Christmas is around the corner so it’s time for some advice on how to navigate the waters through this tricky period. Watch my video for some practical tips on how to sail smoothly through to the other side.
Just a little note here before we get started. I receive emails every day from readers and many have questions for me. What I would like to ask you all is if you could ask these questions in the comments, please. I always answer every comment and you get notified by email of the answer so you will get exactly the same result but will be helping others too. Many questions are asked over and over again so it would be good to have the answers officially in the comments for all to see. That way everyone benefits from the answers and not just the person asking them. Anyway, back to Christmas.
Transcript of the Video – Surviving Christmas
How will I survive Christmas and stay true to the low Fodmap diet?
Those on a low Fodmap diet may approach celebrations like Christmas with trepidation. Today I am going to talk to you about how to relax and enjoy this holiday period with everyone else.
Christmas Parties
The Christmas holiday period is full of pitfalls, if you let it be. Prior to Xmas there will be parties at your office, among friends and maybe even pre-Christmas family get-togethers. Have a look at my video on cocktail parties to help you navigate those. It’s here .
Christmas Day
But let’s look at Christmas day specifically. If you are all contributing food, you can make sure that your food suits your diet and that it constitutes a well-rounded meal by itself. But there are sure to be some family members who are on-board with you, and you can co-ordinate with them to ensure you have a few dishes to choose from.
What You Can and Can’t Eat
But let’s look more closely at the meal and what you can take. The two classics for the main course – ham and chicken will be absolutely fine unless the provider of the turkey has stuffed whole cloves of garlic into the flesh. Avoid the stuffing, of course, because it traditionally has at least onion in it if not garlic as well. If you were the supplier of the stuffing then you could make a delicious one with either gluten-free bread or a different starch completely, like rice or quinoa. Chop up the green part of either spring onions or leeks instead of onions and the rest of the traditional ingredients should be fine on a low Fodmap diet.
There are usually roast vegetables with the turkey so pick out the low Fodmap ones – most of the root vegetables are fine – and eat those.
The desserts are a different story so you may have to avoid those altogether. The classic plum pudding would be lethal with all its dried fruit as would the traditional Christmas cake. Most other creamy, dairy laden-desserts or fruit salads should be avoided as well. Again, you could take a low Fodmap dessert so that you can make sure you can have a little sweet something at the end of the meal if that is important to you. Here is a lemon tart which would be appropriate.
The Main Dish to Contribute
Now let’s look at a main dish you could take with you. Make sure it has all the food groups in it in case you decide nothing else on the table is suitable. That way you have a complete meal just from your own dish. Make sure it has a grain, a protein and several vegetables and you will be set. Here is an example: brown rice salad.
It contains 2 cups of brown rice (uncooked), which you then cook – this could be white rice, gluten-free pasta or quinoa if you prefer, 1 tomato, chopped up, 1 zucchini, diced, 1 red or yellow bell pepper, diced, 150gms/5.3oz feta, cut into squares, 1 cup shredded cooked chicken – you could vary this protein, 1 cup chopped cooked green beans – we can have 10 beans to stay low Fodmap but you will get much less than that in a serving. 2 spring onions (green part only), chopped, 1 tbsp chopped parsley, and a dressing of olive oil, vinegar/lemon, salt, pepper and tabasco sauce. You can of course vary the low Fodmap vegetables. As long as you take a small to medium serving of this, it is all you will need and you will not have too much of anything that could add up to a high Fodmap cocktail.
Alcohol
Speaking of cocktails, don’t have any! Have a glass of dry wine and then switch to water – no juice. To make your wine last longer, fill your glass with ice cubes first and then you can have 2 glasses.
Stand Strong
Stand strong for your health and don’t let anyone derail you, but mostly no one will notice what you are eating or drinking or not eating or drinking – they will be getting on with their own business so relax and enjoy the day!
I hope that has given you a few guidelines to work with for the Christmas period.
If you would like to receive a free 4-part video series on the low Fodmap diet and how to integrate it into your life as well as an accurate food chart, then go here to receive it.
Thank you for watching this video, Merry Christmas and good bye.
Snowball Cookies
It is certainly time to be thinking about Christmas and these snowball cookies fit the bill. I used the recipe from Crazy for Crust and adapted it to suit the low Fodmap diet. I do have to say they are a bit crumbly but delicious. They are like a light ball of sweetness. I suggest only eating one at a sitting if you are on a low Fodmap diet. I can also see these being great with dried cranberries instead of the chocolate. We can have 1 tbsp of dried cranberries so they would be better than other dried fruit which are high Fodmap.
- 1 cup/226gms softened butter
- ½ cup of icing sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla essence
- 1.25 cups white rice flour
- ½ cup tapioca flour
- ½ cup potato starch
- 1.2 tsp salt
- ½ cup dark chocolate, chopped up
- Heat oven to 180°C/350°F.
- beat the butter, vanilla and icing sugar together until they are light and fluffy.
- Sift all the dry ingredients together.
- Mix the chopped chocolate, together with the dry and wet ingredients to form a batter.
- Form it into small balls by wetting your hands and rolling between your palms.
- Place on a baking tray which has been lined with baking paper.
- Bake for 10 minutes.
- Let cool before handling them because they are fragile.
- When cooled, sprinkle icing sugar over the top.
’tis the season for cookies! And these look great. Thanks, and I hope you have a Merry Christmas and Happy New Years!
It is indeed the season for cookies. One of my husband’s clients just gave us a massive Christmas cake and I can’t touch it if I don’t want pain. So sad!
Merry Christmas and Happy New years to you too, John.
Nom Nom Nom!!! I ate something sweet!! So far on low fodmap I’ve been pretty much stuck with grapes since anything sweet from the store is generally processed or full of ‘fodmaps.
These were really easy to make and I substituted 2 cups of store bought gluten-free flour (make sure to check all ingredients to verify low fodmap) and it worked out great!
Great for Xmas or anytime really.
GF flours are fine as long as you don’t react to the gums which most contain.