Five Yummy Diet Food Tricks

When you need to drop a few pounds, the first vision that comes into your head is probably boring salads and celery sticks. With just a little research and creativity, however, losing five pounds or even twenty-five pounds won't seem so boring. Here are five tips to try.

1. Use Lettuce Leaves in place of bread or tortillas. Use the outer leaves of a head of lettuce for more than salad! The larger leaves of iceberg, romaine or butter lettuce work great in creating tasty lunch wraps and "boats". Wash, rinse and pat dry and use them in place of a taco shell, tortilla or bread. Fill with:

-Chicken fajita mixture

-Ground turkey taco meat, salsa and low-fat cheese

- Sliced turkey, chopped cucumber, low-fat cheese and season with a salad spritzer.

2. Use cucumbers like crackers or chips. If your diet program is low to moderately low in carbs, such as Atkins, or the 17-day diet, you will miss the crunch of chips and crackers. Peel and slice a cucumber in a small bowl, cover with water and chill. Make your favorite chicken or tuna salad and use the cucumbers like crackers. Mix Ranch dressing into fat-free dressing and use cucumbers like a chip. The more you use them, the more snacky ideas you'll come up with. For a quick tuna salad recipe, click here.

3. Use Salad Spritzers. There's no way you'll completely eliminate a salad when dieting. In place of fattening salad dressings or weird-tasting low-fat varieties, try a salad spritzer. Salad Spritzers are a thinned down, spray-on version of salad dressing that add approximately ten to fifteen yummy calories, 1-2 grams carbs, and zero to half a gram of fat, for ten squirts. I usually need no more than 15 squirts for a large salad. Wishbone and Ken's both offer a variety of tastes, from traditional Ranch to Raspberry Walnut Vinaigrette.

4. Add crunch with Soy and Sesame Seeds. Dying for some crunch? Sprinkle sesame seeds or bacon-flavored chips (Baco's) on cottage cheese, cooked vegetables, salads, in eggs, etc. This little bit of crispy can get you through an otherwise boring, un-crunchy day!

5. Freeze Fruit. Have you ever found yourself throwing out a whole carton of strawberries or blueberries because you didn't eat them before they went bad? At the beginning of a diet, we all race to the produce section of the grocery store and load up on fresh vegetables and fruit that often end up in the disposal due to spoilage. To avoid all that waste, freeze any fruit that you've had a few days, because adding frozen fruit to any blender concoction makes it thick, like a milk shake!

Freeze blueberries, blackberries, bite-sized pieces of strawberries, bananas peaches and nectarines, then add the frozen fruit when blending protein shakes or smoothies made with yogurt or kafir. Make a decadent, low-sugar, low-fat shake using fat-free half-and-half, Splenda and your choice of frozen fruit. For a healthy, low-calorie quick snack, pop a dozen frozen grapes in your mouth. (They are addicting when frozen!). If you have extra when you make a smoothie, freeze it and eat later, like shaved ice.

The best trick when dieting is to think of ways to eat healthy foods that will fit into your lifestyle as closely as possible. In addition to reducing calories and fat, these five healthy ideas are easy and taste good too. You might even find yourself including them in your regular diet well after you've lost the weight!

Related Reading:

Keeping Lettuce Fresh
Club Lettuce Wrap