That's Fit

Supermarket guru Phil Lempert was on The View the other day, offering all sorts of tips for saving bucks on holiday meals. According to Lempert, 63 percent of us say food prices are so dramatically high, we need to do something about it. Here's what he says we should do.

• Skimp on shrimp. It's all frozen anyway. Even the stuff in the glass case that looks all pretty and fresh has been previously frozen. So march right over to the freezer aisle, and grab yourself a bag of frozen-solid stuff. It'll cost you maybe $8, compared to $25. Make your own cocktail sauce too. Horseradish sauce and ketchup are all you need.
• Buy ham in a can. You can pay $69 for a big 'ol ham or $15 for a canned one.
  
• Ban the bakery and buy store-bought cookies, make your own pumpkin pie and mix up your own egg nog too.

Want more money-saving tips? The gals at The View have got you covered.

Gravy, stuffing, pumpkin pie ... as delicious as it all is, the calories can really add up. Martha told us that a typical Thanksgiving feast can add up to 4,000 calories. The American Council on Exercise (ACE) is a bit more forgiving and estimates that most of us consume about 3,000 calories. But that's no less shocking. ACE also estimates that we take in about 229 grams of fat. Or, to look at it another way, it's the caloric equivalent of 5.5 Big Macs. Wow.

Don't let those scary numbers stop you from enjoying the feast, though. Fitz has some great ideas on how you can enjoy Thanksgiving and not regret it later. To help you decide what foods you want to splurge on, consider this list:

• Egg nog -- two cups have 684 calories and 36 grams of fat
• Dark turkey meat -- a 3.5-ounce serving has 187 calories and 7.2 grams of fat
• Candied sweet potatoes -- one cup has 286 calories and 7.8 grams of fat

We all know the benefits of breakfast -- it can help you control weight by managing your hunger, it improves focus, and it can give you the energy boost you need to get moving. But what if you're just not a morning person? The idea of pulling together a balanced breakfast when you can barely keep your eyes open isn't exactly realistic, is it?

Cranky Fitness has a great post about how those of us who are much more like slugs than chipper birds in the morning can still get our healthy morning meal. Some of the tips:

• Make a batch of steel cut oats ahead of time, then just warm it in the microwave. Add some low-fat milk and some sliced bananas to sweeten it up.
• Hard boil a few eggs and keep them in your fridge for quick access.
• Fresh fruit is about the simplest and quickest breakfast you can have -- just grab and go.

Though meals made from scratch are always better, sometimes the convenience of frozen meals is too difficult to pass up. And the pictures on the boxes of those frozen meals usually look quite tempting, don't they? The reality is often quite different, though. The portions are small and you can be left feeling hungry -- all that extra sodium and preservatives don't feel worth it when it's not even satisfying. But, with a few added ingredients, you can make those frozen meals more nutritious, tasty, and filling.

Women's Health shares lots of easy ideas -- such as adding basil, garlic, asparagus, or tomato to a Healthy Choice Chicken Alfredo dinner. Check out their other ideas as well. Then, the next time you're resorting to a heat-and-eat meal, look around your pantry or fridge and see what fresh and nutritious ingredients you can add.

When you're crunched for time, you many find it difficult to prepare creative, healthful meals. I know that I resort to my old stand-by meals when I'm really busy. They're stand-by meals because they're quick, healthful, and tasty but after a while, they get a bit boring.

One of my favorite tricks for cutting down on meal preparation time is to cook ahead. For example, if I'm going to be baking some chicken for dinner, I bake an extra piece or two for a different meal later in the week. Self magazine has a great sample menu that uses that same time-saving tip -- and the recipes are healthful, balanced, and sound positively yummy. Give it a try!

Celebrity chef Jamie Oliver has been trying to make a difference in the nutritional quality of the UK's school lunches for years. Now, Oliver is focusing on another area that needs improvement -- the typical British home. He worries that the tough economic times are further degrading the quality of food served at home.

When Oliver was first zeroing in on school lunches and teaching cafeteria workers to prepare fresher, more nutritious meals, he didn't just encounter resistance from kids. In one South Yorkshire town, cameras caught parents of school children shoving burgers and fries at their kids through the school's fence. So now Oliver is working in that town and trying to teach families how to eat healthfully on a tight budget.

Oliver makes a good point: Historically, when money was tight, people had to become more resourceful -- growing their own produce, using cheaper cuts of meat, and so forth. Now, however, people have the option of buying $0.79 boxes of macaroni and cheese or value meals at fast food joints. Have you seen that recent commercial for KFC? The one that challenges people to buy the ingredients for a bucket of chicken for less than they'll sell it to you? That's just the point the Oliver is making -- when convenience and cost pair together, some people will let nutrition slide.

If you're trying to lower your grocery costs, try these tips for eating healthfully on a budget.

'Tis the season for bloating. Starting with the onslaught of Halloween candy and ending -- hopefully -- with a New Year's celebration, many of us are about to eat, drink, party, indulge, and ditch our dutiful exercise routines. We'll be stuffed, stretched, filled to the brim, and -- yuck! -- bloated. I hate that.

On any given day, women are especially vulnerable to bloating, because gastrointestinal ills occur up to six times more often in women than in men, say the experts at Redbook magazine. Give us girls some holiday cheer, and the tummy troubles really ramp up. We can minimize the stress on our systems, though, by understanding why we bloat and how we can prevent those bothersome bulges. Check out these three thoughts.

• Holiday over-do in progress. Raise your hand if you over-do it at holiday meals. Many of us do, with hard-to-digest, rich, fatty foods -- gravy, stuffing, pie with whipped cream, even peppermint -- which cause indigestion. Redbook says you should ease your symptoms with an antacid such as Pepto-Bismol, Maalox, Tums, or Rolaids. I say head this stomach stuff off by avoiding the over-do. If you simply must indulge, make it small -- think you can succeed at the three-bite rule? Also, keep your body upright for a few hours after a feast, instead of curling up for a nap.
• More eggnog and hot cocoa, please. If your belly aches and bulges after these treats, it's probably because you can't tolerate lactose, the main sugar in dairy products. The trick for a settled stomach is to find your own lactose limit and respect it. You can also opt for lactose-reduced milk.
• Belly up to the bar. Besides the overload of calories you'll consume by knocking back too many cocktails this season, you'll likely be left with a bad hangover after an alcoholic indulgence. And maybe a scary condition called acute pancreatitis, caused by an excess of alcohol. One symptom is bloating -- others include pain in the upper abdomen that worsens and wraps around your back. See a doctor right away if this occurs. A better option than alcohol -- since we women don't tolerate alcohol as well as men -- is sparkling water. It's better for the diet overall.
  

My healthy habits have taken a bit of a vacation over the past couple of week. Ten days ago, I took a short trip to Vegas (which-- let's face it -- is not the kind of place that helps you stay motivated to eat well and exercise.) Then, this past week, I had out-of-town guests, complete with four birthdays to celebrate over the weekend -- one of them my own. But I'm not writing this to tell you about me -- I'm trying to offer you (and myself) some tips for getting back on track after falling off the health wagon.

Here are five ways to revive your routine:

Proper nutrition is no goal of the airlines nowadays. It doesn't seem to be, anyway. Fly anywhere at anytime and you'll likely get nothing more than a little bag of pretzels and a small drink. If you're lucky, your flight attendant might throw two snack packs your way. You've got to bundle up your own breakfast, lunch, and dinner if you wish to eat while flying. Or you could eat in the airport while waiting to board your plane -- which might just get easier, if you travel out of JFK.

At JFK's JetBlue Terminal 5, travelers will soon be using touch-screen monitors available in front of about 13 gates to order and pay for food, which soon thereafter will be delivered to them on the spot. The price is right -- about $7 to $8 -- and the convenience is perfect. My only question: How healthy will this food be? I mean, I don't usually stumble across very many healthful options when I'm racing through the airport.

Anyone have any dirt on this inventive new system? And if you were to take advantage of it, what healthy foods would you hope to order?

Having difficulty figuring out what to feed baby? Good news -- your little one can eat the same food as you, in smaller, mushier portions of course. Feeding your baby what you eat is a good way to help your baby develop varied tastes and a fondness for the same kind of foods you eat, and it's perfectly safe according to this article from the New York Times.

There are exceptions to the rule, though. Before they turn one, many experts warn that you should avoid giving your little one egg whites, shellfish, nuts, honey, citrus fruits, beans and wheat. Additionally, there are some allergy concerns with feeding your baby grown-up food so talk to your doctor first.

Our most recent James Bond, Daniel Craig, admits that he's somewhat obsessed with fitness, but that "he's got to stop doing it soon." Not too soon, I hope -- his fitness regime is keeping him in perfect shape to play everyone's favorite spy, especially when he's wearing nothing but some skimpy swimwear.

Of his James Bond body, Craig says, "You have to be psychologically happy to do a movie like this and I genuinely don't diet." He goes on to say that he eats full meals, three times a day, and even indulges in Guiness and red wine on occasion. "Otherwise," he says, "you go insane. You get into a stupid place. I'm obsessive enough about getting fit, it's ridiculous."

He claims that he's getting too old to keep it up, and says, "I have to start getting fat and old." I don't really think that's the case. He's certainly welcome to make that choice, but I know of a lot of celebrities older than 40 who continue to look ridiculously hot -- check them out in the gallery.

I know we don't usually think of the phrase "make your own" anything when it comes to reducing stress. But in the case of kids' meals, I honestly believe it applies.

We often divert to going out to eat when we're maxed out on stress and running way short on time. However, let's disect this knee-jerk reaction a bit and see how much time we're really saving:

By the time kids are loaded into the car, you drive to a restaurant, wait in line to order or wait to be seated, decide what to order, wait for it to be prepared, eat it and come home, you could have easily boiled some water for pasta and steamed veggies and called it a night. Think about it. What's really easier? Another thing I like to do to save time and feed my family, make a couple of dishes on Sunday that can be eaten all week long: enchiladas, a pot of soup, lasagna. I also often make chicken tenders with a package of chicken cut in that format, dipped in bread crumbs, salt and pepper and sauteed in a little olive oil. Takes 10 minutes, tops.


If you still prefer to go out, knowing what's in kids' meals at various restaurants might stress you out enough to keep you home. According to the article, one Chili's Bar and Grill kids' meal composed of country-fried chicken crispers, cinnamon apples and chocolate milk contained 1,020 calories, while another composed of cheese pizza, homestyle fries, and lemonade contained 1,000 calories. A Burger King meal with a double cheeseburger, fries, and chocolate milk has 910 calories, and Sonic has a "Wacky Pack" with 830 calories worth of grilled cheese, fries, and a slushie.

While there are some healthy choices on restaurant menus, "parents have to navigate a minefield of calories, fat and salt to find them," the report said. Plus, there's the price of the food and the gas to get to the restaurant.

Now do you believe me that it's less stressful to stay at home?

A good friend and I were chatting on the phone the other day and the subject turned to grocery costs. I thought my grocery bills were high, but compared to my friend's bills, mine are chump change. Her grocery costs were literally triple what mine were. Considering we have similarly sized families, it was kind of shocking.

In the end, we determined that the bulk of the savings is because her family eats a lot of meat and mine doesn't. It's not that my son and I eat 100% vegetarian meals every night -- we don't. But our meals have just a little meat, and larger amounts of grains and produce. Some ideas:

• Make meat stretch. Instead of cooking one chicken breast per person, make a package of chicken breasts spread over several meals. For example, one average-sized chicken breast is enough to feed three people if you serve enough veggies and grains with the meal. Use the remaining chicken for other meals such as a stir-fry or a cold chicken salad. You can apply the same principle with other meats as well. For example, a package of ground turkey can stretch into three meals for my family -- usually turkey burgers, lettuce wraps, and turkey chili with beans.

I hope you aren't headed to the hospital anytime soon but should misfortune land you there, you might find a better variety of food on your meal tray.

Hospitals are apparently beefing up the quality of food they serve patients. Even well-known chefs, like Wolfgang Puck, are serving as consultants to the hospitals aiming to upgrade their menus. Some locations are even offering hotel-style room service, delivering meals when patients are willing and able to eat them.

Typical dishes you might find gracing your tray: Grilled honey-lime grouper with shrimp and watermelon salsa, soba noodle salad and, for dessert, fresh fruit or a slice of heart-healthy cheesecake. How do these picks sit with you?