Healthy Holiday Snacking

I'm certain we all have different thoughts on what we do and don't like for snacking habits, but one thing we can probably all agree on is that it gets just a little more difficult when we have unpredictable schedules, like during the holiday season.  Probably just the word "holiday" is enough to increase your anxiety level, much less toss in there the idea of eating those holiday favorites and not impacting any work you did all year to achieve or maintain a healthy weight.  Not to mention any hopes you have for starting the new year off without any weight gain during the season.  One way to stay on track is by including healthy snacks.  I know, sounds like it could be counterproductive, but not if done with some forethought and planning.

First off, snacking can always be part of a healthy diet, but only if those snacks are carefully selected, and packed with nutrients.  Sounds easy enough, but I know many are still hesitant to give snacking a chance.  Any of the basic principles you can think of that make a healthy meal are also the basics that help with creating healthy snacks.  So my big tip here is to focus on more than 1 food group.  I always recommend aiming for at least 2 food groups, which can help increase the different vitamins and minerals you can get from those snacks.

Second, don't over do it.  Snacks should complement your meals without exceeding your calorie needs.  If you aren't snacking now but plan to add in snacks, remember that you need to cut back on your meals.  Snacking is a pick me up between meals but doesn't work if those meals are really large and high in calories.

Third, prepackaged is great, but be wary of sodium.  It's ok to love convenience.  Having a snack that you can toss in your purse, bag, brief case, or glovebox, means easy access, but it also means an increased chance of too much sodium and even added sugar and fat.  This doesn't mean avoid prepackaged snacks altogether, but it does mean you should choose wisely.  Read labels and compare products.  Even better would be to prepackage those snacks yourself.  I personally like buying in bulk and dividing snack items up into my own reusable snack containers or baggies (those can be reusable too).  Not only can this save on cost, but it can increase variety because you can mix up the ingredients, like dried fruit and nuts.

Let's get back to the holiday season snacking theme since we are in that week between Christmas and New Years.  I know not everyone works from home like I do, but I can guess your schedules aren't 100% normal right now either.  You might be on the go, stuck back at your desk after a more active week during Christmas (anyone else spend time walking all over a shopping mall?), or still stuck in a hyper-social state where you seem to be dining out 24/7 with friends and family.  Whatever it may be, you may still find that snacks are a healthy way to keep you from overeating at meal times and help boost your intake of nutrients.

So what are my favorite healthy snack ideas?  Easy!  I have my regular go-to's like non-fat plain Greek yogurt with dried fruit (I usually add dried cranberries or chopped dried apricots), pretzel flats with almond butter or hummus, and roasted nuts mixed with dried fruit.  Since it is holiday time there are a few others that become easy based on leftovers from holiday parties:

veggie sticks with hummus or guacamole, 

fruit and cheese: there almost always seems to be a little left over from the holiday party fruit platter and the cheese and  cracker platter,

and "left over" soup: yes, soup makes a great mid-day snack and bonus points if you can make this on your own with a low sodium broth, leftover veggies and proteins.

Whatever it is you choose, don't forget that snacks make an easy way to boost your fruit, veggie, fiber, and dairy intake (or some calcium alternative if you prefer), especially if you found those lacking in your holiday meals over the last few weeks.  These are just some of my favorite holiday snacks.  There's no reason to have to give up healthy eating and nutritious foods over the holiday break and this will help you start off 2016 on the right foot.

For more on great snacking ideas, check out these healthy snack ideas from Nuts.com.  And for all of my military spouse friends and readers, if you aren't already a fan of Nuts.com, consider checking them out (this is my own personal endorsement as I have been a long time fan and shopper on this website).  I have always found this company to be very military friendly and accommodating of those of us living overseas (you know how it can be when you try to ship to an APO address!).

Happy Holidays everyone!

Day 10: International Congress of Dietetics 2012, Opening Day

As I mentioned at the end of my last post, I had to be at the convention center at 6 am to help set up for a breakfast.  To kick things off, the American Overseas Dietetic Association (AODA), along with the Academy, welcomed special guests at a special breakfast.  Although Julie, our fundraising chair, organized this lovely breakfast, she was unable to join us in Sydney, so I offered to be the contact person for AODA here (I'm the nominating committee chair so I was going to be there anyway).  Our Australia country rep (we call them CRs) did all of the work here to get this to be the success that it was.

The breakfast really was beautiful.  Everything looked great.

They served these lovely fruit kebabs.

Then we had some yogurt on muesli.

They also served eggs, toast and bacon (which I passed on, of course).

Here is our CR introducing speakers.

Naomi Trostler, a very important person not only in dietetics all over the world (and her home country of Israel), but within AODA, gave a nice presentation about AODA.  Many people do not know we exist, but we have quite a few (I believe over 700 now) members spread out over 70 countries, and we are all Academy members living and working in various places around the world, even in the US.

Ethan Bergman, the current president of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics also spoke.

I managed to head into the expo and quickly grab a few goodies, like these Quaker cookies.  You can see they have some fiber and less saturated fat, and include Australian oats.  They were not very big cookies either, about 2-3 bites per cookie, so that helps keep the portion reasonable.

To kick off the conference, ICDA (International Confederation of Dietetic Associations) spoke about their findings from a survey of all the dietetic associations around the world that are ICDA members.  One thing I did not know was that only 1 dietetic association per country can be a member, and therefore be that countries representative in ICDA.  It may sounds strange because we only have 1 dietetic association, but in other countries it seems they have multiple groups that dietitians are members of.

I took some pictures of the slides so I could share some things that I found interesting.  As far as a title or credential, like RD, which we use in the US (APD in Australia, Accredited Practicing Dietitian), that is protected by law, over the past 4 years this has increased in countries around the world.  So for the protected title, in 2012, 72% of the dietetic associations that are members of ICDA, have a protected title in their country.  It is up a little from 69% 4 years ago, but the other difference is that more countries are ICDA members and therefore more responded to the survey.  Around 73% have a credential, like RD.

Here is a breakdown of the education required in order to become a dietitian or equivalent.  Most are like the US where the Bachelors degree is the minimum requirement.

Here is the infomration on length of years for education, and most fall in at 4 years, which is what the US has.  Some countries where a dietitian earns an undergrad degree may still not translate to our 4 year degree in the US, as they can earn that same undergrad degree in 2.5 years.

This is a slide about the practicum, which was have as an internship in the US.  There are 3 countries that have no practicum at all.  Most fall in with 11-30 weeks of a program.  If you are an RD, how long was yours?  I think mine was about 40 weeks, but in the US it is the hours total, not the weeks, that matters.  Mine was about 10 months, 4 weeks each, but I guess we had vacation at Christmas time.  I am pretty sure this is about the norm in the US.

As for maintaining registration, this is required in 14 countries, and continuing education is mandatory in 21 countries.  You can see that 13 out of the 14 countries with maintenance, 13 also require continuing education, which is what we have in the US.

As far as where the dietitians in other countries are working, you can see the data.  Let me explain this a little.  So, the percentages mean that the countries that responded said they have at least 1 dietitian working in that area of dietetics.  For hospitals, 100% of the countries surveyed have dietitians working in the hospitals.  This is the most traditional setting, so that makes sense.  The information continues on the next 3 pictures.

Lunch was eaten standing up, so I couldn't get a picture, but it was sandwiches.  I did grab some mixed nuts (hot nuts too!) for my afternoon snack.  I love that at this conference they served morning and afternoon tea.  During that time coffee and tea were available at the expo and the booths were open to give up samples and information.

After the day ended, we headed outside to the harbor to enjoy the sunset.  Here is a sculpture out by the convention center.

Across the harbour you can see the Pyrmont bridge, which I walked across a few times.

Then I went to the mall to use the pay computers there so I could get some work done.  Most everyone else went to the opening welcome reception, but I paid my registration as a student (to save a few hundred dollars, and yes, I am a student...doctoral that is!) and this did not include the reception.  If I wanted to attend it would cost me another $65 and I just wan't that interested.  I guess I didn't miss to much, or so I was told.  Once it was over, I met back up with my friend Charmain, the AODA IT person and Hong Kong country rep.  We took a walk towards China town and the train station since she needed to catch a train that night back to her uncles house (great way to save money...stay with relative!).  I just loved the colors on this building so I took a few pictures.

QUESTIONS:  Have you ever been to a conference where meals are served?  Did you know there were so many countries with similar RD credentials out there?

New snacks and food combos plus From Scratch Weekends Info

I have a few pics that I haven't gotten posted yet, so here is what I did to enjoy my left over tortellini from scratch.  Some I can't believe it's not butter spray and black pepper.  It was fantastic.

To warm up the other day I made some hot chocolate with skim milk and reduced sugar Hershey's syrup.

I am working at the school all week, so I have been packing my lunches.  This was my super lunch from yesterday.  Gotta love leftovers.  I added a laughing cow cheese, kiwi and an apricot.

Ok, so on to my new and delicious snacks and such.  I added some of this yummy PB to a choc rice cake...

and the result was heavenly.  This is my new snack after the gym.

This was my breakfast from over the weekend.  It was so good I had it both days.  This is oat meal, frozen strawberries (which get heated with it so they are not so frozen) and a spoonful of TJ's almond butter.  So yummy!

Ah, so I took a little of this...

Added some (frozen, but thawed) strawberries and cherries...

Then topped it with a crushed one of these...

To make this amazing dessert.  You can't even see the yogurt anymore with the rice cake on top.

QUESTION: Any new favorite snack or food combo that you just can't get enough of right now?

FROM SCRATCH WEEKENDS:  The idea came to use when we wanted to make some tortellini's at home.  We googled for recipes and had a hard time since most called for prepared store bought tortellini.  Then there was a post on Yahoo! Answers where the person asked for a recipe from scratch and got a response for a sauce from scratch and tortellini from the store, so the original author then had to clarify.  I thought FROM SCRATCH would imply just that, but it means different things to different people.

So, our idea is to cook one FROM SCRATCH meal over the weekend.  For us this will mean as from scratch as possible, so bread, pasta, whatever.  As much as from scratch as possible.  At some point we will have to draw the line since somethings we may not be able to make.  I plan to make any bread we will use for the meal from scratch and anything else that is within reason.

So my challenge is for everyone to jump on board with from scratch weekends and spend time in the kitchen making a real home cooked meal.  Some of you do this all the time already, but I know that from scratch means varying things for all of us.  So what I propose is that on the week you step it up from your current kitchen experiments.  Whatever from scratch means for you, that's what I want you to aim for.  Try to make everything from the basics as possible.

I think and hope that we will get to do this most weekends.  As this is the first of the new year, well practically, I think we can get 40 meals in over 40 weekends.  With 52 in the year I know that some weekends will be a wash.  I plan to travel and have family here so I do not want to over commit to something.  With Ryan as my partner I also hope the time spent in the kitchen will decrease since 3 hours seems like a lot, but Ryan and I have a good time in the kitchen and get to enjoy our success for not only dinner, but as leftover meals too.

Good luck!  I wish all of you success with FROM SCRATCH weekends, if you accept my challenge.  The main thing is to have fun and enjoy yourself, so no stress and if you mess something up, no worries...order a pizza!  I want everyone to learn and enjoy themselves and the company the share in the kitchen.  Happy cooking everyone!