Healthier Easter Candy Choices – BETTER CHOICES

Video: Healthier Easter Candy Choices - BETTER CHOICES

Easter is a calorie laden holiday for most. Without skipping the goodies, instead of filling up those baskets with unwanted goodies, just a little comparison and information can make for a healthier basket. If you are a chocolate person, choose dark chocolate which actually contains healthy antioxidants, and just be careful to eat in moderation. So when you are deciding what to put in those Easter baskets just make them a little healthier make sure you choose the right candy and lose some of the old standby’s.

Here is one example:

CHOOSE: Special Dark Chocolate Kisses (4 Kisses)

(4 Kisses)

• Calories 90
• Fat 5g
• Sodium 5mg
• Carbs 11g
• Fiber 0g
• Sugar 9g
• Protein 0g

LOSE: Cadbury Creme Egg

• Calories 150
• Fat 6g
• Sodium 15mg
• Carbs 24g
• Fiber 0g
• Sugar 20g
• Protein 2g

Skipping the Cadbury Creme Egg and picking up the Kisses saves you 60 calories some fat, carbs, and sugar which will not only leave you happy, but your kids as well. The extra bonus is that it feels like you got more than you actually did with the Kisses because you get to eat 4 which feels like more of an indulgence than just chowing down on one Egg.

CHOOSE the Special Dark Hershey’s Kisses and LOSE the Cadbury Creme Egg. 

Some of the healthiest candies are black licorice and Mounds made of dark chocolate, coconut and vanilla.  Almond Joy’s are one of the best milk chocolate bars.

M&M’s have about half the calories of Skittles.

And choose Jelly Belly jelly beans over other brands.  They are smaller, so you feel like you are getting more and they use a higher quality of ingredients.  The even make an energizing sports bean.

Also… definitely choose chocolate (dark is the best) over the Peeps and those types of sugary candies.

The Eat This, Not That! No-Diet Diet...

Halloween Is Coming... With Sugary Goodies Galore

Halloween is coming...

In the U.S., we spend $1 billion dollars on Halloween candy (we load up on 20 million pounds of candy corn alone!).

And for what?

To help the visiting ghosts and goblins (and ourselves and our own kids) experience more of sugar’s spooky fallout: obesity, diabetes, tooth decay, accelerated aging, and a host of other health concerns.

It’s not your fault. Marketing of sugary products is very intentional and very slick. In fact, the food industry spends millions upon millions of dollars each year to advertise products loaded with sugar to a public that just can’t seem to get enough.

As children, most of us loved Halloween and all things sweet. Now, in a perfect world, I would advise you to forget about eating sugar and just stick with healthy foods. And that's still the best policy to follow most of the time.

But it's not always practical — or realistic. Especially on holidays such as Halloween, when you don’t want to disappoint those trick-or-treaters… or your own children.

So, maybe it’s time to…explore some options and be creative:

Homemade snacks for people you know

sugarless candy

give out quarters

energy or nutrition bars

candy with dark chocolate and coconut (at least a bit healthier)

coupons

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