Eating Well on Shine

5 holiday food shockers (and what to eat instead)

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’Tis the season of eggnog, Christmas cookies and decadent holiday drinks from Starbucks—at least in my house. ’Tis also the season when Americans put on half of our annual weight gain. It’s no wonder our waistlines expand when you see just how calorie- and fat-laden some of our favorite holiday foods are. Check out these holiday food shockers—and find out what to eat instead.

Countdown to Christmas: 12 days of delicious & healthy holiday cookies

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There are only 12 days until Christmas and I plan to bake one cookie recipe a day until the big day. Want to see what cookies I’m making? Here’s what’s on my cookie-baking menu this year.

Angry mommy responds: chocolate milk is “soda in drag”? Puh-lease!

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The other night I heard something that really got under my skin. Some schools across the country are outlawing flavored milk. And crusading for the cause is school-lunch reform maverick Ann Cooper, who's calling chocolate milk "soda in drag." I think that the ban on chocolate milk is crazy and here's why...

Yummy homemade gifts that won’t blow your budget

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I have a tight budget for Christmas this year, but my gift giving isn’t going to suffer. All it takes is little creativity to put together some holiday gifts from the kitchen. This way, I can get into the spirit of giving by delivering healthy homemade gifts that everyone appreciates without worrying too much about blowing my budget.

5 secrets for baking healthier holiday cookies

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Every year when I was a kid, my mom, my sisters and I baked dozens of rich, buttery cookies to fill our famous holiday gift tins. I still love giving homemade cookies as gifts to friends and family, but I don’t want to feel like I’m sabotaging someone’s diet with my present. So this year,…

How to make crispy latkes lighter

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Even though I’m not Jewish, I have a soft spot for Jewish cuisine. I learned to love matzo ball soup and knish when I waited tables at a deli in college, but my real Jewish-food obsession is latkes.

I love fried foods and think it’s pretty neat that they’re served during Hanukkah to celebrate the miraculous way that one day’s worth of consecrated olive oil kept the Jerusalem temple lamp burning for eight days. But all that frying doesn’t exactly make latkes low-cal. Luckily for my waistline, the EatingWell Test Kitchen has come up with ways to make our favorite fried foods taste delicious without a lot of extra fat, including these 3 healthier latke recipes. Find more delicious recipes for the Festival of Lights in our Hanukkah recipe collection.

10 tips to fit into your party dress

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I have a not-so-forgiving little black dress to get into for New Year's Eve. And in between now and then I have a cookie swap and a couple of holiday parties to attend. Forget twigs and berries: with that dress as my goal, these 10 tips should help me wear it happily.

What's your favorite holiday cookie? 5 new 100-calorie favorites

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When the gals in the Test Kitchen told me that these sweet and buttery thumbprint cookies were only 80 calories each (holy cow!) I got to thinking: would it be possible to fill an entire holiday cookie platter with beautiful, delicious AND low-calorie cookies? I did some digging around for my favorite healthy cookies and—ta da! I found these five amazingly delicious holiday cookies for the platter—all for 100 calories or less. Believe me: I’ve tasted every single one of these cookies and you would never know they’re low-cal! Now I don’t have to feel quite so guilty about my holiday cookie obsession.

350-calorie dinners to put the brakes on holiday weight gain

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With Christmas just a few weeks away and lots of parties on the calendar, I need to do something RIGHT NOW to keep my calories in check so I don't have to spend the beginning of the new year on a treadmill 24/7. I'm not going to starve myself, but I am going to work some quick and easy low calorie dinners into my menu, like these 5 main course recipes for 350 calories or less, to help combat holiday weight gain.