By Melissa Breyer for Care2.com

Oh, for the day when the worst thing you could do to your coffee was add a hundred calories in cream and sugar. These days, most of the health atrocities being committed in the name of coffee come to us courtesy of the ubiquitous coffee-house and fast food chains that are colonizing our neighborhoods from sea to sea. Why do they see the need to turn a cup of coffee into a concoction capable of ringing up four-figure calorie counts? (Aside from the fact that consumers are scarfing them up…)

A plain cup of brewed coffee has only two calories and no fat. Even adding 49 calories from a tablespoon of sugar, 20 calories from a tablespoon of half and half, or 52 calories from whipping cream–a regular coffee can’t come close to competing with the desserts-in-coffee-cups listed here.

For a little perspective, keep this in mind: the range of recommended calories is from 1,600 to 2,400 calories per day for adult women and 2,000 to 3,000 calories per day for adult men, depending on age and physical activity level.

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It’s the ultimate time of year for indulgence and coffee chains are jumping on the holiday spirit bandwagon by introducing festive beverages that might satisfy your sweet tooth, but also pack plenty of fat and calories by adding heavy cream, milk and extra sugar.

If you don’t want to look like Santa Claus come the end of the year, the coffee shop is a simple place to make smarter choices.

“For every high-calorie drink you forego in December, it’s an hour on the treadmill you won’t spend in January,” editor-in-chief of Men’s Health and author of the best-selling “Eat This, Not That!” series David Zinczenko told the New York Post. “If you cut out caloric drinks, you can pretty much eat whatever you want this year.”

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