Welcome the wine?

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With Christmas a distant but pleasant memory and the government currently looking at alcohol pricing an article in the Healthy Food Guide (I have a substitution) caught my attention this week.

The overall message of the article (Time to whittle your wine waist) was to drink less to help your health and weight loss. I'm not planning to reproduce the article here but to focus on one little bit in the bottom corner of one page that gave calories of a few common 'tipples'.

The first thing I looked at was my favourite drink choices if I'm imbibing which are red wine or strong lager (I also like cider which is pretty much expected when you live this far South and West but I've had to get details from www.drinkware.com where you will find lots of information about alcohol and it's effects for that).

Large glass of red please barman! That will be 170 calories, 3 units please madam!

Pint of lager then please? That's worse madam with 244 calories but only 2.8 units (only!)

What about a pint of cider then? Around 210 calories and 2.6 units that one!

For you white wine and spirits drinkers the statistics are: Large white wine, 185 calories, 3 units, single shot of spirits 1 unit at 55 calories.

So, there are a good deal of calories in your glass and nothing else of nutritional value. I'm not suggesting that you give up alcohol – unless you want to or have to, but a reduction could make a big difference to your calorie intake without many other changes.

For instance swap your large glass of red for a small (85 calories) or medium (119 calories), drinking half pints cuts your calories by half and if you drink lower strength lager that reduces the calories by around 50 per pint from the values above.

Practical ways to make the change (as well as reducing the size of the glass) include only drinking at the weekends, having a soft drink on alternate visits to the bar, drinking 'long drinks' made up of a spirit with a diet mixer. There is evidence that suggests a small amount of, red wine in particular, can be good for your heart and relaxing with a small drink can help you feel less stressed after all.

As a final note, remember that a little of what you fancy does you good but too much of anything can be very bad for you. For help with any alcohol related questions visit www.drinkaware. Speak to your GP if you feel professional help may be required.