Dr. Oz’s Weekend Challenge

You look forward to girls’ night out all week. When you get together, the food, drinks and long overdue catch-up conversations start flowing. Before you know it, you’re about 2 drinks over your threshold and your self-control to resist just-one-more-bite has been displaced by your buzz. Think of these tips to keep yourself in check next time you’re out on the town.

Drink Smart

There’s nothing wrong with having a cocktail or 2, but it’s easy to overdo it. The next time you’re your sipping on something, consider these points:

• Cut back: Having only 2 glasses of red wine as opposed to 4 translates into saving about 300 calories a night. Over the course of a year, that’s 21 cups of sugar, equating to a 5 pound weight loss.

• Make Smart Swaps: Instead of wine, try a vodka-soda – you’ll save around 100 calories. Flavored vodka with soda water provides a bubbly burst of sweetness without the excessive sugar or calories.

• If your drink of choice is a white wine, try creating your own spritzer. Use about 4 ounces of white wine with a big splash of lemon-line seltzer water for around only 100 calories. Click here for more Dr. Oz-approved cocktails.

• Go Virgin: Don’t forget, you can still toast with classy cocktails sans alcohol. Click here for healthy juice-infused “mocktail” recipes.

Serve with Strategy

If you’ve prepared or ordered up a large spread, enjoy only 1 appetizer at a time. You’ll savor the different dishes, instead of gobbling it all up at once. You’ll give your body more time to realize there’s probably more food on the table than it should be consuming.

Also, try to incorporate Dr. Oz’s detox appetizer – asparagus. Research suggests that asparagus is actually loaded with vitamins that help us metabolize the alcohol, so you’ll spare yourself the misery of a hangover.

Click here for a recipe of asparagus guacamole.