Images of yummy food stuff and drinks conjure up people’s appetite on all special occasions. Such piles of chips, pieces of fried chicken, sausages, deep fried fish and roasted beef scattered here and there on a dining table whet the appetite and compel people to eat from morning to evening.

Welcome to the festive season, a period where you will find people who gorge up on booze, fatty dishes and spicy sauces. Those who eat unwisely, find their once trim bodies out of shape to fit in their skirts and trousers, and will slothfully bring up the prime New Year’s resolution as losing weight.

"There is no guarantee that this weight will disappear easily in the early months of the New Year,” sSays Joseph Uwiragiye, a nutritionist at the University Teaching Hospital of Kigali (Chuk).

"Before struggling to lose weight, be cautious of your eating habits,” adds Felix Muvonyi a gym trainer at Befit24hrs gym in Remera.

Muvunyi, who cautions about food choice, says most foods during the festive season are heavily-laden with fats and oils which are very high in calories and hence risk individuals toward gaining a lot of weight.

But why not take a healthier approach to what we eat during this holiday season and beyond?

Mindless eating

The American Heart Association describes mindless eating is as consuming food just because it’s there. It’s eating while distracted – watching TV, working at a computer or texting on our smartphones. It’s eating for emotional comfort instead of for hunger.

Simply put, it’s not paying attention to what we eat which can lead to being overweight and even obesity.

Foods to watch out for

"It is not the right time for you to crunch on that pizza or pudding that you have always desired,” Muvunyi warns.

Although chips, ice cream, french fries, pizza, cheese, burgers are tempting, what is unfortunate is that they can be loaded with fat, sugar, salt and cholesterol.

But these could be just some of the foods, what else frequently makes it to the dining table during this season?

"You find bad fat in most animal based products such as cheese or poultry skin.” Uwiragiye adds.

For example, 100gm of cheese contain about 33 per cent of cholesterol and it is not very different from that’s in red meat.

However, vegetable derivatives are free from most harmful ingredients that are closely associated with cardiovascular diseases.

Healthy foods to stick to

Uwiragiye calls for variety in food preparations saying that: "Provide a variety of dishes mainly vegetables and fruits as part of the servings.”

"Fruits and vegetables such as mangoes, ovacado, pawpaw, guavas, watermelon and pineapple are rich in essential healthy nutrients hence when provided provide relief from the heavy meaty menus,” Uwiragiye says.

It is okay to pick a piece of meat but making the fruits the main accompaniments of the diet.

Avoid extreme consumption of alcohol, because this hypes the work of your regulatory body organs.

Claudine Uwimana, a clinician at Harmone Clinic in Nyamirambo, says, "A lot of alcohol puts the liver to a great task in the bid to detoxify the body.”

And not only the alcohol but excess foods have limited function in the body and may induce high work rate for the liver.

Uwimana, for example, explains that while proteins are the body building foods, excess of them are not stored in the body, they are either converted into other forms such as carbohydrates or even stored as fats.

Things to watch out for

Watch out for food poisoning especially in street vended and fermented foods. Food poisoning is common in both fermented foods like yoghurt and local brew, says Audrey Mutabazi, the director of Gasp, a Gikondo-based food science consultancy firm.

"Maintaining hygienic preparation and preservation practices is essential therefore when it comes to these food products,” Mutabazi adds, questioning safety in street vended food products.

"For street vended food such as meats, samosas and groundnuts bacteria may heavily thrive,” he says.

The consultant thinks that people should stick to consumption of steamed foods than those that are heavily fried to avoid gaining weight.

However, recent studies suggest the strategy may not keep off holiday pounds.

Researchers who followed 48 men and 100 women of age ranging between 18 and 65 for the six weeks between the festive season.

Half reported being serious, regular exercisers. On average, they said, they worked up a sweat almost five hours each week, nearly double the amount of moderate physical activity

Researchers weighed and measured each person to calculate their body mass index (BMI) before and after the holidays. They also gauged their percentage of body fat and took their blood pressure.

From mid-November to early January, people in the study gained an average of one-and-a-half pounds. Men gained slightly more, around two pounds each, while women gained a little less, about a pound apiece.

"Gaining a pound or two may not sound so bad, but considering a number of years, this would results into a cumulative weight gain, that’s is why holiday weight gain could be a more important factor in the obesity epidemic,” Mutabazi adds.