Thanksgiving Healthy Eating Tips
by Klint Newton
We all know that Thanksgiving has been labeled the least healthy eating day of the year. If you are on a diet, you will most likely blow it, or make yourself crazy trying to stick with it. With Thanksgiving’s tradition of eating until you’re ready to burst, it seems pretty logical to be scared.
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We have labeled Thanksgiving as the least healthy holiday. Well, like we all know, it doesn’t pay to hang out with the wrong kind of people. Thanksgiving should just be considered another day in November as far as it’s affect of our health, it just happens to be guilty by association. The association we give it to food, and lots of it. With this being the United States of America, we are free to do as we wish, furthermore, eat as we wish. Let’s take a closer look at the major food components to Thanksgiving before we judge too strictly.
First up, I’d like to call to the stand, Turkey, the main character in the Thanksgiving feast.
5 ounces of white mean Turkey: Total Fat: 11.9g Saturated Fat: 3.4 Trans Fat: 0 Cholesterol: 107.8mg Sodium: 89.3mg Carbs: 0 Protein :40.6g
It seems like turkey does have a little bit of fat, but it’s a healthy unsaturated fat, not saturated or trans fats. It has small amounts of cholesterol, sodium and no carbs. There are tons of proteins, and proteins from turkey are especially good because it is a complete protein with all necessary amino acids. Well, it looks like turkey is not only not bad for you, but actually good for you. The outcome, Turkey is innocent.
Now for Sweet Potatoes.
Sweet Potatoes, Dark Orange, Fresh, 5″ long Total Fat: .1g Cholesterol: 0mg Sodium: 71.5mg Carbs: 26.2g Protein: 2g
Hmm, it appears that sweet potatoes are essentially fat free, and cholesterol free. The sodium content is negligible, and so is the protein content. It does have 26.2g of GOOD carbs. Good carbs you ask? Yes, the carbohydrates found in sweet potatoes are complex carbs, meaning they digest slowly, providing your body with energy, not your “spare tire” with more “air.” No fat, nothing else unhealthy, healthy source of essential carbs: The Verdict: Sweet Potatoes are innocent!
Up next, canned cranberry sauce.
Cranberry Sauce, Sweetened and Canned, 3 slices: Total Fat: .3g Cholesterol: 0mg Sodium: 49.6mg Carbs: 66.5g Sugars- 64.5.g Protein: .3g
It would seem like cranberry sauce is fat free, but think of the rules the FDA puts on fat, preservative or even trans fat free items. If an item has less than .5g per serving, then it can claim to be free of it. Just keep that in mind. Imagine that it all has .49g and that is how much fat you are consuming. Cranberry sauce has no cholesterol and a limited amount of sodium. There are tons of carbs, 64.5g from sugar to be exact. Why don’t you just measure out 65g of sugar and attach it to your waistline, we can cut out the middleman that way. It would appear that cranberry sauce is guilty! At least the canned sugary kind is.
Now for the stuffing:
Stuffing, bread, prep/dry mix 1/2cup Total Fat: 8.6g Saturated Fat: 1.7g Cholesterol: 0mg Sodium: 543mg Carbs: 21.7g Sugars: 2.1g Protein: 3.2g
Stuffing has a bit of fat, but not bad fat. It has negligible amounts of cholesterol and protein, but a boatload of sodium. This tasty treat has a lot of sodium, but less than one can of most canned goods. So compared to most people’s diets, stuffing is low in sodium. The carbs are a little high, but the sugar isn’t. That means that the carbs are actual food and not sugar. Now these carbs are from the white bread found in the mix, so they aren’t the best, but 21g of it isn’t enough to worry about, it’s less carbs than a 20oz Gatorade. The Verdict: Innocent!
I’ve seen all I need. We have learned that turkey is actually healthy, canned cranberries are loaded with sugar, sweet potatoes are great, and stuffing isn’t healthy, but isn’t that bad either.
Is Thanksgiving guilty? No, it’s innocent. Turkey, sweet potatoes, and stuffing might actually be our healthiest meal of the year with small healthy portions.
So if Thanksgiving dinner is basically a healthy meal, who is guilty?
No matter what you eat, whether it’s turkey or a hamburger, if you eat too much you will gain weight. If you eat more calories than you burn, you will gain weight.
So what’s the problem with Thanksgiving? We overeat. Not only do we overeat on healthy real food, but we gorge ourselves on desserts. I’m not even going to go there, we all know what we should and shouldn’t be eating when it comes to dessert.
So get off of Thanksgiving’s case, its not guilty, we are. This year, instead of getting so stuffed we have to be rolled away from the table, how about we take responsibility for ourselves and know when to call it quits, and actually do it. This year, instead of complaining how miserable we are from overeating, let’s give thanks to the lord that we actually have more than enough to eat and have our needs provided for.
Have A Happy Thanksgiving.
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Filed under Nutrition by on Nov 22nd, 2009. 2 Comments.

