As the name of the GFCF Diet indicates, it is a diet free of gluten, a protein found in wheat, rye and barley, bulgar, durum, spelt, and kamut, and casein a milk protein found in all milk based products (cheese, butter, yogurt, ice cream, etc.). Putting your child on a GFCF Diet can significantly improve his or her symptoms of autism spectrum disorders.

Many doctors in the "Defeat Autism Now!" movement are promoting this diet heavily since parents and researchers are saying that significant and even dramatic improvements in behavior and speech are being seen in them after gluten and casein are removed from their diet.

MealMixer's GFCF Diet Planner helps you get gluten and casein, and other substances suspected of playing a role in Autism, out of your childs diet, such as food dyes.

This link between gluten a, casein and autism stems in part from a study by the University of California Davis Health System that found children with autism that were born during the 1990s had a great incidence of gastrointestinal problems like constipation, diarrhea and vomiting, than autistic children born in the early 1980s. Regardless of the behaviour improvements, many parents put their children on the GFCF diet to avoid this GI problems, which may be related to food allergies, sensitivities or intolerance. Their have also been many reports by parents that their children have experienced fewer bouts of diarrhea, for example. Others have not seen this affect.

If your child has autism, you should talk to your doctor (or alternative medical practitioner) about putting them on the GFCF diet to see if any of these physical symptoms (as well as the behavioral/developmental issues) can be lessened. You might consider eliminating one food from their diet at a time to see which one, if any, is the offending protein or substance. Do this for a few weeks each. The GFCF Diet Planner will help you do this. Also, ask those around your child about any improvement they may have seen, just to get some objectivity in your search for improvement.

If you go this route, you should try casein first, since it clears from the gut faster (in about a month some say), than gluten (up to six months).

Theories about the GFCF Diet and Autism

One prevalent theory about why gluten and casein have these effects on autistic children is that they are improperly digested and effectively become peptides that act like opiates in their bodies, causing the aberrant behavior. Research in Europe and the United States has found significant occurrences of peptides in the urine of a number of autistic children. One step then is to have your doctor test your child's urine for peptides.

This is a big change, so using a planner is essential for success. There are simply too many foods that contain gluten and casein in hidden form. (See for example the Gluten Free Diet).

Getting Replacement Food on the GFCF Diet

More and more you'll find your regular grocer will have the foods you need for the GFCF diet. If not, most health food stores stock alternative flours, breads, cookies, crackers, cereals, and pasta. These are made from rice, potato, amaranth or other flours that do not contain gluten. The planner has integrated into it the planning of brand that are gluten-free and casein-free, as well as well tested recipes that use them.

Other Foods to Consider Eliminating for Autistic Children

Some parents see even greater improvements in their children when they remove corn and soy. This is not a wide-held belief, but it may be worth experimenting with these too. The GFCF Diet Planner handles removal of these foods as well.

Gluten is a protein contained in grains such as wheat, rye, and barley. Many people cannot properly handle gluten as it travels through the small intestine. This condition is known as Celiac Disease, which is an inherited autoimmune disorder. If you have Celiac Disease, read on since you need to be on a gluten free diet, and manage your diet using MealMixer as a Gluten Free Diet Planner.

As someone suffering with Celiac Disease, gluten will injure the lining of your small intestine, resulting in a number of symptoms including:

• weight loss
• bloating
• diarrhea
• gas (flatulence)
• abdominal cramps
• vitamin and mineral deficiency
  

When you eliminate gluten from your diet, you will allow the lining of your intestine to heal, and diminish these symptoms of Celiac Disease.

There are so many gluten containing grains that are used in formulating foods that it is very difficult to tell whether they contain gluten. MealMixer handles this for you. We also suggest you consider working with a dietitian using MealMixer Professional so they can track your progress and help you stay on your life-long gluten free diet.

Oats are theoretically safe for Celiac patients since they do not naturally contain gluten. However, they can be contaminated with gluten during the manufacturing process of producing oat-based flour, since they use the same equipment that processes wheat — even with the best manufacturing cleaning methods. Luckily there are a few manufacturers that do not cross contaminat. Note that most all Celiac patients can tolerate pure oat products, but in rare cases some may not. In this case you can configure your settings to avoid oats as well.

Using the planner will allow you to meet your dietary needs (specified by the Dietary Reference Intakes (DRI's) of the Institute of Medicine).

Gluten-Free Living Tips

Beyond using the planner, you should make a point of reading labels carefully when you're not using a recommended brand to make sure there is no hidden gluten. Make sure they don't contains wheat, rye, and barley. Watch out for words such as:

• Hydrolyzed Vegetable Protein (HVP), unless you can determine they are made from soy or corn (the planner does this for you)
• Flour
• Cereal products unless they are based on pure forms of rice flour, corn flour, soy flour, or potato flour
• Malt or Malt Flavoring (unless it's corn-based)
• Vegetable Protein (unless they are soy or corn based)
• Modified Food Starch / Modified Starch — unless it's based on corn, arrowroot, tapioca, or potato
• Vegetable Gums that are not vegetable starch, cellulose gum, guar gum, gum arabic, carob bean gum, locust bean gum, gum aracia, gum tragacanth, or xanthan gum
• Soy Sauce
• stabilizers, flavorings, and emulsifiers — we've looked into these and the planner helps you avoid the products that use these items
  

As you can see the list is quite long. However, you can also see that there are a lot of alternatives which include many items you're probably not used to eating, like buckwheat, millet, soybeans, tapioca, quinoa, arrowroot, carob, and amaranth. MealMixer will help you easily integrate these new grains into your diet plan, and keep out the grains that cause the symptoms of Celiac Disease.

MealMixer's Diet Planners produce a comprehensive weekly diet plan for you, integrated with a family meal plan. We do this based on a lot of pretty cool technology that matches your taste, dieting strategy, time constraints, and specific dieting goals.

The whole process of getting exactly the right plan for you and your family for the week is simple and straightforward, regardless of how intricately you want to track your diet. Here are the general steps involved:

1 You start each week with either a blank plan, or plan that you've used before (you get these from your archives). If you're starting from scratch, we'll suggest meals for each day and meal of the week that fit into your specific diet. All you need to do is choose which meals you're in the mood for and we'll do the rest. As you select meals, we automatically scale the dishes (recipes and individual items) to match BOTH your diet and the size of your family and put them on your menu.

And here's the good part. You'll be able to eat foods that you wouldn't normally consider being on a diet plan. This is because it's all about portion control, and we handle telling you what those portions are. This is all part of our comprehensive approach to allow you to adopt and maintain healthy eating habits.

That's it! But...

The good news is that you're not locked into our suggestions. You can tweak your meal plan by easily copying meals to different days of the week, plan for leftovers, etc. You can also add individual items to any day/meal, copy them, move them, etc. As you do this we keep track of how you're doing relative to your diet plan, and let you know when you're over or under where you should be.

You can also plan your exercise for the week. This is a great way to lose weight and eat more of the delicious food you prepare!

2 When your plan is the way you want it, you simply print it, which automatically archives it for future use. This is when you finalize your grocery list for the week. You can add/subtract anything from the list we automatically make for you.

3 Throughout the week you can visit MealMixer to record how you're doing on a day-to-day basis. This isn't a requirement at all, since you'll get most of the benefit of your diet plan by simply doing your planning, having the right foods on hand to eat, and following the menu. But if you want to get detailed and track what you're doing (for example, if you're working with a dietitian or personal trainer), you can :

• update the amount of each dish you actually ate
• add additional things you ate
• record your exercise
  

At the end of the week you can re-print your plan (re-archive it) and, if you're working with a dietitian using our Professional Diet Planner, you can send it to them, or have them login to view it directly on MealMixer.

Using these simple steps each week allows you to attain your dietary goals, whether they be weight loss, avoiding food allergies, keeping your diabetes in check, or all of the above.

Table of Contents [Hide/Show]    Theories about the GFCF Diet and Autism    Getting Replacement Food on the GFCF Diet    Other Foods to Consider Eliminating for Autistic Children       Gluten-Free Living Tips    Basic Nutrition for a Healthy Diet    Basic Healthy Eating Tips    Good Mealtime Practices    Building Block of a Healthy Diet       Diabetic Diet       Gluten Free Diet (Celiac Diet)       GFCF Diet (Autism Diet)    Meal Planning in 3 Simple Steps    Saving Money    You'll Stop:    You'll Have a System That:    Low Calorie Diet    Low Carbohydrate Diet    Low Fat Diet    Balanced Diet    Low Fat Diet Guidelines    High Fat Foods    Low Fat Foods    Managing Your Low Fat Diet

Healthy eating habits combined with a healthy diet allow your body to have more energy, feel great, and prevent disease...and it doesn't require you to deprive yourself of foods you love. The key to healthy eating is eating the right amount given your body's needs. It simply takes a little nutritional education and planning tools to manage what food you buy, prepare and eat.

Basic Nutrition for a Healthy Diet

A healthy diet consists of a balanced amount and ratio of protein, fat, and carbohydrates, as well as fiber (a form of carbohydrate), and other micro-nutrients like vitamins and minerals. Each of these play a role in building or powering your body. Unfortunately there are many different forms of fat and carbohydrate that impact how healthy foods are for you, so it's important to choose, as often as possible, foods that will improve your health rather than foods that increase your risk of illness such as cancer, heart disease, and diabetes.

What are the right amounts of each of these nutrients on a daily basis? That depends on a number of factors including your age, height, activity level, and what diet strategy you choose. You can use MealMixer's Body Mass Index Calculator and Diet Calculator to determine your caloric needs, and also where you fall on the weight scale.

Basic Healthy Eating Tips

Eat enough to satisfy, but don't overeat, and always try to match your daily (or weekly) caloric intake (food) with your caloric output (exercise and normal body function). The government has a "recommended daily allowance" based on 2,000 calories, but this will have a negative impact if your caloric needs are under 2000 calories. A better solution is to use our body mass index calculator and diet calculator to determine if you need to lose weight, gain or maintain weight, what your intake should be based on your dieting strategy, age, height, sex, and level of activity.

Eat a wide variety of foods including (especially) fruits and vegetables, whole grains, and legumes. These foods contain complex carbohydrates, fiber, vitamins, and minerals, and are low in fat, and free of cholesterol. These foods are metabolized by the body in a normal way, which doesn't spike your blood sugar. Eat these and all food in moderation, particularly high-calorie empty food like candy and desserts. MealMixer Dieter will tell you the number of servings you should have for each item/dish on your meal plan. This is important since over the years serving sizes have increased dramatically in restaurants and consumer packaged goods.

Explore new foods. Each week or month add a new type of food using tried-and-true recipes. The planner will give you new suggestions each week, be adventuresome every now and again and you'll be richly rewarded with an expanded palette.

Drink plenty of water. Water is vital to a healthy diet -- it flushes our digestive and other bodily system of waste and toxins. Most Americans are chronically dehydrated, and often eat when they're really just thirsty.

Limit high salt, high sugar, and highly refined grain products. These products are at the heart of why Americans are overweight. For example, drinking one 12-ounce can of cola every day at 160 calories can add 16 pounds of body weight each year. Add chips, french fries and candy to the mix, and lead a sedentary life, and you're assured of getting fat. But remember, in moderation, you can enjoy your favorite sweets and even some fried foods now-and-again. The Healthy Eating Diet Planner will show you how to intersperse these foods into an overall healthy eating plan each week.

Exercise. When you're active you'll:

• have a better appetite
• have more energy
• enjoy the foods you eat more
• not feel guilty eating those "sinful" extras (but, again, in moderation)
• improve all of your bodily functions, which will give you a more positive outlook on life.
  

We have plenty of great suggestions for ../exercise.

Good Mealtime Practices

You are what you eat and how you eat. In our hurried lives we often make mealtime a perfunctory chore. Change this by:

Chewing food more slowly. Enjoy what you're eating. Like wine-tasting, it should be fun to explore the flavors, textures, aromas, and colors that make up your meals. Make meal time more about quality than quantity.

Chilling out and making meal time a special time. It's vitally important the you avoid stress while eating.

Stop eating when you start feeling full. It takes a few minutes for the signal to get to your brain that you're full (didn't your Mom tell you to chew your food 17 times?). Beyond this, you'll avoid that sleepy feeling after a big meal.

Eat a good breakfast to wake-up your metabolism and give yourself energy for a productive day. The later you eat the more your body will tend to store the foods as fat, rather than burn it for energy.

Eat smaller, tastier meals so you won't over-tax your body and blood sugar levels, which can cause a rebound effect making you even more hungry (and reaching for snacks) when you really aren't (see metabolism for more about this curious effect).

Building Block of a Healthy Diet

Eat more Fruits and Vegetables because they have numerous health benefits such as providing essential vitamin, minerals, antioxidant and fiber. Every meal should contain one or more fruits and vegetables and should be your go-to item when it's snack time because, in addition to powering your body and helping it develop, they help protect against developing certain types of cancers and other diseases. Try to get at least five servings of fruits and vegetables every day, preferable seven to ten.

Limit sweets in your diet. You should enjoy sweets on occasion (as someone once said, imagine the people who passed up the dessert cart on the Titanic). Refined sugar is one of the bad carbohydrates since it spikes blood glucose levels. It also tends to diminish enzymes and minerals we need to function well. Too much sugar will increase your risk of diabetes, and hypoglycemia, as well as arthritis, and osteoporosis.

As you cook more using one of our diet planners, you'll have more of an opportunity to bake more, which will allow you to manage the amount and source of sugar in your sweets.

Skip the soft drinks, or at least curtail them as much as possible. They are the bane of healthy eating as because their sweetness usually makes you crave something salty, which starts a vicious cycle of calorie consumption. Spritzers are a much better choice, or, just plain old filtered water.

Stay away from salty foods. Try to limit your sodium intake to 2,300 mg per day (about one teaspoon). In time you will appreciate the actual taste of the food and won't enjoy overly salty food.

With these tips, and a great diet planner helping you put everything together on a weekly basis, you and your family will enjoy food more, spend less, and be healthy for the long-run.

There are many medical conditions which require patients to be on special diets. In many cases, not following a diet prescribed for a medical condition can lead to a severe health crisis. Some of the diets that are easily followed using MealMixer's planner are:

Diabetic Diet

A Diabetic Diet Plan is very similar to a low-carbohydrate diet plan, as counting carbs is very important to maintain proper blood glucose levels. Maintaining a doctor recommended level of carbohydrates keeps blood glucose level in a healthy range. MealMixer Dieter allows you to precisely set the number of carbs you eat at each meal and counts calories so that you stay healthy.

Gluten Free Diet (Celiac Diet)

Gluten Free Diet is a diet requiring the elimination of gluten. Ingredients that contain gluten go by many names are hidden in packaged foods. Our Food Allergy Diet Planner allows you to plan meals that avoid these ingredients, heal and stay healthy, and ensure variety and complete nutrition. It avoids the use of gluten in all its many (seemingly ubiquitous) forms.

GFCF Diet (Autism Diet)

A Gluten Free Casein Free (GFCF) Diet requires the elimination of gluten and casein, which has been shown to positively affect the symptoms of Autism. These ingredients go by many names are hidden in packaged foods. MealMixer allows you to plan meals that avoid these ingredients, and ensure variety and complete nutrition. In addition, it can also avoid other food items such as food dyes. Many of these ingredients are hidden in packaged foods. MealMixer allows you to plan meals that avoid these ingredients, and ensure variety and complete nutrition.

Family Meal Planning is fast and fun when you use MealMixer's Family Meal Planner. In just a few minutes each week you will get a meal plan complete with a menu, grocery list, and recipes that will make you completely prepared for putting quick and easy, family-favorite, or gourmet meals on the table every day of the week (and every meal of the day). Here's how our meal planner works in 3 simple steps.

Meal Planning in 3 Simple Steps

Saving Money

It's simple to save money using MealMixer because its easy for you to look at grocery circulars for what's on sale, and then search for meals and recipes that use those items. When you find what you're looking for (we help you with this too), you simply add it to your meal plan.

You'll also save money by never wasting food and always buying only what you need, and not having to go back to the grocery store or hit the drive in.

You'll Stop:

• going to the grocery store 3 times a week
• wasting time at the grocery store
• wondering "What should we eat tonight?"
• eating out because you forgot to defrost or buy items
• throwing away food because you bought too much or never prepared it
• impulse buying food on sale that you end up never eating because it never fit into a meal
  

You'll Have a System That:

• Organizes your family meals (or personal meals) for you, including dinners, lunches, breakfasts, snacks, and lets everyone in the family know what's cooking every day
• Scales meals to your family size (or how many people will eat a meal/dish)
• Gets fresh, home-made meals on the table
• Makes sure you serve the fruits and vegetables you buy
• Gives you a variety of healthy meals you will LOVE based on your specific taste in food
• Prepares your grocery list for you (which you can edit/add to), organized by store section
  

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The key to weight loss success is to find the right diet that you can incorporate into your lifestyle. Short term fad diets simply don't work. Becoming overweight didn't happen overnight, and those extra pounds aren't going to disappear overnight either (no matter what the Hollywood Diet promises). Our Weight Loss Diet Planner supports all of the popular and sane diets for weight loss, including:

Low Calorie Diet

A Low Calorie Diet Plan is simply not taking in more calories than you burn. All MealMixer's diet planners calculate your BMR and show the calories needed to maintain current weight. You can adjust the calories you want to consume to customize your progress.

Low Carbohydrate Diet

A Low Carbohydrate Diet Plan limits carbohydrates such as bread, grains, rice, starchy vegetables and fruit and emphasizes protein and fat. There are several versions of low-carb diets, the most popular including Atkins diet, Zone diet, and the South Beach diet. Using MealMixer allows you to closely track the number of carbohydrates consumed, and also helps to keep the meals varied so you don't get burned out.

Low Fat Diet

A Low Fat Diet Plan works for weight loss as long as the high calorie fat is not being replaced with the same amount of calories from other sources (like sugar). MealMixer's recipe editor allows you to replace higher-fat recipe ingredients with low or no fat ingredients depending upon your taste.

Balanced Diet

A Balanced Diet Plan gives you an appropriate number of carbohydrates, protein, and fat for your caloric needs. It is easy to stay on a balanced diet if you plan your meals in advance. MealMixer helps you put complete meals on the table and eliminates quick dashes to the grocery store or a crawl through the fast food line.

A balanced diet means getting the right types and amounts of food and drink to supply nutrition and energy for supporting normal growth and development, and maintaining the body.

The term "balanced" simply means that a diet meets your nutritional needs while not providing too much or too little of any nutrients. To achieve a balanced diet, you should:

• know how many calories you should consume every day (use our bmi calculator for this
• know the healthy choices from each food group (i.e. whole grain bread instead of processed white)
• provide your body with a steady stream of fuel (don't skip meals)
• eat a variety of food at every meal
• use the Healthy Diet Planner
  

A well managed diet makes living with Diabetes far easier by managing the flow of sugar into the bloodstream and avoiding highs and lows. It can also reduce the amount of medication or the number insulin injections needed to maintain proper blood sugar. MealMixer provides low glycemic dieting options (see glycemic index) so you can moderate and manage your insulin levels.

The main concern of the diabetic diet is finding the correct balance between the food eaten and the medicine taken. A good plan is to keep a food journal (which is what MealMixer does for you) coupled with a testing journal (provided by your physician). This way you will be armed with the information necessary to identify problem areas and continually improve your meal planning to attain the proper sugar balance.

There are different schools of thought for the diabetic diet, a Low Carbohydrate Diet Plan or a Low Fat Diet Plan. Your physician or dietitian should be the one to make this determination, as well as determine your specific diet regimen.

Carbohydrate counting (done by the planner) is essential for the diabetic diet. Although necessary for energy, carbs can quickly break down and dump sugar into the bloodstream which is difficult for diabetics to process since they are insulin deprived. It's very important to carefully balance insulin, carb intake and exercise to maintain optimal levels of glucose in the blood. Varying your nutritional intake too widely from meal to meal causes fluctuations in blood sugar, making it difficult to accurately predict the amount of insulin you require.

Another concern is weight control; you should determine a good weight using our BMI Calculator and Diet Calculator. Being fit has a very positive impact on your body's ability to properly metabolize glucose. MealMixer allows you to factor exercise into your diet through the use of exercise tracking.

Eating balanced healthy meals with the proper number of portions and balance of proteins, fats and carbs will help you assimilate the sugar from your food more evenly. With your diet properly managed, your need for insulin or medication could be lessened, and in some cases eliminated.

Eating less fat is probably good for most people, but to lose weight, sustain that weight loss, and be healthy, you must also be careful about the quality of the food you eat. It makes perfect sense, because a gram of fat contains 9 calories,and in comparison, a gram of carbohydrate or protein each contain 4 calories. By eating less fat, you're getting less calories, and MealMixer's Weight Loss Diet Planner helps you do just that.

Many fat-free products have substituted the fat with sugar (and salt) to replace the flavor that was lost when the fat was removed. If there are not considerably fewer calories in the reformulated product, you will not see any weight loss.

Fat is necessary to maintain a healthy body, however many people eat too much of the bad fats, and too little of the good fats. The amount of fat in your diet plays a big role in how all types of fat are digested and metabolized. A good diet can alleviate many problems relating to, for example, high cholesterol, and avoid medications. Small changes in fat intake can have big impacts on your health.

A healthy diet needs to be concerned with the levels of total fat and cholesterol since total fat and saturated fat drive the metabolism of all fats including cholesterol.

• Saturated fats are converted to cholesterol by the liver and are found in high quantities in animal-based foods, which should be used sparingly. They are solid at room temperature.
• Polyunsaturated fats are lower HDL (bad cholesterol), but also tend to decease HDL (good cholesterol). These fats are liquid at room temperature.
• "Monounsaturated" fats both lower LDL (bad cholesterol) but also increase (HDL) the good cholesterol, so use these as much as possible.
  

Low Fat Diet Guidelines

The USDA recommends the following with respect to fat intake:

• Total fats: less than 30% of total calories
  • Saturated fats: less than 10% of total calories
  • Monounsaturated: less than 15% of total calories
  • Polyunsaturated: less than 10% of total calories
• Cholesterol: less than 300 mg daily
  

MealMixer's Weight Loss Diet Planner tracks all of this for you.

If you have heart disease, then the recommendations change to:

• Total fats: 25-30% of total calories
  • Saturated fats: less than 7% of total calories
  • Monounsaturated: less than 10% of total calories
  • Polyunsaturated: less than 10% of total calories
• Cholesterol: less than 200 mg daily
  

Put in perspective, the estimated average American diet has 34% of calories from fat, 12% (a third of total fat) from saturated fat. So its not hard to have a low fat diet since most Americans are close to it. You just need to stay away from high fat foods.

So how much fat should you have in your diet? To answer this question its easiest to use the BMI Calculator and Diet Calculator, since everyone is different with respect to dietary needs.

High Fat Foods

• Fatty red meats, sausage, salami, bologna, hot dogs
• Whole milk, ice cream, and other fatty dairy items
• Butter
• Oils (though some have have low saturated fat)
• Egg yolks (also high in cholesterol)
  

Low Fat Foods

• Fruits & Vegetables
• Cereals, rice, pasta
• Fish and shellfish
• Nuts and seeds
  

Managing Your Low Fat Diet

The best way to manage and maintain a low fat diet is to use the Weight Loss Diet Planner since it will

• Select meals for you based on your specific dietary needs (fat, protein, carbohydrates and overall calories)
• Make your shopping list (you are what you eat and you eat what you buy)
• Plan more fruits and vegetables for you
• Plan the number of servings you should eat (quantity is even more important that type)
• Provide recipes with more flavor, less fat
  

You should also:

• Trim visible fat from meats, as well as the skin from poultry
• Eliminate organ meats (liver, kidney)
• Cut down on certain lunch meats (bologna, salami)
• Use egg whites rather than the entire egg
• Drink skim milk rather than milk with fat
• Roast, grill or bake rather than fry with oil
• Use olive, canola, safflower, sunflower, peanut, and corn oil
  

The low carb diet focuses on limiting (or in some cases the eliminating) carbohydrates from the foods you eat. This diet ranges from eating a variety of lean meats, fruits, and vegetables with a small amount of whole grains, to the extreme of eating only meat, nuts and dairy products.

The core theory of a low carb diet is to remove insulin spiking foods from the diet and replace them with foods that allow for a sustained release of energy. What are insulin spiking foods? White bread, refined sugar, and high starch vegetables like carrots, corn, peas and potatoes. Better choices are whole-grain breads and pastas, natural sweeteners (honey, maple syrup) and dark green vegetables. The low-carbohydrate diet is a good choice for diabetics.

MealMixer's Weight Loss Diet Planner can help you by planning a variety of meals and snacks that fit into your personal carbohydrate count so you always have something on hand to eat.

A low calorie diet can be the simplest form of dieting, it is essentially nothing more than reducing the number of calories you consume. However, for long term success it's important to choose high quality foods rather than simply restricting yourself to a certain number of calories regardless of the food.

A diet based on eating smaller amounts of the highly processed, calorie-rich foods typically results in hunger, poor nutrition, and only temporary weight loss. Processed foods are often referred to as "empty calories" because they have little nutritional value and fiber, they don't keep your blood sugar even.

Eating foods that are higher in nutrients and fiber and lower in calories, allows you to eat more food and still lose weight. 100 calories of fruit will satisfy much longer than 100 calories of potato chips.

The problem with counting calories alone, is that while it doesn't eliminate any particular foods, it also doesn't ensure that you are eating a healthy diet. MealMixer Dieter helps you track nutrients, as well as fiber, calcium, and sodium so that while you are reducing your calories you aren't reducing your health.