Gingerbread and Christmas chocolate can be bought every year from the end of August. It is often difficult to resist the temptation. From November onwards, when it gets colder and darker earlier and the first Christmas lights shine, it becomes even more difficult not to reach into the bag of biscuits more often. After all, the particles now taste particularly good. This is followed by the Christmas market with mulled wine and lard, baking cookies and three long Christmas days of generous cooking. A few kilos more on the ribs quickly become noticeable. However, there are a few little tricks you can use to avoid overeating!
Table of Contents
1. Know calories and portion sizes
With many delicacies, it is often difficult to correctly estimate the portion sizes and thus the calories. If you can eat a little more gingerbread, you should eat less with nuts, as they often have twice as many calories. For example, each portion can look like this:
| Food | calories |
| 6 cinnamon stars (approx. 34 g) | 166 kcal |
| 100 grams of almonds | 576 kcal |
| 100 g roasted almonds | 490 kcal |
| 1 gingerbread (approx. 28 g) | 109 kcal |
| 3 Coconut Macaroons (approx. 20 g) | 94 kcal |
| 4 Marzipankartoffeln (ca. 26 g) | 110 kcal |
| 1 cup of mulled wine | 240 kcal |
| 1 Lumumba Mug | 400 kcal |
| 100 g fried pastries | 420 kcal |
| 1 love apple (approx. 155 g) | 183 kcal |
| 1 slice of stollen (approx. 100 g) | 300 – 400 kcal |
2. Find alternatives and make them yourself
If you bake cookies or gingerbread yourself, you can keep track of the ingredients and the calories. Butter can often be replaced with cream cheese, yoghurt and quark. You can use less sugar or replace nuts with nut flours. The latter are often de-oiled, so they bind better and have fewer calories. They are therefore popular with low-carb cookies . In addition, low-carb biscuits contain more protein than conventional pastries, which makes them feel full longer and keeps blood sugar levels low.
3. Avoid cravings
Is there a big Christmas party in the evening or do you have an appointment at the Christmas market? Most people would probably just eat a little breakfast and a small bite for lunch throughout the day. However, you often only realize that this is not a good idea in the evening, as cravings have spread in the meantime. The result: Overwhelmed by hunger, you eat more than you actually need in the evening. The solution is simple: don’t eat differently than usual throughout the day and listen to your body. If the majority of the nutrients are already covered, there are fewer cravings. In addition, you should drink enough water or tea to support the feeling of satiety. Do not see the buffet at the Christmas party or the Christmas market as a free ticket, but rather as a wide selection,
4. Prefer small plates
In fact, there’s value in eating off small plates. Even when filling, less ends up on the plate and the brain signals earlier that you are now full. To have better control over your portions, you should fill the plate with the amount that you are sure will fill you up. Avoid frequent refills and eating small bites. The amount eaten is quickly underestimated.
5. Exercise and sports
The best way to get rid of excess energy is exercise. If you exercise, try to keep up your exercise routine during the run-up to Christmas. That way, the extra piece of gingerbread won’t be noticed so quickly. Gym goers and strength athletes can also use the pre-Christmas period for a muscle building phase. A slight calorie surplus of approx. 100 kilocalories and increasing weights during training are optimal and desired. So if you have covered your nutrients and vitamins, you can reach into the cookie tin a second time.
Or simply build activity into your everyday life:
- Go for a walk after dinner.
- Go to a playground with the kids and relatives.
- Clean the house or apartment diligently and decorate it for Christmas.
- Walk more instead of taking the bus, train or car.
- Take breaks at work, get up, stretch, and visit colleagues at the table instead of calling them.
- A shopping tour through the shopping streets or shopping centers.
6. Think about fruits and vegetables
Despite the cold temperatures in winter, there are enough fruits and vegetables. Vegetables in particular are low in calories, so large amounts can be eaten. They fill you up enormously, supply important minerals, vitamins and trace elements and strengthen the immune system. Fruit contains natural sugar and is therefore an ideal substitute for chocolate and gingerbread, e.g. B. as baked apples.
fruit in winter
- apples
- bananas
- Pineapple
- oranges
- Grapefruit
- Mango
- beets
- Cabbages such as kale, white, red, Brussels sprouts, and cauliflower
- Broccoli
- savoy
- Pastinaken
- Poree
- Portulak
- Topinambur
7. Rest and sleep
Even if the pre-Christmas period often quickly becomes stressful, both professionally and privately, you should still try to take regular breaks to relax. To do this, plan your days so that there is still time for a soak in the bathtub, a long shower or a bit of spa, you have time for yoga, sports or meditation or you can simply pursue your favorite activity. Getting enough rest and relaxation lowers cortisol levels, which lowers stress levels and reduces cravings. A fixed sleep routine with fixed bedtimes can also be helpful. The body regenerates through an optimal sleep time and the hunger and satiety hormones are balanced. This also reduces cravings.
8. Don’t freak out
The important thing is that if it does happen to you and you eat a lot more than you want, don’t panic. Just as eating a salad doesn’t make you slim, eating too much doesn’t automatically make you gain weight. Nevertheless, the shock on the scales the next day can be great if you suddenly weigh two more pounds. However, this is often only due to an increased intake of carbohydrates and salt, since the body then draws more water and stores it in the muscles and in the surrounding tissue. The intestinal contents also weigh a few hundred grams, which should be taken into account. Usually it is only a few grams that have settled as fat. And you will get rid of them faster than you thought!
