Ten SAFE Ideas to Knock off Thousands of Calories Each Week

Judy Goffi MS, RD, CDE, LD

With some safe tweaking, you can slash calories in very safe and effective ways.

For many people, making these changes result in losses of 1-2 pounds per week. Each tip below will cut roughly 100 calories per meal from your diet.

The best thing about these 10 tips is that they are virtually "painless." They target high-sugar and high-fat foods and additives.

Give them a try and you'll love the results.

1. Switch to drinking water first thing in the morning instead of fruit juice. Fruit juice is high in sugar, which adds lots of calories. Since most of us are dehydrated in the morning and simply need fluids, water is most appropriate anyway.
2. Switch to eating sugar-free yogurt instead of regular yogurt.
3. Switch to a low-fat store-bought bagel instead of a bakery bagel.
4. Use fruit as a topping on that low-fat bagel, instead of flavored cream cheese.
5. Replace bacon at breakfast with reduced-fat turkey bacon or Canadian bacon.
6. Steam your vegetables instead of sautéing them in butter or oil.
7. If you drink a lot of soda, switching to diet soda will probably save you literally hundreds of calories a day.
8. Switch to boiled shrimp or chicken instead of steak on shish-kabobs.
9. Replace 1 tablespoon of regular mayo on your turkey sandwich with 1 1/2 tablespoons of reduced fat mayo.
10. When eating french toast, use non-fat milk and egg whites instead of whole milk and eggs. Be sure you are drinking non-fat milk as well.

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