Healthy & Tasty Air Travel Trends

Daughter Katie is a master travel ninja with great carry-on style and savvy.

 Holiday air travel is notoriously challenging with throngs of passengers populating security lines, dealing with winter weather delays, jostling with fellow fliers to stow carry-ons, accepting an airline snack mix and eventually making it to their destinations.

Add hunger to the travel quotient and you’re really in for some unexpected turbulence. Happily there’s a renaissance in airport restaurant menus. I’ve been impressed with kiosks selling really good salads and sandwiches packaged to fly, sit down restaurants with freshly prepared foods and concourse newsstands with a nice selection of healthy snacks (even crudité of vegetables in the cooler with the bottled water.) And low and behold, if a sweet splurge is what it takes to make your travel day more bearable, A Piece of Cake has just landed on concourse A at Hartsfield –Jackson Atlanta International Airport. Now you can be the envy of the exit row while savoring a slice of red velvet cake with a carton of cold milk (fat free, there must be some digression). Atlanta based caterer Proof of the Pudding serves up on-the-go salads and sandwiches at two locations on concourse B and Wolfgang Puck’s (with locations in many US airports) kiosk is on concourse C.

The menus at E Bar on concourse E and A Bar on concourse A feature a terrific selection of cheeses and charcuterie with olives and whole grain crackers. Warning: fellow passengers will be impressed with your gourmet savvy so share a little.

Navigate Nutritiously

-Ask for OJ. The nutrients in orange juice help boost your immune system to give you a fighting chance to ward off cold and flu germs. Mix juice with sparkling water for a lower calorie thirst quencher.

- Snack Smart. Bag your own “sky trail mix” of nuts, dried fruit and granola. Sunbelt Bakery Granola is one of my favorites and is an excellent source of fiber. Healthy fats in nuts and stomach filling fiber in  dried fruit and cereals keep you keep going and if you make your own mixes they can be much lower in sodium than the airline’s salty snack mixes. Sodium plus sitting can lead to unwanted puffiness and ankle swelling.

-Easy Carry-on Cuisine. Granola bars and fruit & nut bars are easy to carry and even easier to eat when on the fly. Make sure to choose bars that just the right portion size; say under 150 calories. Sunbelt Bakery chocolate chip granola bars contain just 140 calories. 

- Concourse Cuisine. A salad is fine, but make sure it contains protein, such as chicken, turkey, ham, eggs or cheese to keep blood sugar on an even keel. Stress can drive blood sugar levels down way below normal.

Flight attendant! No, we are not dipping into our duty free vodka! 

- Alcohol at altitude. Your skin and your brain can get really dehydrated in a pressurized cabin. Alcohol accelerates dehydration. If it’s the end of long travel day and you want a drink to unwind, that’s fine. But make sure to double up on water with the wine.

Food on the Fly

Airport security rules prohibit liquids and “gel type substances” in carry-on luggage if over 3.4 ounces. (I always try to travel with a container of Greek yogurt but it usually ends up in the TSA trash.) Solid foods such as sandwiches, hard cheeses, crackers, fresh fruit and vegetables are allowed.

Holiday travelers take note that TSA rules state, “You can bring pies and cakes through the security checkpoint, but please be advised that they are subject to additional screening.” (Especially if it looks like a really good dessert.)

Summer Slimmer Menu Tips

As summer’s heat moves in, it’s time for casual dress and laid-back dinners on the patio or porch. Foods lighten up, too, with a new crop of restaurant menus featuring more salads, grilled entrees, cold soups, frozen drinks and fruit for dessert.
The heat drives more diners to cool down with cold foods, and summer’s skin-baring fashions increase demand for waistline-friendly dishes and drinks.
Many restaurant salads aren’t the summer slimmers they may seem. Dietitian Jo Lichten, author of “Dining Lean — How to Eat Healthy When You’re Not at Home” (Nutrifit Publishing, 2007, www.drjo.com), says take a good look at what is tossed into entree salads. “If you’re eating salads just to cut calories, stop and do the math. When you pile on the cheese, fried chicken, croutons, taco chips and salad dressing, you’ve probably eaten more calories than a large burger and fries.”
Remember that the principal ingredients in a salad are supposed to be fresh, raw vegetables, which are low in calories and a good source of fiber to keep you feeling full. Pick veggies in lots of different colors to contribute a wide variety of nutrients to your diet. The fluid in fruits and vegetables helps keep you hydrated in the summer heat. Add a total of 3 to 4 ounces of lean proteins such as boiled egg, grilled chicken or steak, steamed shrimp, seared tuna or deli-sliced roast beef, turkey or ham. Accessorize with a few nuts or small amount of grated Parmesan or crumbled goat cheese.

Summer menu tips

Look for menus that take advantage of summer’s bountiful harvest of low-calorie, nutrient-rich produce, including tomatoes, cucumbers, arugula, spinach, sweet onions, peaches, basil, strawberries and all kinds of other berries. Did you know that the vitamin C in produce is essential for building collagen for healthy skin? But don’t forget the sunscreen.

Don’t be fooled by the fire. Grilled meats and fish are often slathered with butter or oil, so request that your order be brushed lightly with oil. Enjoy steak sauce and barbecue sauce — most brands have fewer than 20 calories per tablespoon. The “fire” in Mexican or Thai foods, from fresh chiles used in recipes, comes from the powerful antioxidant compound called capsaicin. Research shows it actually boosts the metabolic rate a bit, so it may help you burn a few more calories. If it’s so hot it makes you sweat, you’ve found a dish to help cool your body in the summer heat.

Avoid cream-based cold soups, and go for bowls chock-full of vegetables such as gazpacho. Fruit soups, from melon to strawberry, are delicious and nutritious summer menu additions, too.

Instead of ice cream, you’ll save hundreds of calories per serving by choosing sorbets made with fresh fruit or frozen confections made with low-fat or nonfat milk. Some frozen yogurt outlets make their products with skim milk, so there are zero grams of fat per serving. But watch out for empty calories in frozen ices, slushes and frozen “fruit” drinks made from colored, flavored sugar water. They may be nonfat, but they are pure sugar and offer no nutritional value. Watch those road trip treats: A 40-ounce fruit-flavored frozen slush drink at a convenience store can contain up to 500 calories. Look for frozen fruit pops made with frozen fruit. Some of the best are popsiclesfrozen pops made by King of Pops and sold via street carts at area farmers markets. Grapefruit mint, strawberry lemonade and coconut lemongrass are three of King of Pops’ most popular flavors.

Cocktail calorie cautions: Pina coladas may be popular poolside, but Lichten cautions that these high-calorie cocktails don’t belong anywhere near a bikini. “Instead of a pina colada, margarita or daiquiri [at 350-400 calories per 8 ounces], choose a light beer or wine spritzer [100 calories per 12 ounces] or wine, sangria, or a rum and diet cola [80 calories per 4 ounces].” For less than 100 calories per 8 ounces, choose a summer cocktail of vodka and soda with a spritz of fruit juice. Increasingly more available are the new “skinny” mixers for margaritas made with noncaloric sweeteners such as Splenda or stevia. Margarita mixes, often super-sugary slurries that make for a soft drink-type beverage, are on the outs. In favor, por favor, are bar mixes made with fresh-squeezed lime juice and a hint of artificial sweetener to add a little sweet to the sour.