Director of the weight management program at Sara Bush Lincoln Hospital in Mattoon, Kristina Adams said the best way to cut out fat and excess calories is using more spices, less butter and more vegetables. (Photo used under Creative Commons from Flickr user Marcus Q)

By Jim Anderson

CHICAGO - Thanksgiving brings an onslaught of calories, but it doesn’t have to.

The traditional Thanksgiving feast isn’t composed of foods that are inherently fattening. It’s how we prepare them, heavy on the butter and the cream, that’s the problem, says Kristina Adams, a registered dietitian and director of the weight management program at Sara Bush Lincoln Hospital in Mattoon.

“Cranberries, pumpkins, sweet potatoes, apples, turkey - all of those are very healthy for us, but unfortunately the way we may have grown up cooking with them, or leaned from grandmas or mothers, they may not be the healthiest way to eat them,” she said.

Adams says you can cook with less fat and still get flavor by using spices, vegetables such as celery and zucchini, and flavored broth instead of fat.

She says some of us will consume 5,000 calories on Thanksgiving. A typical day is about 2,000 calories.

She says in the period between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day, we’ll consume an extra 100 calories a day, and add one to three pounds, which is not a problem if we work it off throughout the rest of the year, but which is a problem if we allow the weight gain to accumulate year after year.