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5 Recipe Collections for a Healthier Holiday

Preparing a holiday meal that’s full of rich, classic flavors while also low on calories can be daunting, but these five cookbooks and recipe collections make finding the perfect dishes easy and fun!
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Photo: fstop123 via gettyimages.com

It’s never too early to prepare your menus for the upcoming holiday season. Whether you prefer to serve traditional dishes that taste comforting or try new, innovative dishes that use surprising ingredients, it can be challenging to find recipes that keep all of the flavour without all of the calories.  

This year, plan ahead and adapt your recipes to match your wellness goals. These five cookbooks and recipe collections are full of ideas for brunch to dessert—and everything in between! 

Nourished Simply 

This collection of healthy holiday recipes can be your one-stop location for the best food blogs on the internet. Not only are there delicious recipes from the Nourished Simply team themselves, but most of the selections come from other health-conscious sites. Some of the recipes, like the Roasted Carrot Souffle, are fancy creations that will impress your guests while staying true to a low-calorie diet. Others, like the Roasted Turkey Breast, give a fresh take on the flavours in classic meals that friends and family have come to expect. Not only will this collection provide a wide variety of choices for your upcoming holiday meals, it will also undoubtedly introduce you to many wonderful sources of healthy recipes to use in the year ahead. 

Eating Well 

You may be familiar with the popular Vermont-based magazine Eating Well, which has helped families follow and understand healthy diets since 1990. The companion website offers hundreds of recipes, articles, and interactive elements to make following any lifestyle diet simple. Their collection of low-calorie recipes takes the guesswork out of combining flavour with nutrition for the holiday season. Enjoy the “staff picks” section for innovative recipes like the Christmas Breakfast Casserole. You can impress your house guests with this low-calorie meal on Christmas morning after the frenzy of present-opening is done! Each recipe also clearly notes the “nutrition profile” of the dish so that you can easily see whether it aligns with your wellness goals.

The Guilt-Free Gourmet 

The Guilt-Free Gourmet site is dedicated to transforming high-calorie meals into delicious lower-calorie versions using innovative ingredients and surprising techniques. The best part? Everything is free to download (or you can purchase a printed version if that’s your preference). The holiday recipe collection combines popular items from previous cookbooks into an easy-to-use guide to special occasion cooking. One of the best sections in this cookbook is Dips and Dressings. We often overlook these small items when it comes to healthy cooking, and a high-calorie dip can go a long way towards ruining an otherwise carefully planned nutritious meal. Recipes like the French Onion Dip are great options to take to all of the holiday events that feature appetizers and small bites. 

Cara Clark’s Healthy Holiday Cookbook 

Run by nutritionist Cara Clark, this site hosts various recipe collections and meal challenges that help individuals reach their nutrition and wellness goals. A new cookbook of “fresh and festive” recipes is available for digital download ahead of the holiday season. The sections for Christmas Cookie Options and Seasonal Beverages are real highlights in this collection; these two categories are often overlooked in healthy holiday cookbooks. If you’re planning a cookie swap or cocktail party this season, the recipes here will help you re-imagine your holiday favourites in a calorie-conscious way. 

Skinnytaste 

Founded on the idea that eating seasonal, clean food can be healthy and delicious, the Skinnytaste site features hundreds of recipes that align with various lifestyle choices. In the holiday collections, you’ll find many recipes that feature classic flavours (like the Chicken Sausage and Herb Stuffing) alongside innovative ideas (like the Butternut Squash Risotto). It’s easy to use the search function to find particular ingredients you’d like to feature, so turning your traditional holiday meal into a lower-calorie feast is a simple task! 

Browse these holiday cookbooks today as you prepare for the upcoming celebrations!

Home For The Holidays is brought to you by Great West Media Content Studio and in part by the Sponsors on this page. It is not written by and does not necessarily reflect the views of the editorial staff.

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