Our Secret Weapon

Are you sick of people telling you what not to eat? Cut down on carbs! No more sugar! No trans fats!!
Instead of focusing on what you can't eat, it's time to start filling up on delicious foods that not only keep you fit, but have other health benefits as well. We've got a whole arsenal of amazing foods in our new tool for you to try based on your diet needs. Low-fat? We've got them. Low-Carb? Coming up! Anti-aging foods? You've got it! We'll tell you why some of your favorite foods are so good for you and introduce you to some foods you never knew existed. Kimche anyone? Try a new food every day and let us know what you love on our new snack blog.

You Deswerve Pretzels

Miss your unhealthy snacks? Pretzels aren't really categorized as unhealthy but each serving of regular pretzels isn't providing you with the nutrients you need in a snack. iDeserve Energy Pretzels are perfect for all you salty snackers. These whole wheat pretzels taste just like all other pretzels. They are great for a quick snack— each little bag contains only 100 calories but because of the increased protein and fiber the little bags keep your tummy full! Check out their website to order iDeserve Pretzels and you can also find many other all natural organic products. Nutrition Info: 100 calories, 1.5g fat, 15g carbs, 4g fiber and 8g protein

Best Foods For Your Diet

Don't Eat For Two

Dare To Bare

Taste The Rainbow

Eating 5 servings of fruits or vegetables a day is vital to a healthy diet. Fruits and vegetables contain plenty of nutrients that assist you in maintaining total health. Judith Gordon, Registered Dietitian and Culinary Nutrition Consultant, suggests eating the colors of the rainbow in a week's time to ensure you are consuming a wide variety of fruits and vegetables. Because all fruits and vegetables are loaded with different nutrients and vitamins it is important to have a wide selection each week. We've got a great selection of fruit and veggie suggestions if you're feeling stuck on the same old produce.

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Blue Cheese Burger

Rumor has it that veggie and meatless burgers do not meet most people's standards when they are looking for a big juicy burger but I have found that rumor to be just that, a rumor. Next time you crave a big cheeseburger, opt for BOCA's Blue Cheese Burger. BOCA has a meatless burger that offers a healthy way for people to taste the beef flavor they love without all the fat and cholesterol. Check out this recipe: BOCA Blue Cheese Burger
Ingredients: 1 frozen BOCA Meatless Original Burger 1 Tbsp. crumbled blue cheese 1/2 cup shredded lettuce 1/4 cup chopped tomato Dash of fresh ground pepper
Cook burger in skillet as directed on package, topping with cheese and covering skillet for the last minute of the cooking time to melt cheese.
Cover small serving plate with lettuce; top with burger and tomatoe. Sprinkle with pepper.Nutritional Information: 130 calories, 2g sat. fat, 9g carbohydrates, 5g fiber and 16g protein

Top It Off With Some Soy

We have found a new dessert topping for all of you lactose intolerants. SOYATOO! Whip Cream is the first aerosol soy-based whip cream. SOYATOO! is a great alternative for regular whip cream, with 40% less fat and gluten free. You can use and add SOYATOO! to all the regular foods you would add whip cream to. During the summer months, take advantage of the fresh produce markets and pick up some fresh strawberries and raspberries to try SOYATOO! with! And the benefits from Soy only add to the attractiveness of this dessert. Check out ceresorganic.com for more information and for information on their other products.

Staying Fit This Summer

Staying fit during the summer isn't always easy. We are going on vacation, trying to relax and enjoy the nice weather. We asked Justin Gelband, celebrity fitness trainer some tips for how to stay fit this summer. He suggested that we stick to eating 4-5 small meals a day. He said, "When the weather gets warm a lot of people tend to skip meals because they become more conscious of their bodies because everyone starts to wear more warm weather clothing." Adding that we should not starve ourselves because it only leads to our bodies storing more fat because it thinks it is in starvation mode. He also said that we should continue to avoid salts and sugars the best we can. Read more about Justin Gelband here.

Frozen Food Nevere Tasted So Good

It's the cruel paradox of summer that just when you crave ice cream and cold sugary treats the most, you're looking for ways to cut down on calories so you can look good on the beach. Luckily Judith Gordon, registered dietitian, understand our pain and has come up with a chilly fruity treat that will taste great and help you manage your weight. Introducing Frozen Fruit Bites: Cut your favorite fruit into bit size pieces, place in a zip lock baggie, throw it in the freezer and grab it for a frozen fruity snack whenever you want it. Strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, oranges, grapes and kiwi are all great fruits for this recipe. We love freezing grapes which taste like sorbet. If you are feeling really creative, you might even try throwing some frozen strawberries or raspberries into your lemonade next time you are soaking in some rays.

Trust Your Gut

Getting that daily dose of fiber just got easier because Kraft just introduced Breakstone's & Knudsen LiveActive Cottage Cheese for Digestive Health with prebiotic fiber. It's a mouthful, but it's a great new product. The LiveActive Cottage Cheese will provide you with 3g of dietary fiber making the goal of 15 to 20 grams of dietary fiber a day easier to reach without choking down a cardboard-tasting fiber cereal in the morning. The cottage cheese is packed in yogurt like containers making it effortless for you to grab it and go or to take one for the road for a healthy 90- calorie snack. Check out their website for great recipes to try your cottage cheese and for other digestive friendly foods.

Old School Snacks

Everyone must indulge at some point. Yes, we all gave up animal crackers years ago, but we found a 100-calorie snack pack of chocolate animal crackers that will bring the consumption of animal crackers back into our regular routines. Nabisco has a new 100 calorie pre-packaged bag of Barnum's Animals Choco Crackers. There aren't many of these tasty treats per package but that's okay, we don't need that many anyways. They will conquer your chocolate craving and although leaving you wanting more, will satisfy your need for another snack. Pair these chocolatey crackers with a tall glass of skim milk for a healthy retro snack.
Nutritional Info: Calories: 100, Saturated Fat: 0g, Carbs: 17g, Fiber: less than 1g, Protein: 1g

Healthy Pizza

Sick of wasting excess food? Here's an idea for how to cut back on the amount of food you throw away each week: Try throwing your leftovers onto a pizza. You can add almost any topping to a pizza, like your leftover vegetables. It's a healthy way to use leftover vegetables and it adds more nutrients. Anything can go atop of a pizza. Judith Gordon, Founder of "Nutritiously Delicious," even enjoys throwing leftover pinto beans on the pizza. Adding lots of vegetables instead of meat to a homemade pizza (or any pizza for that matter) can help make a favorite food, a healthy food. Cooking a pizza at home also allows you add a perfectly portioned amount of low-fat cheese and allows you to avoid the grease you experience at the local pizza place, plus you can use whole wheat dough.

Can The Candy Jar

Are you constantly caught with your hand in the candy jar? Odds are that if you work with any kind of candy bowl or jar at or near your desk you may eat an average of 77% more calories per day then if you tossed that candy out according to Brian Wansink, Ph.D, author of Mindless Eating. That may not sound like a lot, but it can really add up. If you snack all day over a year it could add more than 5 pounds in extra weight. You may not even know it, but with that ever so tempting dish in front of you all day you will inadvertently think about it all day too. So save yourself! Toss it out, is it really that important to keep the rest of the office on a sugar high. Don't sacrifice your own diet and get rid of the candy — out of sight, out of mind.

A Sweet Alternative To Chips

If you're a crunchy and salty snack gal, you're going to love this recipe for sweet potato chips courtesy of Tanya Zuckerbrot, M.S., R.D., author of "The F-Factor Diet". Not only do they have far less fat and calories than regular potato chips, they're also a good source of Vitamin A and antioxidants. So dig in!
Sweet Potato Chips
1/2 pound sweet potatoes 1/2 tablespoon canola oil 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
1. Preheat over to 400 F. Lightly coat a baking sheet with nonstick cooking spray. 2. Slice the sweet potatoes into very thin slices. 3. In a large bowl, toss potato with canola oil and salt to coat the potato slices lightly. Lay the slices in a single layer on the prepared baking sheet. 4. Bake for 15 minutes. Turn over each chip and bake for 5 minutes more. Chips should be crisp. If not, bake up to 3 more minutes, checking every minute so the chips won't burn. Cool before serving.
Makes 4 servings of about 15 chips each. Nutritional Content: 75 calories, 14 g carbohydrates, 2 g fiber, 1 g protein, 2 g total fat, 0 g saturated fat, 153 mg sodium per serving.

Divide And Conquer

If you've ever opened a bag of chips intending to have just a few, only to eat until they're gone -- here's a smarter snacking strategy from the experts at the American Dietetic Association: divide your snacks and conquer overeating. It's easy. When you bring your favorite snack foods home, divide larger packages into single serving sizes of about 100 to 150 calories each right away. Doing so will help keep portions under control, because the pre-measured packages make knowing when to stop easy - and make it much less likely you'll experience, "Oops, I ate the whole bag," syndrome. In a time crunch? Look for prepackaged snacks under 150 calories. Some ADA suggestions for healthy snacking include low-fat yogurt, fruit cups, whole grain crackers, reduced fat cookies, or low-fat cheese.

Bump Up The Volume

Here's some snacking advice that might take you by surprise - focus on bumping up the volume! The theory is called Volumetrics, and it goes like this: Research by nutritionist Barbara Rolls, Ph.D., chair of nutrition at Pennsylvania State University suggests our brains seem to be pre-programmed to eat a certain amount, or "volume" of food per day regardless of calories. That's why just having a "few" potato chips or cookies is so hard - it's just not much food! However, if you replace high-calorie, low volume snacks with low-calorie, high volume options, you'll feel more satisfied and eat fewer calories overall. Just replace your usual sweet, salty, or savory snack with another that you can have more of. For example:
Instead of a 1 ounce serving of potato chips (152 calories), have 5 cups air popped popcorn (153 calories)
Instead of 2 chocolate chip cookies (118 calories), have 2 cups diced watermelon (92 calories)
Instead of 1 slice of pepperoni pizza (181 calories), have 1 cup tomato soup, 1 cheese flavored brown rice cake, and 1 small apple (175 calories)
Snack more, weigh less. How great is that?

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Dessert Without The Decadence

There's nothing better than ending a great meal with something that satisfies your sweet tooth. It's one of life's simple pleasures. But what isn't pleasurable is what topping things off with chocolate cake and vanilla ice cream night after night can do to you hips! But don't worry, we're not going to tell you to cut out the sweets. Just choose carefully. Here's a great anytime recipe from Tanya Zuckerbrot, M.S., R.D., author of "The F-Factor Diet" that has all the pleasure of a sweet after meal treat, without the usual fat and calories. Plus, since apples are high in fiber, it sticks to your ribs -- not your hips!
Baked Apples
4 medium cooking apples, such as Rome Beauty or Granny Smith 1/2 cup dried cranberries 2 tablespoons brown sugar 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg 1/2 cup apple juice
Preheat over to 350 F. Core the apples, peel the top third of each apple, and place them in an oven-proof dish. Combine the cranberries, brown sugar, cinnamon, and nutmeg; spoon into the hollowed center of each apple. Pour apple juice into the bottom of the dish. Bake apples for 40 minutes or until the apples are tender, basting occasionally. Serve warm.
Makes 4 servings. Nutritional Content: 221 calories, 52 g carbohydrates, 7 g fiber, 1 g protein, 1 g total fat, 0 g sat. fat, 10 mg sodium per serving.

Is Chocolate A Health Food?

It's the news chocoholics everywhere have been waiting for - eating chocolate every day is good for you! Or is it? A new study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) reports that eating a small amount of dark chocolate every day seems to lower blood pressure. So does that mean dark chocolate (which contains 60 to 70 % cocoa, the ingredient associated with the effect) is a healthy snack choice? That may be a bit of a stretch. Here's why: the study defines a "small amount" of dark chocolate as 30 calories worth - or about 6 dark chocolate baking chips. As long as you can eat just six, go ahead and indulge. Have them sprinkled on your cereal, or munch them with a glass of non-fat milk. But if 6 chocolate chips will turn into 60 - there are better ways to lower your blood pressure that don't include the fat and calories that dark chocolate does, like walking, eating more whole grains, cutting back on salt, and losing a few extra pounds. In short -- yes, chocolate can be a part of a healthy diet, in small amounts. But at 170 calories and 12 grams of fat per ounce it's definitely not a "health food." Sorry!