Here’s how you can enjoy a sweet and safe holiday eating occasion

Empanadas from a Mercedes restaurant are seen on Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (Courtesy)

HARLINGEN — Take it easy.

Don’t spike the eggnog, the police are everywhere.

Have a little sweet bread, serve yourself small portions of turkey, and give your mind time to realize you’re full.

The holidays are upon us. Friends and relatives are traveling far and near to gather and feast on food, family and friendship this week for Thanksgiving on Thursday. In the days that follow more parties will serve food and spirits and holiday cheer capped off by Christmas and the New Year.

It is a grand time and a sweet time and a time when turkey and dressing and cranberry sauce and tamales and pumpkin empanadas dance their way through our minds and into our stomachs.

While these are fabulous and good, moderation of all good things is important, especially for those who have to watch their blood sugar, says Dr. Christopher Romero, internal medicine and obesity medicine specialist at Valley Baptist Medical Center.

“All of the empanadas are delicious,” Romero said. “Also we have the tamales that are made this time of year. I love a good tamale, but oftentimes they have a fair amount of maiz which turns into sugar in our blood.”

“The maiz in the tamales is usually mixed with some type of Manteca or lard or fat that gives it that nice doughy consistency,” he said, “so it’s a lot of fat and carbs with that little strip of meat and sometimes that meat can have a lot of fat content to it as well. If you are going to partake of tamales, they’re delicious, totally it’s hard to resist a tamale, especially homemade, so really portion control and limit the number that you consume.”

Eating too much turkey and dressing and cranberry sauce too quickly can also cause a sort of disconnect between the stomach and the mind, said Dr. January Hill, bariatric and general surgeon at Valley Baptist.

Dr. January Hill

“Enjoy yourself in moderation,” Hill said. “If you still feel hungry, just take a break, sit down, go do something else and let your mind catch up with your stomach or vice versa. Because there’s a disconnect when you’re eating, it’s like, ‘Oooooh, I wanna eat more,’ but your brain hasn’t quite clicked.”

It’s about mindful eating.

“If you’re going to get a dessert, take a smaller piece,” Hill said. “If there’s more than one dessert take two, take a small piece of each.”

She also cautioned against drinking too much alcohol, especially when people want to drink during the day because the police are patrolling the streets at night.

Day or night, though, moderation in drink is still crucial to a good and safe time.

“Have a plan,” she said. “’OK, I’m going to have just two drinks today and that’s where I’m going to stop, or just one drink or something.’ We all know what our families are going to make every year. Just think about what you’re going to do before you do it, especially if you have a weakness for certain things like alcohol or sweets.”

Have one or two drinks, not three or four. Have one bread roll, not three or four. Have part of a sweet bread, not a whole one. And eggnog and cranberry sauce are packed with sugar so be very careful unless you want to get hit with a sugar bomb.

“There is a lot of cultural pressure to please your family,” Hill said. “So, I just tell people you should try a little bit of things from the whole spread. You don’t want to make your aunt and your grandmother mad. Just take little servings of different things.”

Romero said one good way to enable portion control is to use a smaller plate, which he referred to as “real estate.”

“Limit the real estate you can load up, and start off adding your vegetables to it,” he said. “If somebody has made green beans, that’s fantastic. Throw that on there. Take a good portion of that plate up with your greens, whatever vegetable you’re having.”

Next add some meat, lean meat if possible. Turkey of course is the main holiday staple, but don’t eat anything with skin on it, he said. The skin is packed with fat and calories.

“Have a small portion of the carb that they have with the meal, especially with people with diabetes and other underlying issues of blood sugar control,” he said. “Limit the amount of sweet potatoes. Take just a few bites. Same thing with mashed potatoes, to make sure you have a balanced plate and a smaller plate.”

In all of the kitchens and the dining rooms across the Valley the real spirit of the holidays is very much the same: the intimacy and the warmth of family and friendship.

“I look at these holiday gatherings as two-fold,” Romero said. “One, it’s nourishment for our bodies and two, it’s nourishment for our souls and our well-being to get to spend time with the people we care for most in our lives. So there’s a huge value for people’s health and well-being, for getting together and sharing a meal, laughing with people they love and care for most.”

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