After having spent about 7 hours in the kitchen on Thursday making the “traditional” Thanksgiving dinner I wondered how you did it! Did you cook, or did you visit?
I thought I might share some thoughts and a few recipes as well since its so very easy to do poorly with our eating and our choices over the holidays.
First a couple of rules for me:
1) I make doubly sure I take at least 6 fish oil that day because I know there are going to be more Omega 6 inflammatory fats in the diet that day.
2) If you were EVER going to take a multi to make up for the gaps in the nutritional value of the food you are going to eat now is the time! You and I have both heard the varying degrees of lack of nutrition in the food we eat but a conservative estimate is 50% less than 70 years ago due to the way soil is treated. Sadly buying organic does not absolve us from this problem!
3) Make sure you get at least your routine exercise!
4) A longer fast than usual is best on the Holiday day itself. Personally I did not start eating on Thanksgiving until late in the day leaving a good 18 hours without food.
You won’t die! And believe it or not once you get past your usual preprogrammed time to eat you will find you are less hungry not more- that is until you actually begin to eat and then you will really enjoy it.
OK so here are few other notes from the table:
In general we kept carbs lower than the recipes called for either doing without sugar or substituting Truvia or Stevia for the sweet.
The turkey was hormone free, free range and the sausage (used for the stuffing) was also no nitrate non cured. You can use similar bacon for a substitute if you have trouble finding this type of sausage locally.
The turkey was rubbed (separating the skin from the meat) with a mixture of free range butter thyme rosemary, and olive oil and roasted at 400F until hitting 155 internally at the thigh.
The stuffing was a traditional bread stuffing but the bread was cut in half and the bulk of this stuffing was filled with sausage, cauliflower, brussels sprouts, and red onion baked at 400 with the turkey but for a shorter period of time so it went in a bit later.
Salad was torn endive, moderately toasted previously raw walnuts, shelled hazelnuts (easy on these they are high in Omega 6), Macoun apple slices and pomegranate arils. Dressing was buttermilk, olive oil based mayo, chives, and a little lemon rind.
All pretty simple but requiring a fair amount of prep.
And yes, I took my multis with the meal on this day.
I don’t think a rare indulgence is a problem especially if you cover your bases!
Oh Yeah finally, several of my readers have been asking about a sale and when it might be.
There is no question we are going to have an “event” but it is going to be a little different this year mainly because so many people have usurped my ideas that we are due for a change.
The how and when of it is a secret to discourage the copycats as is the structure, but it will not be just like before that is for sure. It will also not be “like what everyone else is doing”!
You should know by now that I am anything but typical!
Bottom line: stay tuned and pay attention to the emails because that is where all will be revealed!
Enjoy the Holidays!
Dr. Dave