Eat This, Not That!

A diet only works when you have control over what, where, and when you are eating, and we don't always have that control. Because it's a fact of life that most of us don't prepare every meal from scratch - at home- with fresh, natural ingredients- we need all the help we can get in making the best choices when eating out or buying packaged foods at the grocery store.

Having access to nutritional labels is one of the ways we've talked about to compare the calories, carbohydrate and fat content of meals that are pre-packaged or sold to us at chain restaurants. But I want to share with you a great little book that is just packed with this information - in other words, the authors have already done the research for you!

Eat This, Not That is written by David Zinczenko with the editor-in-chief of Men's Health Magazine.  It's not a traditional "read-only" diet book; it's really a guidebook to take along to grocery stores and restaurants as a tool to help you make the absolute healthiest choices you can when you are in a place where you can't control the ingredients of your meal.

Different sections highlight common, brand-name foods and meals with the EAT THIS recommendations on one page and the NOT THAT options on the facing page. It's fascinating, entertaining and educational!

By following the recommendations in the book, you can save hundreds of calories and dozens of fat grams at every meal - without doing the math yourself!  For example, I found out why Chick-Fil-A is actually the healthiest fast food place to get a grilled chicken sandwich; that Triscuit reduced-fat crackers are a better choice than Wheat Thins even though both list "whole wheat" as the main ingredient, and how to save 540 calories at Thanksgiving dinner (have mashed potatoes instead of sweet potato casserole, green bean casserole instead of stuffing, and pumpkin pie instead of pecan pie).

Eat This,Not That has been such a success that there is also a version just for the supermarket shopping and one devoted to kids' meals!  I found my copy at Wal-Mart, but I have seen it in Krogers, Sam's Club, Amazon.com and stand-alone bookstores too - highly recommended!