Silver Planet™ Help Your Parents Age in Place.

Fruits and vegetables fill you up with their fiber. Most have very few calories. So . . . eat more, lose more, right?

Yes, actually. It can be that simple, if we eat fruits and vegetables instead of higher-calorie foods. So why don’t we do it? Maybe because we don’t like vegetables. Maybe because they spoil before we can prepare them all, so we don’t buy them. Maybe because we’re just not used to eating them.

Question: What's a healthy amount to eat at a time, and why do some people get full quicker than others?

We came across this cool company that lets you make your own energy bars through a fun and simple online process. You pick your ingredients—from the base bar to fruits and sweets and other fun stuff—and then order 'em up. We figured they’d make unique gifts or maybe tasty treats for yourself. So we asked two readers and a registered dietitian to test them out. They went through the process and received their baked bars not long after. Find out the results here!

Did you know it’s legal to sell meat from cloned animals, but the USDA has asked companies not to because people are wary of it? We just posted a debate about whether it really is safe here.

Though meat from cloned animals isn’t supposed to be in your grocery store, meat from their offspring has been there for years. Proponents say it’s no different than regular meat. Skeptics say we don’t know that yet.

What do you think?

Just around the corner loom . . . dum, dum, duuuuum . . . New Year’s resolutions! Let the dieting begin!

This week, we focus on a type of diet that has not only your waist size but also your entire physical health in mind: the food-combining theory.

Ever heard that fruit should be eaten only on an empty stomach? That comes from a theory that has been around for more than a century. It says certain foods eaten in certain combinations are harmful and can even make you gain weight. Thus, food-combining diet plans are readily available.

Some fast-food chains have jumped on the trans-free train and successfully eliminated these fats from most of their choices. Other chains have not.

A quick look at the nutrition information for Jack in the Box breakfast items clearly shows that trans-isomer fatty acids (i.e., "trans fat") are still on the menu. Here are the items I found with at least three grams of trans fat per serving:

A good friend of mine recently asked me to point her in the right direction to get information on anti-inflammatory diets. It turns out that her recent bout with thyroid cancer was worsened by Hashimoto's thyroiditis, which is closely related to rheumatoid arthritis (both autoimmune in nature).