You may not realize it, but a traditional Thanksgiving dinner has more than 2,000 calories. That's more than most people need in an entire day.

Thankfully, there are some ways to eat fewer calories while still enjoying a traditional meal.

Many people have spent the past few days buying the ingredients for a traditional Thanksgiving feast.

“Got to have a turkey, dressing, mashed potatoes,” said Robert Roth, a shopper.

“Dressing, pumpkin pie, coconut pie, desserts,” added Nell McMillin, a shopper.

All that can add up. But indulging in your favorite foods doesn't have to cost you several thousand calories.

“We want to have our traditional meal. It's Thanksgiving,” said Pam Wood, a group leader for Weight Watchers. She says one of the easiest ways to trim calories is to substitute lighter foods for high calorie foods.

“Instead of using your turkey drippings for the base for your dressing and those kinds of foods, use fat-free chicken broth because you're going to get the same flavor, but you're going to get rid of the fat,” said Wood.

You can also boil potatoes in the broth, instead of water, and then add the remaining broth to the mashed potatoes. It will add flavor and only about 20 or 30 calories for the entire dish, versus about 100 calories per tablespoon of butter.

Another tip -- use 98 percent fat free cream of mushroom soup in your green bean casserole.

“Another way that you can lighten up the green bean casserole is by using only half a can of the french fried onions. There are 500 calories in that small can,” said Wood.

Also cook with fat-free milk, and use less butter than a recipe requires, or substitute it altogether.

“There's some baking recipes where you substitute apple sauce or even prunes, baby food prunes, instead of your butter,” said Wood.

“If you can cut back on calories somewhere, then you can enjoy something else a little bit more,” said McMillin.