What you want is to rev up your metabolism so that you are burning fat and calories, not preserving fat and calories.

I missed a tuna-fish sandwich with mayo on toasted wheat bread more than anything. Six months after I went vegan, I snuck into a deli and took one home. And, of course, it wasn't nearly as good as I fantasized. It tasted, well, fishy.

Though I'm vegan and advocate that others eat a plant-based diet, I know that many people aren't quite ready to take that step in whole.

You get tons of phytonutrients and antioxidants from plant-based foods, very little saturated fat, and you avoid cholesterol entirely!

The reason fiber helps us control our weight is that it fills the belly yet yields few calories since fiber is, for the most part, not something that we can digest.

If you want to feel more comfortable and happy, work on making the people around you more comfortable and happy.

So if you serve a whole chicken to your family like grandma did, you may be serving them 10 times as much fat than the days of yesteryear. That's a whole lotta fat, and big trouble for the waistline.