Tips to Decrease Your Sugar Cravings this Holiday Season

• Eat regularly. Eat three meals and two snacks or five small meals a day. For many people, if they don't eat regularly, their blood sugar levels drop, they feel hungry and are more likely to crave sweet sugary snacks.

• Choose whole foods. The closer a food is to its original form, the less processed sugar it will contain. Food in its natural form, including fruits and vegetables, usually presents no metabolic problems for a normal body, especially when consumed in variety.

• Have a breakfast of protein, fat and phytonutrients to start your day off right. The typical breakfast full of carbs and sugary or starchy foods is the worst option since you'll have cravings all day. Eating a good breakfast is essential to prevent sugar cravings

• Try incorporate protein and/or fat with each meal. This helps control blood sugar levels. Make sure they are healthy sources of each.

• Add spices. Coriander, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves and cardamom will naturally sweeten your foods and reduce cravings.

• Move your body. Exercise, dance or do some pilates. Whatever movement you enjoy will help reduce tension, boost your energy and decrease your need for a sugar lift.

• Get enough sleep. When we are tired we often use sugar for energy to counteract the exhaustion.

• Keep sugary snacks out of your house and office. It's difficult to snack on things that aren't there!

• Don't substitute artificial sweeteners for sugar. This will do little to alter your desire for sweets. If you do need a sweetener, try Stevia, it's the healthiest.

• Learn to read labels. Although I would encourage you to eat as few foods as possible that have labels, educate yourself about what you're putting into your body. The longer the list of ingredients, the more likely sugar is going to be included on that list. So check the grams of sugar, and choose products with the least sugar per serving.

• Become familiar with sugar terminology. Recognize that all of these are sweeteners: corn syrup, corn sugar, high fructose corn syrup, sucrose, dextrose, honey, molasses, turbinado sugar and brown sugar.

• Sugar in disguise. Remember that most of the "complex" carbohydrates we consume like bread, bagels and pasta aren't really complex at all. They are usually highly refined and act just like sugars in the body and are to be avoided.

• Drink lots of water. Sometimes drinking water or seltzer water can help with the sugar cravings. Also sometimes what we perceive as a food craving is really thirst.

• Have a piece of fruit. If you give in to your cravings, have a piece of fruit, it should satisfy a sweet craving and is much healthier.

10 Kids' Foods to Avoid & Their Healthy Alternatives

1. Kid's yogurt

Is the equivalent of sprinkling lots of sugar and candy on top of a cup of steamed broccoli. "All the sugar that's in many brands turns something that's full of calcium, protein, vitamin D, and magnesium into dessert." The biggest offenders: yogurt "fun foods." Read the labels of yogurt in plastic tubes that are meant to be frozen and thrown into kids' lunchboxes. After the first ingredient, which as hoped for, is milk, come high fructose corn syrup and sugar, artificial flavorings and colors.

Alternative-organic yogurt with fruit added for sweetness

2. Instant oatmeal

You already know that many kids' cereals are sugary to the extreme. Read the ingredient label-one teaspoon of sugar equals four grams -- some of the 'maple' or other favors have more than 12 grams per serving.

Alternative-Microwave whole oats in a glass dish (following the directions using low-fat milk or water). Stir in a quarter-cup of raisins and, voila, a naturally sweet breakfast.

3. Fruit juice

Many juices advertised as "natural" contain artificial sweeteners. Some contain only fruit juice concentrates, and are little more than sweetened water, enhanced with extra vitamins.

Alternative- Pack an orange, an apple or a cup of applesauce. And if you do serve juice, go for 100% natural fruit juice, not concentrate, and limit kids to one 8-ounce serving a day.

4. Kid's meals

On the menu at just about any restaurant, these are often higher in fat and calories than items on the adult menu. They're high-sodium and high-fat foods like fried chicken nuggets, fried chicken, cheese pizza or mac 'n cheese -- all foods that have very little nutritional value.

Alternative-Insist your kid be able to order a half-size portion of adult foods.

5. Fish sticks

Some labels advertise them as a better-for-you fish, but frozen fried fish is fat-laden and loaded with artificial ingredients. No matter what you call them, fish 'tenders,' 'sticks,' or the like are all battered and fried.

Alternative-Grilled or baked fish.

6. Peanut butter

While peanut butter can be a good source of protein and calories, several have sugar, hydrogenated or partially hydrogenated fat. And steer clear of the jars of peanut butter and jelly. They're loaded with high fructose corn syrup, dextrose and other unwelcome additives.

Alternative-Look for brands with one or at most two ingredients: peanuts and maybe salt.

7. Rice cakes

Parents concerned about their children's weight look to rice cakes as snacks. But there is little nutritional value in these white rice snacks. No matter how many calories they have, they're empty calories and won't fill kids up, so a child is hungry soon after eating one and back in the cupboards looking for something to eat.

Alternative- Whole-wheat pita chips with hummus or peanut butter. To make your own, slice a whole wheat pita into quarters and lightly spray with cooking spray. Bake until lightly crunchy.

8. Breakfast bars

The first ingredient listed on cereal bar, granola bar, and breakfast bar packages is usually refined flour (even enriched). Sugar is often second or third. Not only does that make this a fattening meal, it'll have your kid's tummy grumbling in about an hour. Empty calorie foods like this do not fill a child up. So they wind up eating more than if they would have had a 'real' meal.

Alternative-A cup of yogurt with a cup of crunchy low-sugar cereal stirred in.

9. Fruit snacks

Once and for all ... there is no fruit in fruit roll-up-type snacks. Even though the front of the package shows pictures of fruit, the ingredients tell the tale. They're loaded with high fructose corn syrup, sugar, dextrose, artificial flavors, fruit flavors, artificial colors, etc.

Alternative-An apple.

10. Fat-free foods

Just because something is fat-free, that doesn't make it calorie-free, or healthy. When fast food apples come with 'low fat caramel dipping sauce,' the apples are still being served with a 70 calorie portion of low-fat caramel dip. So low-fat doesn't mean low-calorie or low-sugar. And since sugar can turn into fat in the body, fat-free foods that are high in sugar aren't really fat free after all.

Alternative-Read the labels and look at the calories and sugar per serving. Although it might feel counterintuitive, fat-free just might be more fattening.

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High Fructose Corn Syrup...

Study after study are taking their place in a growing lineup of scientific research demonstrating that consuming high-fructose corn syrup is the fastest way to trash your health.

And fructose in any form -- including high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS) and crystalline fructose -- is the worst of the worst!

Fructose is a major contributor to:

• Insulin resistance and obesity
• Elevated blood pressure
• Elevated triglycerides and elevated LDL
• Depletion of vitamins and minerals
• Cardiovascular disease, liver disease, cancer, arthritis and even gout

If you received your fructose only from vegetables and fruits (where it originates) as most people did a century ago, you'd consume about 15 grams per day -- a far cry from the 73 grams per day the typical adolescent gets from sweetened drinks.
There are two reasons fructose is so damaging:

1. Your body metabolizes fructose in a much different way than glucose. The entire burden of metabolizing fructose falls on your liver.

2. People are consuming fructose in enormous quantities, which has made the negative effects much more profound.

Today, 55 percent of sweeteners used in food and beverage manufacturing are made from corn, and the number one source of calories in America is soda, in the form of HFCS. As the truth comes out about HFCS, the Corn Refiners Association is scrambling to convince youthat their product is equal to table sugar, that it is "natural" and safe.

Of course, many things are "natural" -- cocaine is natural, but you wouldn't want to use 142 pounds of it each year. The food and beverage industry doesn't want you to realize how truly pervasive HFCS is in your diet -- not just from soft drinks and juices, but also in salad dressings and condiments and virtually every processed food. The introduction of HFCS into the Western diet in 1975 has been a multi-billion dollar boon for the corn industry.

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