During a holiday, an average Pole will eat six thousand calories, and some even 10,000, says Professor Danuta Figurska-Ciura from the Wrocław University of Environmental and Life Sciences. The requirement for a healthy adult weighing 60-70 kilograms is approximately two thousand calories a day.
The expert emphasizes that Poles buy too much food and prepare too much food for Christmas. – The average Pole will eat six, and some even 10,000 calories during the holiday day in the form of bigos, meat, ham with fat, or poppy seed cakes – says Professor Danuta Figurska-Ciura from the Faculty of Biotechnology and Food Sciences of the Wrocław University of Life Sciences.
He points out that “a healthy, adult person weighing 60-70 kg needs about 2,000 calories a day.”
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How to “lose weight” during the holidays?
Figurska-Ciura, pointing out how to “lose weight” during the holidays, first of all advises to buy less and prepare half of the initially planned portions.
She added that it is also worth slightly modifying the recipes for Christmas dishes. – If it's fish, maybe boiled or stewed or in jelly this time, instead of fried. And if we do fry, let's do it briefly in deep fat in vegetable oils or clarified butter (…) Let's not overheat the fat, don't burn fried foods and remember to place them on a paper towel for a while after frying, which will absorb excess fat – advises the expert .
Figurska-Ciura notes that in most Polish homes there is still a rule that “a pig must run through a good bigos”. – To make matters worse, Christmas bigos with a lot of meat is fried and reheated many times. This contributes to the creation of flavor, but also to the formation of substances that we do not digest well, so some people snack on heavy bigos with pharmaceutical substances. To avoid this, let's put half of the bacon from the recipe in the Christmas bigos and meat and sausages that are leaner than traditional ones, but let's not reduce the amount of spices: pepper, plums, cumin… they will improve digestion – he emphasizes.
He also advises replacing fatty meats with turkey, pork loin, veal or rabbit. – Be sure to add cranberries, blueberries and salad, rich in antioxidants and tasty. It will be a great opportunity to show children that there is more than just ketchup, he emphasizes.
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What is worth using?
Figurska-Ciura points out that in the kitchen it is worth using pots with a multi-layer, thick, acu-thermal bottom, which allows food to be cooked over low heat for a long time. – All the aromas remain in the covered pot, and slow cooking at a low temperature makes the dishes easier to digest – he emphasizes.
The expert also emphasizes the need to use spices generously when preparing holiday dishes. Replace marjoram, savory, thyme, pepper, hot pepper, garlic or ginger.
– Fruits, such as grapefruit, will speed up and improve your metabolism. It is also worth reaching for slightly forgotten vegetables: parsnips, Jerusalem artichokes, whose ingredients will improve the functioning of the digestive tract, just like Mediterranean artichokes, which can be an exquisite element of our table – he emphasizes.
The professor advises against buying juices or sweetened carbonated drinks. – Dried compote, although it also has a lot of calories, is much healthier because it contains large amounts of fiber, which facilitates digestion – he says.
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