There are a lot of people who, as a general rule, eschew baking mixes. After all, why use a boxed mix when you can do it yourself and produce a better result? This standard may hold true when it comes to the average inexpensive store-bought cake mix, but there is a wide range of high quality, gourmet mixes available now that produced baked goods that will rival not only homemade things, but those from pro bakeries, as well. In fact, many of the mixes are coming from these pros to begin with. Jacques Torres has recently launched a line of baking mixes for several of his most popular chocolate treats: Pure Bliss Brownies, French Kiss Cookies, and Mudslide Cookies. The mixes are made in conjunction with King Arthur Flour and contain all the necessary basics for replicating the chocolatier's favorite treats at home, including a lot of chocolate. They retail for $12.95 each.

I sampled the end results all of the mixes at the SF Fancy Foods Show a few weeks ago, and while all three were excellent, the chocolate-filled chocolate chip French Kiss Cookies were probably my favorite. If you want to give one of them a try from scratch as a comparison, you can find the recipe for Jacques Torres's Mudslides here.

Though the very height of the "low carb craze" has passed, millions of people still follow a low or reduced carb diet. A new study reveals that, though they are sticking to it voluntarily, at least 3 out or 5 low-carbers feel limited in what they are allowed to eat and regularly crave forbidden foods, which makes sticking to the diet that much harder. The number one thing that low carb dieters miss are baked goods (50%), followed by pasta (22%) and fruit (9%). More than 25% of respondents said that the prepackaged versions of baked goods and some mixes, though diet-friendly, were not worth eating under any circumstances.

The survey was commissioned by the baking-mix company Krusteaz, and coincides with the release of a new line of low-carb baking mixes, called CarbSimple. For the sake of all those poor, dissatisfied low-carbers, let's hope that the line turns out to be a good one.

But aside from promoting a new product, the results here indicate that the diet is not for everyone. If you constantly (or even frequently) feel that you are missing out, if baked goods of any kind - from blueberry muffins to sandwich bread - are at the top of your "must-have" list, the low-carb diet is going to be a tough one to follow and you might be better off choosing a different eating regimen. Picking one strategy that you can follow long-term - low carb or otherwise - will generally produce the best results because it is one that you can willingly and happily follow.