How To Eat Healthy During Thanksgiving

What we’re really talking about is a wonderful day when no one diets. I mean, why else would they call it Thanksgiving?

– Erma Bombeck, a humorist who apparently missed her calling as an etymologist

 

Many people will intentionally work out harder or longer on Thanksgiving morning to deserve the right to stuff their face with Thanksgiving goodies later in the day, if not intentionally work out harder or longer the morning after to burn off the meals and desserts from the day before.

If a fucked up relationship with food is what you’re after so exercise becomes a punishment for eating or permission to do so, then sure, go ahead and do a workout Thursday or Friday that strays beyond your norm!

If an eating disorder isn’t on your agenda, then eat in accordance with one of several holiday eating tips out there.

Or, hear me out here… Continue reading How To Eat Healthy During Thanksgiving

Healthy Thanksgiving Turkey Recipe

Turkey is the centerpiece of Thanksgiving dinner.

No feast is complete without it, but why?

As it turns out, the first Thanksgiving celebration between the Wampanoag people and the illegal immigrants that are lovingly referred to as the “Pilgrims” featured wild fowl. But instead of that “fowl” being in reference to turkey, what was most likely eaten were ducks or geese. As to that first Thanksgiving celebration, it wasn’t regarded as a special occurrence by anyone during the event or after because the act of getting together to give thanks for the autumn harvest was a routine tradition dating back to Europe. With that as context, American colonists weren’t observing the Plymouth settlers when they had their own informal Thanksgiving feasts in subsequent years, by which time turkey was on the menu of the harvest celebrations because the bird had become more prevalent in the New England colonies. It wasn’t until about 240 years later that the idea of officially commemorating the “first Thanksgiving” came along. One of the strongest advocates for Thanksgiving becoming a national holiday was Sarah Josepha Hale, an editor and writer that made turkey into the center of the ideal Thanksgiving meal in some of her works. This reinvention of the Pilgrims’ celebration in Hale’s books and magazine features spread across the expanding country and helped link turkey and Thanksgiving together in the public imagination so that there was already a national mythology formed around the festivity when it was finally declared a national holiday in 1863.¹Here’s a fun fact: Hale isn’t only famous for being the “mother of Thanksgiving” due to her work in popularizing Thanksgiving and getting it recognized as a holiday. Nope, she’s also the author of Mary Had A Little Lamb!

Turkey is a staple of Thanksgiving because of marketing — NOT factual history. And because you’re susceptible to marketing, that’s why you continue having turkey on Thanksgiving day. Now, while turkey has many nutritional qualities that make it ideal for someone who’s mindful of their health and weight, some of the ingredients and methods that are used to prepare it for Thanksgiving can make it a nutritional nightmare via the addition of extra fat and calories. That need not be a concern of yours with this turkey recipe if you’re trying to have a healthy Thanksgiving dinner! Continue reading Healthy Thanksgiving Turkey Recipe