Yesterday we were able to learn the difference between beer, white wine, and red and today we will be talking about hard liquors. If you have not read the previous article you can take a gander at it here. After reading both articles, the winner for lowest calories and healthiest overall drink should be pretty obvious. Honestly, it was not what I expected it to be. Hopefully, these articles can save us all some extra lb's over the next year. Especially considering that drinking a six-pack of beer once a week for a year will translate to 15-lbs. What?!! Talk about a serious beer belly!
The Hard Stuff
The hard liquors like vodka, whiskey, and scotch tend to have the lowest calorie and carbohydrate content, but still give us a bang for our buck when it comes to antioxidants. Like beer and red wine, research has found that hard alcohols can help increase levels of the good cholesterol in our bodies. Amazingly, researchers have also found that averaging two drinks a day can increase women's risk of breast cancer by 10% or more! That said, keeping moderation in our drinking is key to getting the health benefits while still maintaining optimal health.
Generally, the higher the proof, the higher the calories and mixed drinks will always have more calories (sometimes 800 calories per drink!) than the straight liquor. One ounce of an 80 proof alcohol averages:
- Calories: about 67 (cordials can have as little as 15 calories per ounce while Schnapps can be over 100)
- Carbohydrates: 0 grams
- Fat: 0 grams
- Protein: 0 grams
Low Calorie Mixes
Mixed drinks can have as few as 100 calories or as many as 800+ for those cream and dessert drinks. Mixtures that use club soda, diet soda, or tonic tend to have a lower calorie count, rounding out to about 100 calories per serving. A great example of this is gin and tonic; this drink has 103 calories per serving! Vegetable and fruit juice mixes are another great mix option when we are counting those calories. One Bloody Mary has 123 calories and about 5-grams carbs.
One of the main reasons that things like flavored vodka have gained in popularity is because we get the flavoring of something extra with no extra calories. These flavored liquors can be mixed with tea or club soda for little to calories outside the alcohol itself. These are a few great drink recipes for those watching there weight. mudslide mojito martini whiskey sour
Mudslide: This drink breaks the mold for healthy and dessert-like cocktails. One mudslide has about 185 calories.
Martini: Martini's are a a great option as long as it is not one of those dessert options with tons of chocolate and dairy. Most martini's average 160 calories and less than 1-gram carbs.
Whiskey Sour: For those who enjoy darker liquors, the whiskey sour clocks in at a 160 calories, but be careful, they have a whopping 14-grams carbs per serving!
Mojito: Mojitos are quite low in calories at 160 calories per serving. Lower the carbs by opting out of the sugar rim for a bit healthier option.