Watching your weight this holiday season? Go on have a cookie

Are you starting to think about the inevitable holiday weight gain? Are you coming up with defense strategies?  Looking for "light" cooking advice to limit the damage?  Perhaps you are resolved to the fact that weight gain is going to happen and you'll worry about the diet in the New Year. Is any of this sounding all too familiar? 

At some point this holiday season you are going to be faced with the choice of tantalizing, delicious holiday cookies. So how do you survive the holiday season with all this temptation? One option is to deprive yourself of all those treats. When everyone around you is feasting on sugar cookies, gingerbread men, snicker doodles and mouthwatering butter cookies you can try to convince yourself that the carrot dipped in low-calorie dressing really hits that holiday spot. 

So this year consider another option? Enjoy your favorite holiday foods in moderation. If you revamp the holiday menu to be low fat, low calorie and low sodium there won't be much traditional fare left on the table. No lasagna, no mashed potatoes, no glazed ham, no stuffing and definitely no cookies. You might as well cancel the holidays completely. Holidays come with traditions and they can be enjoyed in moderation. If you aren't changing the holiday menu, at least downsize how much you pile on your plate. 

The next time you are offered an exciting variety of delicious cookies, choose your favorite one, savor it and then put the lid back on the cookie jar.  I'm not suggesting that these cookies are good for you. In all likelihood they will be loaded with saturated fat and unnecessary amounts of added sugar… but they are part of the season's tradition and deprivation may end up backfiring. If you deny yourself that one cookie, it is quite possible you will six cookies later on.

When it comes to managing your weight, how much you eat can be just as important as what you eat.  Here are my top 3 tips for surviving the season

1. Use a smaller plate (no bigger than 9").  Research shows that when you use a bigger plate, you will put more food on it and end up eating more.
2. Get moving - take a brisk walk daily (or any form of exercise).
3. Don't skip meals – you'll be more likely to overindulge later.

Happy Holidays.

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Gemma Saylor is a registered dietitian and the director of Mather Hospital's "Just Ask Us" restaurant program – a New York State grant funded program that encourages Suffolk County restaurants to include smaller portion options on their menus.

John T. Mather Memorial Hospital is an accredited 248-bed, non-profit community hospital dedicated to providing a wide spectrum of high quality health care services to Suffolk County residents, showing compassion and respect and treating each patient in the manner we would wish for our loved ones.