If a “picture is worth a thousand words,” here's a video that will give you a real education about the calorie content of six healthy meals (it's worth the 15-second commericial that precedes it).  If you need about 1,800 calories a day (check out our calorie needs calculator), the 300-calorie meals and snacks shown can add up to a day’s worth of good nutrition without busting your gut.  Let us know your reaction to seeing what 300 calories of food looks like. 

Eleven percent to 15%. There has been a four percentage point increase in one year in the number of people who could correctly estimate the daily calorie intake level that is right for them, according to a new survey released this week by the International Food Information Council (IFIC). A jump of over 25% in a single year. Fantastic! But let’s look at it another way. If we continue at this rate, it will be 21 years – or 2029 – before all Americans know what is the appropriate calorie level for them.  Obviously, we have to find ways get

People are getting green – with envy over their friends’ and neighbors’ environment-friendly cars. Now with gas prices going through the sunroof, they are even more envious of the energy-efficiency feature of such cars.  But before you turn green with envy – or from nausea over gas prices – consider this. You and your legs are the most energy efficient mode of transportation there is. According to Marcia Lowe in her book, “The Bicycle:  Vehicle for a Small Planet,” published by the Worldwatch Institute in 1989, bicycling burns 35 calories per person mile traveled. Walking – 100 calories per person

Do you know just how much food you chow down on each day? Chances are you don’t. And that can get you into deep calorie balance trouble.     According to Dr. Brian Wansink, a former professor of marketing at Cornell University and now the Executive Director of Center for Nutrition Policy and Promotion at the U.S. Department of Agriculture, you make several hundred different decisions about food – each day! But most decisions are mindless ones. That is, your food environment – the packaging, placement, and promotion of foods – guides how much you put into your mouth. For example,

Click on the picture above to watch a great clip of Snowball dancing to the Back Street Boys. Now if you just sat there in your chair watching Snowball do his thing, you burned about two (2) calories. If you stood up and followed Snowball's every move, you danced off about 8 calories! So every time you need a break at work, have Snowball put you through your paces. Five times a day = lots of belly laughs and 40 extra calories burned.  Do that every work day and you will have burned over 200 calories in a week.  That's about equal to a 16-ounce cherry soda or 2.5 cups of fresh

Calorie literacy – that’s what we’re after. And boy is it needed. Check out this YouTube clip of people trying to guess the amount of calories in a typical fast food meal.  The vast majority of people get it wrong. There are guesses from 0.3 to 5,000 calories! The actual total is 1,215 calories. Obviously, most people don’t have a clue about the number of calories they put into their bodies each day.  That’s one of the reasons for the growing obesity epidemic in America and around the globe.  It’s also why New York City and other places are trying to mandate that restaurants post calorie amounts