Guilt-Free Answers to Summer Eating

Heading out for the day? While this often means eating bags of greasy chips (oh no!), gas-station snacks (eeks!), and hot dogs that should come with a Surgeon General's Warning, there's no reason you can't have a great time and make smart food choices. Check out these tips from Hungry Girl...

Leader of the Pack

Why be at the mercy of the road? Grab a cooler and pack it up with some of your fave guilt-free snacks -- fruit, low-cal/low-fat energy bars, nuts (in portion-controlled packs), and jerky (beef, turkey, or even soy). Keep some light string cheese and fat-free yogurt in that cooler, as well. Both are satisfying and can act as a mini-meal or snack. Forget packing produce and get fresher-than-fresh fruit from roadside stands -- the folks there often let you try before you buy or pick 'em off the tree yourself, which turns snacktime into a fun activity.

These Shoes Were Made for Walking

... and that's just what they should be doing. You've been sitting in the car for a couple of hours, so don't just get out and sit on the sand (or the grass or wherever you may be)! Take a walk to look around. (Just avoid all those junk food traps -- FEH!) Bring out the kid in you by building sandcastles or playing sports. Grab a Frisbee, beach ball, or volleyball and just know that you'll be showering later anyway. Move around and have fun!   

License to Grill

Day trips usually include the burning of meat. No problemo. There are plenty of ways to enjoy grilled meats, guilt-free!

The onions are sliced, the pickles are diced, the lettuce is shredded and the buns are toasted. They're all just waiting for a greasy burger. Don't do it! Instead, grab your favorite Boca Meatless Burger (or another no-guilt meat-free patty from Amy's, Gardenburger, or Morningstar Farms). You can also seek out low-fat beef and turkey burgers. Flip your guilt-free burger of choice onto a whole-grain bun. You can even melt a slice of low-fat or fat-free cheese on top of that patty. Woohoo!

Other options include grilling up fish, chicken, scallops, or shrimp -- all tasty, all low in calories and high in protein, and all easy to grill.

If those steaks just look too tempting to pass up, turn 'em into kebabs. You'll fill up more quickly (and on less beef) if your meat is competing with hearty chunks of zucchini, peppers, mushrooms, and cherry tomatoes. Coat your kebabs with your fave low-fat marinade and burn those babies. Hungry Girl tip -- try making fish kebabs ... less fat, equally tasty.

Sides, Sides, Everywhere is Sides

Salads  Colorful fruit salads are always a delicious summer treat. If you're going green, try tossing that lettuce with a light citrus-y vinaigrette instead of something super-creamy.

Coleslaw  Sad times -- this stuff is typically over-mayoed, causing it to contain DOZENS of unnecessary fat grams. But here's a Hungry Girl secret -- rinse your slaw (until the water runs clear) to wash calories and fat grams down the drain. It'll taste great (it's already soaked up lots of flavor), but won't have all that excess fatty goo.

Potato Salad  This stuff is as common as flies at a cookout (with way more fat!). Don't fret -- just BYOP (bring your own potato salad). Make it with fat-free versions of mayonnaise, yogurt, sour cream, or buttermilk, and use lots of spices. You'll save a lot of calories and fat grams, and no one will ever know it's not the fat-packed original. Or just skip the fatty spud salad altogether. It won't kill ya!

Hungry For More?

Check out Hungry Girl: Recipes and Survival Strategies for Guilt-Free Eating in the Real World. The book's a New York Times Best Seller, and it's packed with 165 super-easy and delicious recipes, survival guides for eating out, and so much more!

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