5 Tips for a Healthier Thanksgiving Dinner

. . .slow cooking at lower heat is best Holidays are times when everyone breaks a few rules. However, you can minimize damage with these 5 tips for a healthier thanksgiving meal. 1. Choose organic turkey. Organic turkeys are usually more delicious than conventional birds, and they're free of pesticides and hormones. They're given antibiotics only when sick rather than as a standard practice, to stimulate growth and compensate for unsanitary living conditions. 2. Use low temperature cooking. Cooking at high temperatures saves time, but high temperatures (over 370 degrees Fahrenheit) create excessive toxic chemical reactions. It's best to preheat your oven to 325 degrees and cook the bird at this temperature until the stuffing reaches 165 degrees (at this temperature any harmful bacteria have been killed) and the meat in the inner thigh is 180 degrees. 3. Make a healthy stuffing. If you need to be strict in food combining, "stuff" with a quartered, peeled yellow onion; a bunch of parsley; and some roughly cut carrots and celery. If you can be a little more lenient with food combining rules without compromising your digestion, a wild rice stuffing would be the best choice among the grains. Stuff the turkey loosely. If you pack it too tightly, the turkey may dry out before the stuffing reaches 165 degrees. The rule of thumb is to make no more than 3/4 cup of stuffing per pound of turkey. 4. Include cranberries sweetened with stevia. Cranberries are a healthy, high-antioxidant food. Although food combining rules nix eating fruit with an animal protein, most people can tolerate a moderate serving of cranberry sauce (made with stevia, of course, instead of sugar) along with their turkey. 5. Add plenty of raw and cooked vegetables. Make several delicious vegetable dishes and a wonderful big salad to round out your meal so you don't pig out on the turkey, and . . . Bon appetit!