Food

The Family Meal: Tips for Staying Sane and Sated


With so much good food, how do you keep from overeating at the holiday table?

Simple strategies can help minimize the gluttony:

• Keep the serving dishes in the kitchen, so you won’t take extra helpings mindlessly.

• Use smaller serving spoons and plates.

• Stick to foods that require utensils — we eat finger foods faster than those that require a fork.

• Eat your vegetables first.

• Go for second helpings of protein (turkey) rather than the potatoes.

• Drink water with your meal.

• Take small bites and put utensils down between bites.

Mindful eating is also a good strategy to prevent overeating, and it has the added bonus of calming holiday stress. Mindful eating is not meditating on food — it’s simply pausing and bringing full awareness to the experience. When dinner is served, take a moment privately (or invite the whole table) to pause before eating to contemplate everything and everyone it took to bring the meal to your table, from those who planted and harvested the ingredients to those who prepared it. Think of the cultural traditions, handed down over generations, that brought this food to your plate. Silently express your gratitude for the food and the companions you’re enjoying it with. As you eat, bring all your senses to the meal, being attentive to color, texture, aroma and even the sounds of different foods.

Finally, be mindful of the people at the table and contribute to the dinnertime conversation. The more you talk, the less you’ll eat.

Speaking of talking, how do you handle politics at the holiday table?

If you’re worried about partisan divisions ruining your holiday meal, you can ban the topic of politics altogether or create a seating chart that is the least likely to result in combustible conversation. But if political conversations sneak in between servings of turkey and pie, here’s one simple strategy that can help: Ask your guests to talk in a more personal way about politics.

“Don’t try to represent or defend a political party or class of people,” says Parisa Parsa, the executive director of Essential Partners, a nonprofit organization based in Cambridge, Mass., that uses strategies developed in family therapy to structure conversations between Americans on contentious topics. “Speak for yourself. We ask folks to tell stories about their own life experience and how they have come to the views that they hold.”



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