Hannah Chapman

Just a few days to go until Halloween; the first of the food holidays. The stores have been stocked with trick or treat candy since Labor Day. I have fallen for that trap before - buy treats for the kiddos in early October, then again the next week and again the next because the candy keeps getting eaten up. The past 2 years I got wiser and don't buy the Halloween candy until less than 5 days to go. (That's not as smart as it sounds since we have not had a single trick or treater since we moved into this house in the woods 4 years ago!)

Next up will be Thanksgiving. It is advertised as just one day. Most non-retail businesses don't even bother to open the Black Friday after Thanksgiving, so it essentially becomes a 4-day weekend. At first glance, it seems a somewhat healthy holiday with turkey and sweet potatoes. But then we eat 4 portions of turkey and add marshmallows and butter to the otherwise healthy orange taters.

There will be pumpkin pie contests that week as well. Every year there are a few more treats brought to work as various cooks try out new recipes. These are usually people with normal relationships with food, so they bring their trial dishes to work to get them out of their homes.

This month of gluttony has just been a warm up for the big winter holidays. Christmas, Hanukkah or Kwanzaa; they all have special foods associated with them. Sweets are a recurring theme of all these holidays, but particularly Christmas, or so it seems to me. Business suppliers and customers alike come bearing edible gifts. You see a few more fruit baskets than you did 10 years ago, but even those have chocolates tucked between the apples and tangerines.

Holiday parties abound; at work, school and the neighbor's house. Many of these revolve around a big buffet or a groaning sideboard of goodies. The worst are the potlucks where every contributor brings their mouth-watering specialty.

I must come up with a plan. I don't want to end up 3 months from now with 10 of my hard-fought pounds back on and my A1C up half a percentage point. Do you have a plan?