Healthy Super Bowl Snacks

The Super Bowl will be here in a few days. As I was reading the February issue of Eating Well magazine, I found a great article about snacks to eat during the big game. The article mentioned that people often eat as many as 1200 calories watching the game. This can really add up since it only takes about 3500 calories to gain a pound. Think about how weeks of football, basketball and baseball (in addition to many other events or other television programs not even related to sports) can add to our increasing waistlines.

Here are some tips to help keep your calories within reason during the big event:

1. Keep alcohol intake to a minimum, what we drink may add up more than what we eat
2. Plan for a lot of vegetables for your snacks to provide a lot of crunch without adding up on the scale.
3. Make your snacks part of your evening meal and go lighter that day earlier and possible light several days before and day after.
4. Lighten up some of your favorite recipes, for example the Eating Well article had a lower calorie version of a chili con queso with tortilla chips, a creamy spinach dip with pita chips and a French onion dip with potato chips. If you don’t have a chance to grab the issue before you get to cooking, here are some links to other great appetizer recipes.

3. Make a list and get out to the grocery store to get your ingredients!

http://www.eatingwell.com/recipes/collections/super_bowl_1.html

http://www.cookinglight.com/entertaining/menus-for-entertaining/five-star-party-