I've read reviews of this book in LA Times, Salon and NYTimes, I believe. I'm kind of a nutrition nut because I've seen directly the way cutting out processed foods, sugar and food additives has helped my family. We have a very sensitive son with epilepsy and behavior problems, and I turned to excellent nutrition as a treatment with only beneficial side effects. The improvement in this child was unbelievable, and allowed him to be "mainstreamed" by kindergarten. Pretty soon we looked around the family and realized that we were all vastly better off when we ate like our son. We fought less, and I noticed that I was less moody and much more optimistic. Now when I feel down or overwhelmed I start eating fruit and vegetables and I feel better within 24 hours.

Still, I learned a lot from Ms. Nestle, at least from her interviews. Shopping the periphery of the super market is brilliant, you save money, time and collect the best of what the store has to offer. Another thing I learned was to look at the percentage of daily values on any packaged food and, if the number for sugar, fat or salt was above 8% or so, to put it back. Other tips I like are buying packaged food with less than five ingredients, and considering that whenever you buy a nationally advertised brand of food, you are paying for advertising. I like to buy from companies who spend their money on quality ingredients, not on pricey ad campaigns. Actually that goes for everything from body care to cosmetics to food. You just get more value for your money. I recommend the book "True Beauty" for more on this strategy.

Cheers, and happy shopping!

My simple rules: eat relatively small meals, 4-6 times a day, each with quality protein, slow digesting carbohydrates and fiber. Exercise every day. Sleep eight hours a night. Be willing to cook for 10-15 minutes when you cook. The way to decipher good food products from bad ones is the sodium content, which indicates additives and preservatives.

It's called eating "clean." All it did was give me sub-10% body fat.

How many times does she need to make the claim that "no one understands calories" and that people don't understand that more food = more calories. Does anyone really believe that the vast majority of people don't understand that eating twice as much food is giving you twice as many calories?

I agree with her advice for eating healthier, but she needs to stop treating the world as if it's full of imbeciles. It's false elitism and it's not going to help anyone.

A few points:

- One way to really start watching what you're buying in the supermarket is looking for corn syrup in the ingredients. I'm amazed at how many products throw that in there.

- I never really understood the health-food fanatics who would buy energy bars and fake meat with all sorts of crazy ingredients. I found that when I started making as much as I could from scratch I began to lose weight easily. I could control my portions, even though I was using ingredients like butter and cream. I don't have much free time - student with a job - but there are plenty of ways to make easy, cheap meals without Kraft, as long as you're innovative and like leftovers.

I was lucky in an odd sense, I suppose - I lost my car in an accident, and couldn't go to the larger supermarkets for groceries. Instead I have a small market across the street with almost exclusively raw ingredients (except some Annie's pasta and pre-made sauces and soups), and was forced into the situation I really enjoy now. And once you learn how to use things like yeast, you actually start saving money on groceries. Smaller amounts of good ingredients - I'll pay extra for a good dark chocolate bar that'll satisfy me in one piece instead of a bag of M&Ms. I shouldn't be spending less on groceries when I can't get to the huge supermarket chain and rely solely on a very small grocery with only one choice for any particular item and a farmer's market - but I am, easily.

- No, I can't afford $6 for a carton of eggs. I will pay $2.50 for locally raised eggs, and I eat less of them because I'm paying more for the local businesses I try to support... but when McDonald's best selling item is the $1 double cheeseburger because it's cheaper protein than most people can get in a supermarket, no, $6 will not be supported. Maybe by SUV driving suburbanites assuaging consciences by shopping at Whole Foods, not most Americans.

- My high school health teacher once told the whole class that the only diet program that ever worked was Weight Watchers, i.e. cutting calories and exercising. Period. She drilled that into our heads, and I do thank her for it. However, it's more difficult to know when to stop when you have a huge serving plate of food than to just not eat the bread.

Again, great article.

I'm not saying there isn't an air of elitism, but it does deserve to be said. My mother obviously understands that eating twice as much has double the calories, but

- Her idea of a serving, even at home, is fairly large. I've gotten used to eating smaller portions since I've been away, and the mentality is still that it's "worrisome" when I'm OK with just grapefruit for breakfast instead of a full meal with eggs, bread, and meat.

- She (and my other relatives) have come to believe that eating more is OK if it's a healthy food. That doesn't necessarily mean fewer calories, especially when (as the article mentioned) it's "health food" only by a misleading label. She's mentioned to me that I should watch how often I make a certain chocolate cake that features a good amount of butter and cream (but that satisfies in smaller amounts), but she'll stock whole-wheat bagels and muffins for snacks that are just as calorie-laden. It's ok, because the wheat makes it "healthy" - that's her reasoning.

- Again, with the large servings - people know that eating more means more calories, but the more often you go out to eat the more I think you expect a meal to be a certain size. It's not "X is smaller than 2X", it's that your X size is extremely large in the first place and you may need a wakeup from somewhere to realize that.