Five Tricks… Save Five Pounds with Each! That’s 25 Pounds Saved by Summer!

Trick 1:

The “Eat Out While Dining In” Trick: We all hear that you should eat at home more often because it will save you fat, calories and sodium. The truth: Many people come home and assume that their food is automatically healthier. Not true! Often people actually add a lot of butter to their meals at home as they’re trying to get it to taste like it does at the restaurant. Unfortunately, this adds excess fat and hundreds of calories, just like it does at the restaurant.

The trick: Make your food at home and make it taste like you are eating out, but keep it much healthier. At home use a light spread and pay attention to how much you use—you get the great buttery flavor, but without all of the calories and artery clogging fat. Not only will you cut the calories in half and cut the fat, you’ll save five pounds—between using it in the pan, flavoring your veggies, your omelets, your breads, etc. Make this swap daily and save 5 pounds just in time for summer.

Trick 2:

The “Drink Your Nutrients, Not Your Calories” Trick: The brain doesn’t compensate for calories we drink by making us want to eat fewer calories. So drinking caloric beverages can easily spell weight gain. People seem to forget this!

The trick: Instead of that afternoon Frappuccino, you can go for tea or iced tea with lemon—you still get a little caffeine but you save your waistline. You also get disease fighting antioxidants and lots of flavonoids that help to keep your blood vessels healthy, protect your skin and provide other health benefits. One average-sized, medium Frappuccino has 250 calories (high in sugar). Swap it for tea for big savings. You can even go for flavors like mango green tea or honey and lemon green tea.

Swap this daily to get your afternoon boost and lose 5 pounds by summer!

Trick 3:

“The Have Your Cake and Stay on Track Too” TRICK: We’re the first to say that you can have a daily indulgence and lose weight. In fact, this is the secret that will keep you on track so you don’t go off the deep end and binge due to feeling deprived.

The trick: Limit the high calories treats– ice cream, cake, cookies or muffins for calorie controlled delicious treats like Skinny cow or Vita-Tops. Instead of that 600 calorie muffin, go for portion control and go for the Deep Chocolate Vita-Tops which have just 100 calories will conquer a sweet tooth. And instead of that cup of ice cream for your daily dessert (480 calories), have a Skinny Cow Truffle Bar (100-110 calories) so you feel like you’re really indulging.

Make either of these swaps daily and lose 5 pounds by summer.

Trick 4:

Apply our “Italian restaurant” trick: The trick: We love big portions, but to keep the calories in check, we always order a side of steamed veggies (without oil or butter!) to mix right into our meal. This way, when our meal is delivered to the table, we immediately cut the meal in half (such as pasta at an Italian restaurant) and put half of the meal on a bread plate to be put in a doggie bag for another day. Then we dump the big serving of veggies right into the remaining half of the meal. This way, we still feel like we are eating a large plate of food, but we’ve trimmed the calories by several hundred, at the least. Clearly, this is wonderful because you can actually eat pasta and not let the calories get out of hand.

This is so easy and if you use our Italian restaurant trick at least once daily, you’ll lose five pounds by summer.

Trick 5:

The “Trade Your Downward Dog in for A Run with Your Dog” Trick

The trick: Swap yoga for cardio. We all know that yoga is good for you—it increases flexibility and reduces stress. But when it comes to calorie burning, it falls short when compared to cardiovascular exercise. Studies show that when people do yoga, they perceive themselves to be burning a lot more calories than they actually are. It may feel challenging because you are engaging your core, but you’re not truly burning calories the way that you do during cardio. We’re not saying yoga isn’t good, it’s actually great, but it’s not a huge calorie burner. So instead of doing your daily yoga routine, do cardio instead… You burn about 200 calories for an hour of yoga vs. about 450 doing aerobics or speed walking for an hour. (Ideally, keep the yoga and add the cardio!)

Yes, this means you’ll lose 5 pounds by summer!

What of these tricks will you do first to lose 5 pounds by summer?