to eat. The more food available, the more we are willing to eat, and the more we are capable of eating. For once, can we try to leave the table without having to fear implosion?

When your holiday meal is over, suggest your guests relax in your living room area. Or, if the tradition is to sit around the dining room table, clear it off, so the food is not so accessible. As comfortable as it is to sit around the table, it certainly encourages additional eating. For most of us, additional eating increases our risk for medical problems we do not want to be faced with in the coming year.

This New Year, ask yourself to make one small change (monthly!) to your eating habits. It will be a joyous and healthful New Year.

This article originally appeared in the September 2005 issue of Promise Magazine.

 

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