Festive season eating
How do we eat after the festive season, this is the big question that plagues many? What do we do to bring the body back into balance? It’s first important to understand that why the body tends to go out of balance, to seek balance. From a Macrobiotic perspective, we get out of balance with 2 energy forces that need to be in balance in the first-place yin and yang. The thing is during a festive season two things tend to happen (1) We eat in extremes and then we have issues – by this I mean too much sugar, alcohol (empty sugars) or the opposite overtly salted foods, animal protein in excess (2) We eat don’t make any balance at home with our foods, therefore we binge outside the home.
Eating right before the festive season
It’s a known fact that if we eat well overall, we tend to survive the festive season better. One of the things we can do is to watch what we eat to the build-up of any festive season. The questions we need to ask ourselves before the festive season are the following:
- Are we eating a good whole grain at least one of our meals, to sustain the body and brains need for glucose and energy?
- Are we eating enough fibre to feed the gut bacteria, and make for good bowel movements?
- Are we putting in fermented foods to help assimilate, absorb, and eliminate?
- Are we satiated and happy with the protein in our diet to keep the cells regenerating?
- Are we fueled with good quality fats, to keep the cell membranes nourished, and have enough energy?
- Is the acidic load of our diet low, if not moderate? Are we eating too much sugar, sugary foods and drinks, alcohol, refined carbohydrates, too much animal protein, salt, in our diet?
If you have ticked most of the questions above, then you are on your way to helping yourself through the festive season on a better footing. When you set this foundation in place, what you are doing then is establishing a better foundation, which will hold you strong.
How will you eat during the festive season?
- Eat at home before you step out, so eating outside become snacks and not meals.
- Eat a whole grain like brown rice or millets at one meal at home.
- Doing what I have said in point # 3 will bring the need to crave more sugary foods, including alcohol when you step out.
- Eat regularly when at home i.e., at regular times. So that you are not very hungry when you step out.
- Make sure that fermented food like sauerkraut or kimchi is a part of your daily diet.
- Focus on sweet vegetables and some fruit for snacks.
Tips to eat when out?
- Avoid bread, and foods that have refined carbohydrates, and sugar.
- Minimize alcohol.
- Eat white rice (as you may not get any whole grain) and vegetables (cooked) if hungry.
- Eat when the food is served, do not wait till the end.
- Avoid snacking, and if you avoid cheese and dairy; this will bloat you up.
- Eat when drinking alcohol, this will slow the uptake of the way the alcohol will react in your body, basically the absorption.
- Eat a meal that has more protein in it. For non-vegetarians some meats and vegetables, and for vegetarians some beans or lentils with vegetables.
- Have a lot of water, if you are drinking alcohol.
- Avoid eating fried food, as we do not what oil may have been used to cook them in.
How to eat post the festive season?
Follow everything from the points where I mention how to eat right before the festive season, and then add the following.
- Add a greens juice to your regimen.
- Add a lime shot daily i.e., squeeze 1 lime in a glass add the same amount of water and drink 2-3 times a day.
- Drink one more veggie juice in the day, this just aids detoxification.
- Soak star anise in water overnight, and then boils the same water the next day and drink warm.
- Eat soupy and lighter meals like a kichari or congee.
- Make sure you add fermented food to meals.
- Sip warm water throughout the day.
- Eat green apples, if available.
- Exercise and sweat it out.
- Do a body scrub religiously (I have covered this in a previous blog).
Don’t forget to have fun!
