Healthy Meals

NuVal can help you trade up your food choices for a healthier holiday season. As much as I look forward to this time of year the parties, dinners, and cookie swaps - I know it's not the easiest time to make nutritious choices. I'm not one to turn down the season's most delectable treats, so instead, I trade up my favorite foods and enjoy them in sensible portions. Here are some of my favorite holiday trade ups.

Cookies

Holiday Favorite: Pillsbury Chocolate Chip Ready-to-Bake Cookie Dough (NuVal score: 1)
Trade Up: Kashi TLC Oatmeal Dark Chocolate Cookie (NuVal score: 24).

A NuVal score of 24 probably seems like a low score, but from a NuVal standpoint, the median score for cookies is a 3! Yikes, right?! Each category has a median score -- half of the foods in the category score above it, half score below it. But, before you swear off cookies forever, let me explain the NuVal ranges. Basically, you can't get 100 in every food category. Many fruits and vegetables score in the 90 - 100 range, but you also need to eat protein, healthy fats, whole grains and, of course, a few treats, like cookies. But, you're not going to find a cookie that scores a 100 - and if you did, you probably wouldn't want to eat it! So, when you're talking about cookies, the scores range from 1 - 40 and the median score for cookies is a 3. When you look at it that way, a 24 is pretty good!

Hot Chocolate

Holiday Favorite: Swiss Miss Milk Chocolate Powder Hot Cocoa Mix (NuVal score: 4)
Trade Up: Swiss Miss Milk Chocolate Powder Hot Cocoa Mix (NuVal score: 4) + Silk Soy Milk Light Plain (NuVal score: 82)

Unfortunately, my favorite hot cocoa mix is not the most nutritionally sound option as it's mostly all sugar. But, I can amp-up it's nutritional profile if I use 8 ounces of Silk Soy Milk Light Plain instead of water, which adds protein, calcium, iron, and Vitamin A. Plus, soy milk adds a wonderful creaminess to my cocoa that water does not.

Candy
Holiday Favorite: Hershey's Milk Chocolate Kisses (Nuval Score: 3)
Trade Up: Hershey's Almond Kisses (NuVal score: 7)

I love any and all chocolate, so when faced with a dish of Hershey's Kisses around the holidays, I rarely turn them down. An easy trade up for the Hershey's Milk Chocolate Kisses is the almond variety, which is 4 points higher. The Milk Chocolate with Almond Kisses have less sugar, saturated fat, and calories and more protein, which makes it a more nutritious option when it comes to chocolate.

I hope this helps you make a few better choices over the holiday season. Visit NuVal.com to get scores on many more categories of food products, from breads to frozen pizzas!
(Photo Credits: shawncampbell and h3h)