Welcome to our kitchen! We're veteran cookbook authors Bruce Weinstein & Mark Scarbrough. We've written three dozen books, sold way over one million copies, and spent many years thinking about food and cooking.

In this episode, we've got a holiday food survival guide to help us eat to our content and not our discontent. We're using some of the guidelines from UPenn as well as our own thoughts on the holiday extravaganza.

We've also got a one-minute cooking tip. And we'll tell you what's happening in food this week: chicken curry and spritz cookies.

Here are the segments for this episode of COOKING WITH BRUCE & MARK:

[00:40] Our one-minute cooking tip: wash metal cooking pans with hot water, not heating-up water.

[02:30] Our holiday food survival guide, based on guidelines from UPenn and our own thoughts.

[13:25] What’s making us happy food this week: curried chicken that Mark made for Bruce and spritz cookies.

Hey, I'm Bruce Weinstein and this is the podcast cooking with Bruce and Mark

and I'm Mark Scarbrough and it is holiday season if you're listening to this podcast in real time, and we are here to come up with a holiday food survival food.

guide.

We have got a one minute cooking tip and we'll tell you what's making us happy in food this week.

And that's because we get to do this because we have written over three dozen cookbooks, including the Look and Cook Air Fryer Bible, which you need for that air fryer, which you are getting as a present this holiday season.

Let's get to it.

Our one minute cooking tip, run hot water.

Over your hot pans in the sink.

Do not use cold water.

Why?

The temperature change is so extreme that the cold water Can warp the pans.

Yeah, especially true.

I got baking sheets that prove this.

Yeah, baking sheets especially because they're thinner but also with skillets, especially nonstick skillets that Temperature change can ruin the nonstick finish.

It can help it peel off So when you go to put your hot pans in the sink Do not run cold water over them.

Run hot.

And I know this is an extra step and you have to wait for your hot water to come.

I mean, in our house, way out in the rural boonle of nowhere, we, we actually have to wait for the hot water to crawl up the very cold pipes in the walls.

So it takes I don't know, 45 seconds, a minute to get the hot water there, but still and nonetheless it's really important to do this to keep your pants in good shape.

Oh yeah.

Alright, up next, our holiday food survival guide, but before we get there let me remind you that we do have a newsletter.

It comes out, I don't know, twice a month maybe?

It hadn't come up very recently because we've been doing a lot and we've been moving around a lot and we're writing another book.

Yep.

Indeed we are.

And, uh, I've been teaching a lot.

Oh, yeah.

I have lots of 14th century Arthurian myths.

So there hasn't been.

Yes, I do that on the side.

There haven't been many, uh, newsletters recently, but you can find a way to subscribe to that newsletter on our website, bruceandmark.

com or cookingwithbruceandmark.

com.

It all goes to the same place and you sign up there.

You can receive the newsletter, which is Disconnected content from this podcast, additional recipes, additional stories, other things to learn in the newsletter, including celebrations of life itself.

And by the way, I don't capture your email and we'll never know whether you have signed up or unsubscribe.

So let's get to the next segment of our podcast, our holiday food survival guide.

The holidays are a time when.

I pack on the pounds and I know I'm not alone and it makes me upset but there are things we can do that I can do that we can all do to help mitigate some of that but still enjoy the season.

Absolutely.

So the experts at UPenn.

came up with a guide that we think makes a lot of sense.

We want to share a few of their ideas, plus add our own two cents to help you get through the holidays without the trauma that all this food and celebration can cause.

Okay, so here's the first one, and it's choose your drinks wisely.

And I think that this is really important, and we're not just talking about alcoholic drinks here.

We can be talking about Unspiked eggnog.

We can even be talking about any of the many nonalcoholic cocktails and alternatives and mocktails that are out on the market or that you make yourself.

We're talking about drinks across the board,

but you don't have to give up alcohol if that's what you're looking for, right?

No, there are ways.

So you need to think about the calorie content.

I know no one wants to do that, but you do.

You need to think about it because an eggnog could set you back 250 calories.

Now, if it doesn't have alcohol, maybe it's a little less than that.

But if you have a shot of rum, vodka or gin with club soda

shot is five fingers, right?

Yeah, exactly.

That's only about 100 calories.

So one shot.

Not my five fingers.

Five fingers.

Now, my choice is Always, always to go for the brute or dry champagne.

If it's available at the party, if it's a cava, that's fine.

If it's a prosecco, that's fine.

Cause I could get away with 80 calories a glass for one of those.

And I quite honestly would rather save my calories for cookies.

And let me interject here that one of the tricks to not overeating at holiday parties, holiday get togethers, office parties, et cetera, is to start out with a glass of water and here's.

Why?

If you drink alcohol now, we're talking about alcohol versus water specifically.

If you drink alcohol, alcohol, as you well know, from your college days, drops your inhibitions as you well remember from dancing on the tables or whatever else you got up to in your college days.

I'm so glad I didn't know you in college.

And also I I clearly had a very tame college dancing on the tables, that's the best I can come up with, not lying dead drunk in someone's bed four days later.

Okay, anyway, um, so if you're, I did, I had a very boring, well, what can I say about Baylor?

It was boring.

Yeah,

I kind of woke up dead drunk in someone's bed four days later.

Yeah, okay, whatever.

If you, uh, uh, start with, uh, Water and not alcohol you will do better because alcohol drops your inhibitions Which means you tend to start eating more quickly and you tend to start eating more of what's out and you graze more shall we say Aggressively because your inhibitions are dropped slightly I found this very much in my life lately because I have dropped the amount of alcohol I drink Significantly.

And I find that when I used to, I don't know, at six o'clock for myself, a gin and sit there with a gin and read a book, I found that almost always halfway through that gin, I wanted something to snack on.

I went and got a big bowl of pretzels.

I started snacking on it.

Now, in fact, I don't do that.

And so there is a way that.

Alcohol drops your inhibitions and allows you just kind of to graze your way out of sight on a holiday table.

Okay, so which brings us to our second point.

Well, grazing parties.

Yeah, grazing can be deadly.

Grazing parties are popular.

People put buffets out.

So here's the thing.

Eat as much as you want, but stick to the high protein choices, right?

Eat all the cocktail shrimp, eat the sliced tenderloin, eat the smoked turkey, but be frugal with the puff pastry bites.

Yes, be frugal.

And this is the part that I want to interject, is what you said is be frugal.

Don't, dude, no.

don't somehow not have a puff pastry bite, go ahead and have it, have all of it that you want.

But remember that in fact, a better choice is probably a cocktail shrimp or a piece of tenderloin.

That's probably a better choice for you or even a slice of cheese.

But again, let's don't be prohibitive.

That's what leads to all kinds of bad behavior.

Instead, have the puff pastry bite, enjoy it, savor it for all it's worth.

But remember that there are probably better choices to be had around you.

Okay.

So what happens when you host a grazing party and you have a ton of leftovers?

Gosh, you don't want to be eating those for days.

I don't.

So I like to send them home with folks.

So I prepare ahead of time.

I get really nice leftover takeout containers.

Like I go to Michael's, you know, the craft store, I could buy Chinese takeout containers there.

You can buy them online.

Send people home with the stuffing, with the marshmallow.

With the stuffing, with the marshmallow topped sweet potatoes, send them home with the leftover cookies.

Oh, send them home with all of the marshmallow topped sweet potatoes.

That's the only way you should eat sweet potatoes, is with marshmallows.

Yum.

Disgusting.

So the less you keep around the house, the less you're likely to eat all that stuff that you didn't really want to eat in the first place.

I'm going to put marshmallows on pastrami and see what you say.

You're putting marshmallows on my Christian food, so.

I grew up with sweet potatoes too.

I think that's Jew food.

Oh, I don't know.

Sweet marshmallows.

Let's not have that conversation.

Kosher marshmallows.

Uh, uh, Oh, Kojell.

Or whatever it's made with.

Oh, God help me.

Um, alright, anyway, I don't care, because I don't like any of it anywhere.

In fact, oh, here's a big secret.

I don't really like marshmallows, but that's a whole different discussion.

You also don't like sweet potatoes.

Yeah, well, there's so many discussions that could go on here.

I, listen, I grew up, I love sweet potatoes.

I don't want to be maligning sweet potatoes.

You do not.

I do so.

I love them roasted, and when I was a kid, I loved them baked with Butter, we always put butter, cinnamon, and salt.

You don't like them cold left over for breakfast?

Oh, no!

Oh, they're delicious.

Uh, that's why you say I don't like them, is because I don't eat them cold out of the refrigerator.

You don't like anything cold for breakfast?

Like, leftover spaghetti?

No.

Sweet potatoes?

No, I'm very, I'm very Ralph Cramden.

I don't like cold food.

So what can I tell you?

I am Ralph crammed into my core.

So Alice to the moon.

Um, all right, up next, the fourth tip, which is saying no is not rude.

And this is really key.

I think I think you should remember that you don't have to accept every invitation and you don't have to Eat everything that's put in front of you.

Make sure when the holiday season comes around and you're still going to get invitations as it goes through that you keep a couple evenings open for a quiet dinner alone.

Just you and the dog or you and a loved one and a pizza and a movie.

Or if you live in a city, just one evening, take a stroll through a museum instead of eating.

And you'll really have a good time.

I want to say here that.

The advice of saying no to It's Not Rude is clearly directed at our generation because I think that Gen Z and younger people have perfected the art of saying no on so many levels.

So I think this is more about me, an oldster, and people like me who find it difficult to say no because we were taught don't You know, don't say no.

Don't be disrespectful.

Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Well, also

in our case, so many of our friends are older than we are.

And so I think about, well, how many more holidays am I going to have with them anyway?

So I don't want to say no.

Oh, wow.

Okay.

Now we went to death.

Okay, great.

I love death on a food podcast.

That's great.

All right.

So this is a fifth.

tip.

And this is when we used to preach quite a bit when we wrote for Weight Watchers.

You know, we had the longest running column on WeightWatchers.

com.

And we used to preach this quite a bit.

And that is do not plan on a diet.

after New Year's and do not plan on starting exercise after New Year's.

We used to tell people when we wrote for Weight Watchers, do not go to the gym from January 1st to January 15th because it's full of all the newbies and don't go.

Just, just make it your life's effort not to go and then start exercising.

When, in fact, the gym is less crowded, when it's less of a scene, and when, in fact, you can actually focus on what you're doing.

So it's the same with dieting.

Don't plan on my diet starts on January 2nd.

No, no, no.

That is a recipe for failure.

And there's a second part to that.

When you plan on doing something, on next Thursday, I'm going to begin a diet, whether that's January 1st or June 10th, you are giving yourself permission to eat like crazy up until that moment.

It's true.

And so don't do that to yourself.

No, don't do that.

And you can't.

It's like, it's like you're revving the car to 60 and throwing on the brakes and planning to throw in the brakes in like a mile.

Don't do that.

Just instead be steady about what you do and think about, in fact, how to treat yourself better.

Think about self care, not dieting.

That's the key.

And finally, our last tip, keep everything in perspective.

Yep.

Overeating one day.

Whether that's Christmas Day, new Year's Day, Valentine's Day, no St.

Patrick's Day.

Your birthday.

A day TPA of . Oh, excellent.

The Feast of Ster.

What?

What?

Whatever day you're overeating, if you do.

It will not make or break anything, and it certainly won't make you gain weight by eating on one day.

It takes days and days of overeating to gain weight.

Yeah, I know.

I see people say, oh, I went to, I see this online all the time.

People are like, I went to a Christmas party or New Year's party or whatever, Thanksgiving, and I came home and I weighed myself and I gained four pounds.

And I'm like, Yeah, you ate four pounds of turkey.

You know you're going to lose that over the next couple days, right?

You know that this is how it works.

That it's not all instantly converting to fat and it's not all being stored instantly on you.

So give yourself a little bit of a break and keep it in perspective.

Yes, we do overeat on the big holidays.

Yes, we eat more than is usual.

Is that something we should do every day?

No.

Can you do it on the holidays?

Yes.

And in fact, give yourself the permission not to think about a diet during the holidays.

Instead, think about other ways to treat yourself right, to choose your drinks wisely, to take grazing parties for what they're worth, and to say no when you want to say no.

Before we get to the next segment of our podcast, let me say that it would be great if you could subscribe to this podcast or rate it and even better, give it a review.

Even nice podcasts or love the banter or anything like that helps us in the analytics and helps the podcast stay current.

We don't have any sponsors and that is the way that you can help sponsor our podcast.

We very much appreciate that.

Okay.

And is traditional, our last segment.

What's making us happy in food this week?

What's making me happy is a curry chicken dish that Mark made for dinner.

It was one of these dishes he actually saw somebody making on Tik Tok and it was so cool.

It was curry chicken.

And basically the entire sauce was made in a blender.

He blended up a giant bunch of cilantro and he threw in coconut milk and there was ginger and there was garlic and there was red peppers.

And then he basically just.

poached the chicken in that and then put carrot curls on top.

And man, thank you for making dinner.

It was delicious.

Well, thanks.

We served it with brown rice and I did, I saw it on tick tock one night when I couldn't sleep and I was up at like two in the morning and watching tick tock videos and I saved it and made the recipe and it was actually quite good.

Okay, well, there you go.

What's making me happy in food.

This week is something that is out of my past and something that my mother still has and that I made with my mother every year and that is spritz cookies.

If you don't know about spritz cookies, they're those pressed cookies, butter cookies that come out of the cookie press in various shapes.

When I was a kid, I was told that it was a Scandinavian thing.

I don't actually know that that's the truth.

But it's a cookie press, a long metal tube, and you put a form at the end of it, and then you press down, and you make these little butter cookies.

Like the Play Doh Fun Factory.

Yeah, kind of.

And you top them with colored sugar, and you bake them.

And I don't know, they're my childhood.

They are very, very, uh, what do I want to say, very, very beloved by me, and it's partly because I made them with love.

my mom every year.

I'd come home from school.

She would have the dough chilling in the refrigerator.

We would make them together.

And what I'm saying here is maybe you could think about a way to make some kind of food with your nieces, nephews, children, grandchildren, whatever relatives or the children of friends you might have.

One of my great memories involves Bruce making dumplings with our nieces.

Making food with somebody you love, teaching them how to do it.

Sharing recipe.

Such a great way to make you feel good.

Forget about making them feel good.

Cause they will feel so good that you're taking an interest in doing something with them.

So make that one of your holiday traditions.

So that's the podcast for this week.

We have talked about, uh, hot water in hot pans.

We've given you lots of.

Food tips, including probably some you didn't even want.

And we've talked about what's making us happy in food this week.

We'd love to know what's making you happy in food this week.

You can go to our Facebook group, Cooking with Bruce and Mark.

We can continue the conversation there.

And otherwise we wish you a very happy holiday season

and a happy new year from both of us here at Cooking with Bruce and

Mark.