Festive Food that’s better for you and the planet!
Christmas is a great time to enjoy meaningful family traditions. Food is a major part of these traditions and the various holiday gatherings, and creating festive, healthy and sustainable meals can be a beautiful experience!
Eat locally and with the seasons
Some people will be harvesting their own home grown Christmas vegetables but for the rest of us, we can try to eat local and eat with the season. Most of our beloved Christmas vegetables and herbs, including potatoes, brussels sprouts, carrots, parsnips, red cabbage, onions, sage and thyme, are all in season throughout the winter months. Also in season are sprouting broccoli, cauliflower, rocket, celery, leeks, turnips, and kale.
Opting for seasonal, ideally organic food means supporting Ireland’s nature-friendly farmers, who grow using fewer chemicals, so their farms can support more diverse wildlife and healthy, living soils.
Share home cooked meals with family and friends
When we cook at home the food is healthier, it’s usually much less processed and has fewer calories than when we eat out. Every time we prepare a home cooked meal, we are creating new traditions that our children will celebrate in future years.
If you are not ready to go fully plant based then according to research in the EU, if you halve your consumption of meat, dairy and eggs, the “resulting 40% reduction in the intake of saturated fat would lead to a reduction in cardiovascular mortality.” The healthiest sweets and treats are also homemade. If you have time, you can bake delicious cookies, granola or spiced nuts – or make your own chocolate truffles or jams. Be sure to invite family and friends around.
Be careful what you buy
Christmas is a great excuse to fill up the shopping trolley with tins of biscuits and boxes of sweets but who is going to end up eating them? If you are only having guests over for one day at Christmas, buy just what you need for that day. Very few people arrive unannounced these days so you don’t need to stockpile goodies ‘just in case’. Remember some of the supermarkets will even be open on 26th December and all of them open the following day.
Everything you need to know to stop Christmas Food Waste
A scary amount of food waste is created at Christmas. In the UK, its equivalent to 4.2 million plates of Christmas dinner going straight into the bin! Why not try these easy tips this Christmas and make a New Year’s resolution to:
- continue planning your meals and portions
- only buying food you need and storing it properly
- reusing leftovers and freezing food for another time
- Compost anything that remains using your brown bin or home composting.
You can read more on the EPA’s Stop Food Waste Programme.
Plate up for the Planet
There’s a lot of advice on eating healthy, but what if you could also eat sustainably—without sacrificing delicious flavour? So what, exactly is a sustainable diet?
It’s a diet that’s vibrant, delicious, and good for both your health and the planet. It focuses on local, and seasonal ingredients, which supports sustainable farming practices and uses fewer resources.
Celebrate Christmas like a Centenarian
The National Geographic Blue Zones project has been working to empower people everywhere to live better for longer. For over 20 years, they have been working to research and identify the world’s longest-lived and happiest populations who all follow a predominantly plant based diet.
You can learn more about the Blue Zones Project by watching the Netflix Documentary, Live to 100: Secrets of the Blue Zones or you can sign up to their newsletter and you can check out ten sustainable healthy delicious dishes.
Keep active and enjoy the holidays
Make sure you fit in some activity every day of the holidays, not to lose weight but to keep fit and strong and ensure the body and mind and soul are all keeping well in the great outdoors. And remember once off treats are not so disastrous. In the long run, it’s the daily eating pattern that matters the most to our health and the planet.
