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Lighten your calorie load with some delicious, nutritious food between big holiday meals.
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The holiday season has arrived with its cozy vibe, joyous celebrations and inevitable indulgences. From Thanksgiving feasts to Christmas cookie exchanges to Aunt Eva’s irresistible jelly donuts—not to mention leftover Halloween candy still lingering—fall and winter can feel like a non-stop gorge fest.
Total resistance is fairly futile—let’s be real—so it’s helpful to arm yourself with ways to mitigate the effects of eating-all-the-things around the holidays. Serving smaller amounts of rich, celebratory foods and focusing on slowly savoring the taste is one way. Another is to counteract those holiday calorie-bomb meals with some lighter fare in between.
Contrary to popular belief, eating “light” doesn’t have to be tasteless, boring or unsatisfying. And contrary to common practice, meals don’t have to fill an entire plate—especially when we’re trying to balance out heavy holiday eating.
It is possible to enjoy the bounties of the season while maintaining a healthy balance. Whether you prefer to eat low-carb or plant-based or gluten-free or everything under the sun, we’ve got you covered with these 10 easy, low-calorie meals from across the dietary spectrum.
Each of these recipes has less than 600 calories (most a lot less) per serving and can be made in less than 30 minutes. And Albertsons has made it easy to find O Organics® ingredients you can put right in your shopping cart to make prepping these meals even simpler.
Enjoy!
Not quite green eggs and ham, but closeAlbertsons
Breakfast Skillet of Greens, Eggs & Ham
273 calories | 20 minutes
Ingredients:
1 (5 oz) pkg baby spinach
2 eggs
1 clove garlic
4 slices prosciutto
1/2 medium yellow onion
1 medium zucchini squash
1/8 cup butter, unsalted
1 pinch crushed red pepper
Find full instructions and shopping list here.
Get your cauliflower power on.Albertsons
Creamy Cauliflower Salad with Ham, Celery & Dill
345 calories | 20 minutes
1/2 medium head cauliflower
1 stick celery
1/4 small bunch fresh dill
8 oz. ham steak, boneless
1/2 shallot
1/4 tspblack pepper
1/4 tsp curry powder
2 tsp Dijon mustard
1/4 tsp garlic powder
3 Tbsp mayonnaise
1/8 tsp paprika
2 tsp red wine vinegar
1/2 tsp salt
Find full instructions and shopping list here.
Plant-based food fan? This combo looks yums. Albertsons
Grilled Chili Tofu Skewers with Ranch Cabbage, Apple & Cucumber Slaw
568 calories | 20 minutes
1 avocado
1/2 English cucumber
1 (12 oz.) package extra firm tofu
1 Granny Smith apple
3 Tbsp (45 ml) Ranch dressing
1/2 (14 oz bag) shredded cabbage (coleslaw mix)
2 tsp chili powder
1 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1/2 tsp salt
Find full instructions and shopping list here.
Sometimes you just gotta frittata.Albertsons
Bell Pepper, Olive & Sun-Dried Tomato Frittata with Parmesan
513 calories | 25 minutes
6 eggs
1/2 cup Kalamata olives, pitted
2 oz Parmesan cheese
1 red bell pepper
1/2 medium red onion
8 sundried tomatoes, oil-packed
1/4 tsp black pepper
1 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1/2 tsp Italian seasoning
1/4 tsp salt
Find full instructions and shopping list here.
Caprese, if you please.Albertsons
Balsamic Grilled Chicken with Classic Caprese Salad
509 calories | 25 minutes
3/4 lb chicken breasts, boneless skinless
1/2 small pkg fresh basil
1/2 (8 oz pkg) fresh mozzarella cheese
1 clove garlic
3 tomatoes
1 Tbsp balsamic vinegar
4 3/4 pinches black pepper
1 1/2 tsp extra virgin olive oil
3/4 tsp salt
Find full instructions and shopping list here.
These mushrooms look positively poppable.Albertsons
Warm Goat Cheese, Parmesan & Sun-Dried Tomato Stuffed Mushrooms
187 calories | 35 minutes
1/2 lb cremini mushrooms
1 clove garlic
1/2 (4 oz) log goat cheese
1/4 cup Parmesan cheese, shredded
2 sundried tomatoes, oil-packed
1 1/4 pinches crushed red pepper
1 tsp extra virgin olive oil
1/4 tsp Italian seasoning
2 pinches salt
Find full instructions and shopping list here.
Move over, avocado toast. English muffin pizzas have arrived.Albertsons
English Muffin Pizzas with Basil Pesto, Goat Cheese & Tomatoes
327 calories | 10 minutes
3 Tbsp (45 ml) basil pesto
2 English muffins
1/2 (4 oz) log goat cheese
1/2 pint grape tomatoes
3/4 pinch black pepper
2 pinches salt
Find full instructions and shopping list here.
This pita pocket packs a colorful punch.Albertsons
Warm Pita Pocket with Turkey, Cheddar, Roasted Red Peppers & Parsley
313 calories | 20 minutes
1/4 (8 oz) block cheddar cheese
1/2 bunch Italian (flat-leaf) parsley
4 oz oven roasted turkey breast, sliced
1/2 (12 oz) jar roasted red bell peppers
1 whole grain pita
3/4 pinch black pepper
1/2 tsp Dijon mustard
2 tsp mayonnaise
Find full instructions and shopping list here.
Did we say, "Move over, avocado toast?" What we meant was "Throw some prosciutto on it!" Albertsons
Avocado Toast with Crispy Prosciutto
283 calories | 10 minutes
1 avocado
2 slices prosciutto
2 slices whole grain bread
1 5/8 tsp black pepper
1/2 tsp extra virgin olive oil
1/8 tsp garlic powder
1/8 tsp onion powder
Find full instructions and shopping list here.
Vegetarian chili with a fall twistAlbertsons
Black Bean & Pumpkin Chili with Cheddar
444 calories | 30 minutes
2 (15 oz can) black beans
1/2 (8 oz ) block cheddar cheese
2 (14.5 oz) cans diced tomatoes
2 cloves garlic
2 green bell peppers
1 small bunch green onions (scallions)
1 (15 oz) can pure pumpkin purée
1 medium yellow onion
1/2 tsp black pepper
5 7/8 tsp chili powder
1/2 tsp cinnamon
2 tsp cumin, ground
1 tsp salt
1 Tbsp virgin coconut oil
Find full instructions and shopping list here.
For more delicious and nutritious recipes, visit albertsons.com/recipes.
Image shared by Madalyn Parker
Madalyn shared with her colleagues about her own mental health.
Parker lives with depression. And, she says, staying on top of her mental health is absolutely crucial.
"The bottom line is that mental health is health," she says over email. "My depression stops me from being productive at my job the same way a broken hand would slow me down since I wouldn't be able to type very well."
Madalyn Parker was honest with her colleagues about her situation.
Photo courtesy Madalyn Parker.
She sent an email to her colleagues, telling them the honest reason why she was taking the time off.
"Hopefully," she wrote to them, "I'll be back next week refreshed and back to 100%."
Soon after the message was sent, the CEO of Parker's company wrote back:
"Hey Madalyn,
I just wanted to personally thank you for sending emails like this. Every time you do, I use it as a reminder of the importance of using sick days for mental health — I can't believe this is not standard practice at all organizations. You are an example to us all, and help cut through the stigma so we can all bring our whole selves to work."
Moved by her CEO's response, Parker posted the email exchange to Twitter.
The tweet, published on June 30, 2017, has since gone viral, amassing 45,000 likes and 16,000 retweets.
"It's nice to see some warm, fuzzy feelings pass around the internet for once," Parker says of the response to her tweet. "I've been absolutely blown away by the magnitude though. I didn't expect so much attention!"
Even more impressive than the tweet's reach, however, were the heartfelt responses it got.
"Thanks for giving me hope that I can find a job as I am," wrote one person, who opened up about living with panic attacks. "That is bloody incredible," chimed in another. "What a fantastic CEO you have."
Some users, however, questioned why there needs to be a difference between vacation time and sick days; after all, one asked, aren't vacations intended to improve our mental well-being?
That ignores an important distinction, Parker said — both in how we perceive sick days and vacation days and in how that time away from work is actually being spent.
"I took an entire month off to do partial hospitalization last summer and that was sick leave," she wrote back. "I still felt like I could use vacation time because I didn't use it and it's a separate concept."
Many users were astounded that a CEO would be that understanding of an employee's mental health needs.
They were even more surprised that the CEO thanked her for sharing her personal experience with caring for her mental health.
After all, there's still a great amount of stigma associated with mental illness in the workplace, which keeps many of us from speaking up to our colleagues when we need help or need a break to focus on ourselves. We fear being seen as "weak" or less committed to our work. We might even fear losing our job.
Ben Congleton, the CEO of Parker's company, Olark, even joined the conversation himself.
In a blog post on Medium, Congleton wrote about the need for more business leaders to prioritize paid sick leave, fight to curb the stigma surrounding mental illness in the workplace, and see their employees as people first.
"It's 2017. We are in a knowledge economy. Our jobs require us to execute at peak mental performance," Congleton wrote. "When an athlete is injured, they sit on the bench and recover. Let's get rid of the idea that somehow the brain is different."
This article originally appeared on 07.11.17
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Canva
how many wonders can this mouth cavern hold?
Led by Elizabeth Shirtcliff, an associate professor from Iowa State University who studies early childhood adversity, the study gathered 300 8th-grade kids and used a simple survey to determine some basic facts about their parents. The kids were asked things like whether they were close with their parents and how often positive reinforcement was used in their household.
The team was looking for signs of what they called "positive parenting, attachment, and bonding."
Six years later, the kids — now adults — were brought back in for a strange follow-up. The researchers collected a dozen different samples of their saliva.
It sounds a little gross, but they were looking for something important: the presence of a hormone called cortisol. Cortisol is crucial to our overall well-being. Lower levels of cortisol are correlated with fatigue, mood swings, and muscle loss, for example. Higher levels of cortisol correlate with healthy blood pressure levels and better immune system function (though extremely high levels are a health risk).
For this study, cortisol was particularly important because it plays a big role in how we process and react to stress. When we're faced with extreme stress or danger, cortisol floods our bodies, resulting in the "fight or flight," response.
The study's authors observed that people who are generally more stressed over longer periods of time, however, often show lower cortisol levels — almost like they get accustomed to all that stress over time and have a lesser reaction to it. While this might sound like a good thing, as far as your health goes, it's definitely not.
The results of the study were clear: The more signs the kids showed of a positive bond with their parents when they were young, the better their cortisol functioned in adulthood.
Canva
That's a good thing, the researchers suggest, because it helps keep kids alert and sensitive to all of the stimuli and information swirling around them from day to day, rather than having a blunted response to stressors and life in general.
So having great parents who use positive parenting methods is a good thing. Yay!
But the study had an important twist when it came to looking at racial demographics.
When race differences were accounted for — about half the kids were black and half were white — the cortisol correlation didn't hold up.
On average, the study found, white and black parents were equally likely to have a positive bond with their kids. But parenting styles aren't the only thing that can affect stress levels and kids' response to it.
Photo by ia huh on UnsplashMany of the white students in the study may have benefited from "low stress, resource-rich contexts which unfortunately may be less common for black youth," the researchers explained.
It's also worth noting that many groups — including black people of people Jewish descent — carry biological markers of trauma from previous generations (i.e., slavery, the Holocaust), which can also affect cortisol response.
In other words, growing up with various socioeconomic and other hardships does indeed have a lifelong impact, and now we've got the beakers full of saliva (so to speak) to prove it.
This is important work. It proves that, in many cases, being a great parent can actually physically manifest itself in kids growing up to be well-adjusted and adaptable.
Being a loving parent can actually have a biological impact on your kids years and years later. That's amazing!
Perhaps most importantly, however, it shows a glaring need for kids — particularly those belonging to marginalized or disadvantaged groups — to get better support in the form of solid education, safe communities to grow up in, and more opportunities to learn and grow.
Having great parents isn't always enough to overcome a world that seems to be stacked against you, but it certainly helps.
This article originally appeared on 12.18.17