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Diet & Fitness 
  |  Community  |  Diets  |  Following the Gi diet over Christmas dinner
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Following the Gi diet over Christmas dinner


question
We will be back at my mum-in-law's for Christmas dinner, so that means sitting down to eat a huge roast turkey dinner with all the trimmings, followed by Christmas pudding, at about 3pm in the afternoon. All that food is very quickly followed by a blood sugar slump so I crave chocolate about an hour afterwards. Then we miss supper because we ate so late, so I snack on sausage rolls and mince pies all evening. By the next day I've got heartburn, I'm starving all day long but feeling bloated at the same time. Have you got any advice on how to cope with Christmas food a bit better? --Tyllwydd

answer
There's no reason why your turkey dinner can't be mainly low Gi with all that lovely white meat, tons of veg, and perhaps some roasted or mashed sweet potatoes instead of ordinary potatoes (if your mother-in-law is agreeable!). You could even bring along some dishes of your own.

How about giving the Christmas pud a miss this year, at least on Christmas day itself? Your stomach and blood sugar levels will thank you for it at a time when they probably have enough to cope with! You could even have a small piece later in the evening instead of having it straight after dinner. You'll appreciate it much more then anyway!

Try not to snack on high sugar, high fat foods in the evening. Again, you won't even appreciate them because you'll probably still be full from your dinner and any other nibbles you've had. It can sometimes be nice to go back to basics at a time when there is so much rich food around so do have some fruit and even some vegetable sticks with dips for a change from heavy mince pies and sausage rolls. Even buy some nice wholegrain rolls to have with the leftover turkey and plenty of salad.

If you do end up overindulging, don't beat yourself up about it! Try to have a 'healthy' day before New Year where you eat lots of veg, fruit, smoothies, low Gi grains, nuts and seeds etc to give your system a break from all the rich food, and make sure you drink plenty of water the whole way through the festive period!

Kellie Collins

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