How To Reduce The Calorie Content Of A Country Lunch

Barbecue

Not a single country feast is complete without a barbecue. But this folk dish is extremely high in calories: 100 grams of lamb kebab contains about 230 kcal, pork - 270 kcal. At the same time, on average, a person eats from 300 to 500 grams of a ready-made dish, so consider how long it will take you to run and squat to work out your lunch.

Alternative: a dietary substitute can be chicken kebab (on average 140 kcal per 100 grams), fish (salmon - 89 kcal per 100 grams), seafood (shrimp - 100 kcal per 100 grams) and vegetables (eggplant, tomatoes, peppers, zucchini, broccoli - 50 kcal per 100 grams). Each of these options contains at least half or even three times less calories than a traditional barbecue, and is much healthier for the stomach than red meat. We also advise you not to use alcohol, mayonnaise, honey as a marinade and avoid ready-made sauces. I would like to "supplement" ─ prepare it yourself (we have collected the most original recipes in the article "Ideal pair: 7 best sauces for kebabs").

Nutritionist's advice

Remember what the inhabitants of Transcaucasia serve meat kebab with? With lots of greenery. If you really want meat fried on charcoal (and this is harmful from the point of view of the formation of end products of glycolysis), then one serving of it should have 2-3 servings of greens ─ the fiber that it contains binds fat molecules, helping to remove from organism.

Salads

Spring and summer are seasons of fresh vegetables, fruits and herbs. Finally, you can enjoy the real taste of tomatoes, cucumbers, and soon also zucchini with eggplant. Unfortunately, in Russia there is one very harmful tradition - to supplement all salads with mayonnaise (680 kcal per 100 grams), which interrupts the natural taste of products, and all dishes become the same.

Alternative: if you cannot live without mayonnaise, the only way out is to replace the purchased one with a homemade one (300 kcal per 100 grams). Firstly, the calorie content of the dressing will be halved, and secondly, you will know exactly what the sauce is made of. We suggest combining vegetable salads with 10% sour cream (115 kcal per 100 grams), olive oil (150 kcal per tablespoon) or lemon juice (16 kcal per 100 grams), which will add a piquant sourness to the dish. Do not forget about spices - pepper, ginger, Provencal herbs, they not only give a special taste, but also improve digestion.

Nutritionist's advice

Do not overuse salads with boiled potatoes, beets and carrots: when cooked, the glycemic index of these roots increases. In this case, complex carbohydrates under the influence of temperature change their structure and decompose rather quickly into simple sugars, which are absorbed into the blood and sharply increase the level of glucose in the blood. If you can't do without these ingredients in the salad, then cook them until the state of "aldente", and then quickly refrigerate. In this case, the starch in food, practically without changing its structure, will become food for the beneficial microflora living in the intestine.

Bread

Traditionally, not a single dacha dinner is complete without cuts: cheeses, sausages, fish and a dozen other types of "figure killers" are swallowed up with unhurried conversations about everything. Everything would not be so bad if bread was not also used: white (361 kcal) or black (259 kcal) - it doesn't matter, the main thing is that both types are very high in calories.

Alternative: there are three options. The first, the most difficult for baking lovers: give up bread in principle. The second option is more gentle - replace the bread with multi-grain crispbread (22 kcal per piece). The third is perhaps the most useful - replace bread with vegetables. For example, try mixing cheese with a cucumber or radish, and wrap the ham in a lettuce.

Nutritional Advice

The carbohydrate + saturated fat combination is not, in principle, the most dietary. Those who are losing weight can be advised not to overuse even whole grain bread. If you really can't do without bread, pay attention to bread. 1 piece contains about 16-25 kcal. The best breads are gluten-free based on rice, buckwheat, quinoa. It is important that the bread is organic. In principle, this is good for any product, but especially for cereals, because they are often treated with a large amount of pesticides, traces of which may remain in the final product. It is good if there are freeze-dried vegetables as an additive in the breads: they will supplement the product with an additional dose of micronutrients.

Juices and carbonated waters

Another bad habit, which it is better to give up once and for all, is to drink food with juices. First, these are extra and very insidious calories (it's hard to believe that juice can be nutritious, but it is). Secondly, it is simply harmful. When food begins to enter the body, the stomach produces gastric juice necessary for assimilation of food. However, the liquid entering with food lowers its concentration, due to which the digestion process slows down. The situation becomes more complicated if you drink food not just with water, but with sugary drinks, juices and soda, which cause fermentation in the stomach, and also interfere with the proper breakdown and assimilation of proteins.

Alternative: replace juices (for example, apple juice - 45 kcal per 100 grams) and soda (50 kcal per 100 grams) for water, tea, or fruit / vegetable natural smoothies. The latter, most likely, will be slightly less calories, but they will definitely be healthier for the body. As for the rules for taking drinks, you can drink liquid either half an hour before meals, or not earlier than an hour or an hour and a half after.

Nutritional advice

Do not drink hot meat dishes with cold drinks. It is better to prefer warm herbal tea: it will help the meat to digest and absorb faster.

Dessert

A hearty and hearty lunch cannot do without an evening tea party with pastries, cake, ice cream, or all of them combined (especially if guests also dropped by). Do you think your figure will be happy with all these additional calories and are you ready to shed those extra pounds that appeared during several holiday dinners for weeks later?

Alternative: the best option is to simply give up dessert (the lunch was already dense, and you don't need extra centimeters at the waist). Sit back on a chair, enjoy the wonderful nature and drink warm herbal tea: your sleep will be sound, and your conscience will be clear.

Nutritionist's advice It is

better to eat any dessert in the morning before 12-14 hours, so decide for yourself when to eat berries or an apple - in the area of breakfast or lunch.

Expert

Mikhail Gavrilov is a psychotherapist, Ph. D., the author of a patented technique for correcting eating behavior and weight loss, a member of the Institute of Functional Medicine (IFM, USA).

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