But with those barbecues comes a plethora of food, some healthy and some very much not. So, how can you navigate the party without blowing your diet?

1. Avoid fried foods - From potato chips to fried chicken, these foods pack on the calories. They can certainly add up quickly too. Plus, those few chips mindlessly munched can turn into way too much eating.
2. Choose one or the other - Somehow, when we have barbecues, people can lose their minds and suddenly find themselves having a hot dog and a hamburger or two hamburgers — this is too much. Choose one or the other and just have one! That will save you half the calories and keep you from overindulging.
3. Skip the mayo-based salads - Potato salad, macaroni salad, cole slaw, oh my! The addition of mayo can really up the fat and calories of a dish so skip these danger zones and go for the tossed salad instead!
4. Watch your portions - Ultimately, anything is okay in moderation. So be sure that you keep moderation in mind as you fill up your plate.

The July/August 2009 issue of Health magazine features a list of nine superfoods for women that provide alternatives to common nutrient-rich foods like blueberries and broccoli. Check out these options:

1. Kiwifruit: Instead of oranges, try these fruits also packed with vitamin C.

2. Mushrooms: If your attitude toward broccoli is similar to the first President Bush’s, you can get nutritious phytochemicals from this meaty vegetable instead.

3. Raspberries: These berries offer lots of antioxidants, just like blueberries, and they have lots of fiber.

4. Walnuts: The authors of the You books keep telling us to eat walnuts, and they’re right: Walnuts are packed with omega-3 fatty acids, giving them heart-health benefits similar to almonds.

5. Red beans: Beans of any color, including popular black beans, are a healthy choice, but red ones have a greater antioxidant and phytochemical punch.

6. Swiss chard: This dark, leafy green, an alternative to more common spinach, is great brain food.

7. Sardines: These little fishies are a more sustainable fish than salmon, yet they’re also rich in omega-3s like the famed pink fish.

8. Watermelon: Who doesn’t like some fresh, juicy watermelon? Watermelon’s not just refreshing, though: It also provides more lycopene than another summer staple, fresh tomatoes.

9. Pumpkinseeds: Also known as pepitas, these seeds contain the same mood-enhancing tryptophan as dark chocolate, without all the sugar.

Together, you have here the makings of a nice stir-fry for dinner with a delicious fruit salad for dessert. How will you incorporate these superfoods into your diet?

Photo credit: kahanaboy from morguefile.com

But if you want your waistline to be joyful, then you’d better be mindful of what you put on that ice cream cone.

Nutrition expert Gloria Tsang, founder of HealthCastle.com, says that a trip to the ice cream shop can be devastating for the waistline if you choose the wrong toppings. “There are so many delicious-sounding toppings and treats at the ice cream parlor,” Gloria said. “It’s fine to enjoy your summer ice cream, but you need to make sure you choose wisely if you want to be able to indulge all summer long.”

Tsang offered these tips for guilt-free ice cream outings:

• Know Your Cone: A cake cone has ~35 calories, a sugar cone has ~50 calories, and a waffle cone or bowl has ~110 - 160 calories. Chocolate dip adds at least 120 extra calories plus 8g of fat and trans fat.
• Go Easy on Sauces: Hot fudge topping adds 150 extra calories plus trans fat. Hershey’s chocolate syrup adds 75 calories, and whip cream adds 45 calories.
• Nix Bad Mix-ins: Fruits and nuts can add fiber or beneficial omega 3 fatty acids, but cookie dough and brownies only add calories and trans fat.
• Make the Light Choice: Many ice cream parlors now offer light ice cream, frozen yogurt, and sorbet – sweet cold treats with less calories and fat, especially if you skip the cone.
• Forget About Shakes: Ice cream parlor milkshakes generally contain 1,100 – 1,500 calories! Avoid them at all costs.

Photo credit: clarita from morguefile.com

This is the first summer in 6 years that my fiancé, Dan, has had air conditioning. I was lucky enough to have an air-conditioned apartment while I lived in Baltimore. Our first apartment in D.C. was not air-conditioned and we spent last summer sweltering in the muggy Washington heat. I’ll admit that, being from the south, I didn’t mind it half as much as Dan, who hails from Pennsylvania. It was still not pleasant; we spent most of our not working hours laying around in shorts inches from strategically placed fans.

The kitchen was sweltering, and beyond drinking our weight in Fresca, we struggled to find ways to alleviate the misery. That is, until we discovered Dolcezza, a local gelateria. When we first stumbled across Dolcezza in Georgetown, I had their cilantro lime sorbet. They use only seasonal ingredients, which means that their flavors compliment the season year round, which is incredible. Since that first muggy June day, I’ve wanted to try and recreate the cilantro lime, and so recently I tried.

Even though our current apartment does have air conditioning (something our basil plants are not too pleased about), I still love this sorbet, and have been making it weekly since I first experimented a few weeks ago. What finally drove me to make it was a new exercise regime that left me totally pooped, cranky, and in need of a serious reward. So, using limes and cilantro leftover from taco salad, we pulled out the ice cream maker and a new favorite dessert was born!

Cilantro Lime Sorbet
Inspired by Dolcezza
1 cup water
1 cup sugar
1 cup freshly squeezed lime juice
1 tbsp lime zest
1/4 cup fresh cilantro
1 tbsp sugar (to be mashed with cilantro)

Boil water, sugar, and lime zest. Allow to return to room temperature.

Finely chop your cilantro. Stir in sugar and mash it together until it is pulpy.

Combine everything in your ice cream machine and let it run until solid. Freeze overnight, and serve.

First, a recap: I have lost about 10 lbs since New Years thanks to BodyBugg. Although I had lost weight during my initial run, the holidays were a big challenge for me. However, when 2008 turned to 2009, I started the year with a new commitment to losing. Since then, I have stumbled a bit, particularly during illness and stress. But overall, my weight has been on a downward trend.

So, what’s the difference between the new BodyBugg and the old BodyBugg?

• Battery: Instead of having to replace the AAA battery biweekly with the old BodyBugg, you charge the unit for about three hours via USB cable to your computer. The good thing is that you will spend less in the longrun not having to buy batteries. The bad thing is that if you go away, you will need a computer to charge the Bugg (the charge lasts anywhere from 5-7 days).
• Size: The old BodyBugg was about as long as the width of my hand and had some weight to it. However the new BodyBugg is only about two fingers square and can easily be mistaken for an iPod or pedometer. That is such a good thing. Since it’s more discrete, I am happy to wear it even when people can see it (previously, I would remove it when wearing tanktops, I don’t always do that with the new one.
• Vibration: The old BodyBugg would vibrate as part of its on/off indicator. The new one doesn’t (this is part of the reason that the new one is so much smaller). Although it’s an adjustment for me, that was really an unnecessary function of the old BodyBugg so losing that isn’t a big deal.
• Strap: The old BodyBugg strap was grey and would fray at the ends after rubbing against clothes for a few months. The new one is black, sleek and is capped off at the end with a plastic piece that prevents fraying. Great improvement. And all in all, between the size, weight and new strap, the new BodyBugg is more comfortable.

Ultimately, both BodyBuggs track the same things: steps, calories burned and physical activity. Both work great, so no matter which one you have, it’s a great tool to help you shed those errant pounds.

Just remember, the Bugg will only give you the information and knowledge to lose — you have to do the rest.

Army of Women, a joint venture of the Avon Foundation and the Dr. Susan Love Research Foundation, matches women from all socioeconomic backgrounds to the latest breast cancer research trials.  Some of these trials only involve a questionnaire, while others measure the effectiveness of treatment and prevention methods. Current projects include the benefits of yoga on post-treatment breast cancer survivors and investigating why more African-American women end up dying from breast cancer.

Whether or not you have a family history of breast cancer, the Army of Women could use your help to advance research in hopes of a cure.

I didn’t think so then. Now I do.

As a former vegetarian, the hardest part of the diet was taking on a meat-centric stance at meals. But now researchers are saying you can really have it all: the success of a diet like Atkins with a vegetarian diet. Is it too good to be true?

Apparently not. In fact, the study found that a vegetarian … or, even better, a vegan … diet can find great success using the methods of Atkins and also lower their LDL cholesterol in the process.

It really does sound too good to be true … But it’s not. Check out the report in the New York Times.

For awhile after I would make my own pitchers of cucumber water because I loved it so much. But as time went on, cucumber water just became a fond memory … until I cracked open a can of the new R.W. Knudsen Sparkling Essence water in - you guessed it - Cucumber flavor.

This new beverage from R.W. Knudsen (a company that makes a line of Spritzers that are amazing and remind me of my early days in New York) is crisp and just as refreshing as the water I tasted back in Arizona. What’s more is that it’s lightly sparkling, so it gives a touch of zing too … but just the right, small touch. Amazingly, cucumber water is made even better when it’s sparkling.

Not only is this drink tasty, but it’s organic. Available in Cucumber, Blueberry, Lemon and Mint flavors, this could be the answer to the summer question of what alternative you can have to water … without the calories or anything artificial.

The blueberry flavor that smells like you are biting into a handful of fresh berries as you take a sip. Likewise, the mint and lemon flavors have the unmistakable aromas, giving it a very certain feeling of crispness and freshness. In terms of flavor, the cucumber has the most clear flavor to it (which is a good thing if you like cucumbers). You can also taste the lemon and the mint in their respective Sparkling Essences as well. However, the flavor of the blueberry is almost too subtle.

In January, Oprah Winfrey invited Suzanne Somers on her show to share her unusual secrets to staying young. Each morning, the 62-year-old actress and self-help author rubs a potent estrogen cream into the skin on her arm. . . . According to Somers, the hormones, which are synthesized from plants instead of the usual mare’s urine (disgusting but true), are all natural and, unlike conventional hormones, virtually risk-free (not even close to true, but we’ll get to that in a minute).

Next come the pills. She swallows 60 vitamins and other preparations every day. . . . She believes [hormones] block disease and will double her life span. “I know I look like some kind of freak and fanatic,” she said. “But I want to be there until I’m 110, and I’m going to do what I have to do to get there.”

That was apparently good enough for Oprah. “Many people write Suzanne off as a quackadoo,” she said. “But she just might be a pioneer.” Oprah acknowledged that Somers’s claims “have been met with relentless criticism” from doctors. . . .

That would be a lot of doctors. Outside Oprah’s world, there isn’t a raging debate about replacing hormones. Somers “is simply repackaging the old, discredited idea that menopause is some kind of hormone-deficiency disease, and that restoring them will bring back youth,” says Dr. Nanette Santoro, director of reproductive endocrinology at Albert Einstein College of Medicine and head of the Reproductive Medicine Clinic at Montefiore Medical Center.

Oprah responded the article in a story posted Wednesday on Entertainment Tonight’s site (hat tip to Newsweek for providing that link), telling them that she believed her viewers would consult their doctors before relying on information presented on her show. But is it sufficient for someone with such reach to pass the buck to viewers? Should Oprah perhaps take more responsibility for the information she disseminates, much like when she confronted a woman who planned to use “The Secret” to cure her cancer instead of conventional treatments?

On the plus side, doctors and Newsweek agree that the diet and exercise tips — the info most relevant for readers of Fit Fare — given on Oprah are top notch. Dr. Oz and Bob Greene may not be able to force Oprah to follow their advice full time, but if you can stick with their sensible diet and exercise plans, you will become healthier and slimmer.

Dr. Oz, co-author of the bestselling You books, will see his own syndicated show produced by Oprah’s company debut on Sept. 14. Bob Greene is busy promoting his Best Life program and the products carrying its seal of approval, such as the new Wii game, Active. Both continually urge people follow scientifically sound methods to achieve a healthy lifestyle.

Still, the article notes that even Dr. Oz hasn’t protested unscientific medical advice given on Oprah during episodes he guested on. The lure of an audience so massive that it brought KFC to its knees may be too tempting for anyone. For that reason, no matter how authoritative the source may seem, it’s important to remember that salt’s not just for seasoning.

Picture: Newsweek.com

• Blueberries and cottage cheese
• Sliced strawberries and blueberries tossed in honey
• Berries in salad, especially with toasted pine nuts
• Blackberries mixed with chipotle and honey for a marinade
• Vanilla frozen yogurt with berries
• Raspberry ice cubes- freeze a raspberry in a cube of ice (or juice) to spice up any beverage

How do you like to use berries?