On a diet before Easter? No restrictive regimes, but some tricks to make our everyday diet healthier and more dietary, also making an effort to move a little more.

A challenge to do in the weeks before Easter, which with its load of sweets and abundant meals for two days risks making us rise a little.
Especially taking into account eggs, sweet and savory that will be in circulation for the week following Easter and perhaps for two weeks.

In fact, if once our grandparents  or parents observed the rules of Lent , giving up some foods on the occasion of the religious feast of Easter, today this same feast has become just an occasion to exaggerate at the table. Not for everyone, of course, but for many.

Here are the simple tips we can implement to prevent Easter holidays from weighing on the scales.

A DIET BEFORE EASTER: HOW TO BEHAVIOR AT THE TABLE

We start lunch and dinner with a nice plate of mixed salad or raw vegetables.

This is a way to get full before and eat less during the meal , but also to increase the content of fibers and micronutrients (vitamins, minerals, antioxidants) to improve our digestion and enzymatic efficiency thanks to vegetables.
I always recommend a raw carrot before lunch and dinner, due to its benefits on carbohydrate hunger and cholesterol, as I wrote here .

No alcohol or sweets packed before Easter.

If we really want sweet, we eat some fruit cooked with a little cinnamon or fresh pineapple (especially after the protein meal) or a piece of extra-dark chocolate, but for a few weeks we try to get away from alcohol and excess sugar.

Limiting packaged desserts for a few weeks costs us nothing and, if we really can’t be so diligent, we can limit ourselves to just one dessert on Sunday, for example a pastry or a portion of a homemade dessert.

Salty and / or protein breakfast.

Let’s review our breakfast to reduce its glycemic load. Yes to a small fruit or to an orange or grapefruit juice without sugar, and to a slice of toasted wholemeal bread with a spoonful of ricotta or a teaspoon of oil and a crushed tomato. Or an omelette, or at least a Greek yogurt + a fruit.
Let’s make our breakfast more balanced.

More spices, less salt.

Use spices like turmeric, chilli, curry, cloves, ginger to enrich dishes and give us some more antioxidant substances. I recommend: these spices are used in cooking dishes, in decoctions, but not used raw. From raw they are not assimilable.

Coffee, tea and herbal teas without sugar (or sweeteners)

We limit both sweets and sweetened foods to zero calories for a few weeks. In this way we “restructure” our taste buds, accustoming the palate to a less sweet taste throughout the day. It is not that difficult to do and above all it is a trick that makes us more sensitive to the sweet taste, making us need less. For example, try this purifying herbal tea .

Light dinner and best evening habits.

Instead of munching on something until the moment before bed, let’s try some new herbal tea, read, relax, try to sleep even more. If we are hungry before going to sleep, let’s limit ourselves to a chunk of parmesan with a teaspoon of honey, a glass of skim or soy milk or a low-fat or soy yogurt with 2 almonds.

These foods aid in the evening production of serotonin, ensuring the intestinal conversion of tryptophan.

Let’s chew better and focus on the dish.

Let’s try to make our dishes “beautiful” to look at, adding raw and cooked vegetables, a handful of seeds, aromatic herbs, spices. A quarter of the plate must be of foods that contain carbohydrates (pasta, rice, wholemeal bread), a quarter of protein foods (meat, fish, low-fat cheeses, two fried eggs).

In the same way we learn in these weeks to be more sensitive to the taste of what we eat, savoring it more slowly, without distractions. Those with Instagram can have fun posting photos of their dishes, with a captivating presentation that is also a motivational push to treat themselves better.

A little workout at home.

Do this simple 8-minute workout a day to burn more calories without stressing yourself.

Before or after Easter, we observe a day of conscious fasting.

It does not mean not eating, but limiting oneself to fruit, vegetables and a few proteins (a yogurt, a handful of almonds) for just one day. I’ll give you an example here. 

In short, as you can see, these are a few simple tips that can help us change our attitude both towards healthy eating and to purify ourselves without a specific diet.