Before ya'll start in, yes I know you can have carbs, but they aren't the "fun" carbs!

This is my 2nd annual New Year's cleansing using the South Beach diet as my guide of choice. After having gone through many diets throughout the years, I find that the South Beach is the easiest for me personally to follow. Through 2007 I stuck to it as closely as I could on the edible side, with the random slip up involving chili cheese fries or Frito pie. But on the beverage side I tend to backslide quite a bit with a nightly wine habit that I enjoy with much fervor! Let's not forget margaritas, can anyone really have just one?

I realize I will never have the body of a Victoria's Secret model, but I do what I can to stay healthy and fitting into my jeans. So here is one of my favorite recipes from phase one. Do you have any to share?

P.S. I am going to the movies tonight and I am sneaking in nuts. So sad!

See Mexican Chicken Soup after the jump.

I don't know about you, but even though I love every sunny, poolside moment of summer, I secretly rejoice when the days start to get shorter and the air a little chillier. The end of summer means the beginning of fall, and that means I get to drop kick my bathing suit and body-baring shorts and tanktops. I don't have to be so conscious of what I'm eating. And not eating.

But "dieting" isn't a seasonal activity. People watch what they eat year-round. According to Forbes, "Americans spent an estimated $46 billion on diet products and self-help books in 2004." If that's the case, why is obesity such a problem in the US? Because, as a government review has found, two-thirds of dieters on "diet regimes" will regain all the weight that they lost within a year. Give them five years, and almost everyone will gain it back.

People gain the weight back for a number of reasons, but one of them is that the popular diet programs are very expensive, especially since many health and nutrition experts believe that they are ineffective to begin with. Forbes examined the weekly menus of the ten most popular diets to find out just how expensive they really are. The results are listed below. The first dollar amount is how much the program costs per week for any associated book, membership fees, and food costs, and the second percentage is how much more that is than the average $55.44 a normal person spends on food.

• Jenny Craig - $137.65, 152.8%
• NutriSytem - $113.52, 108.5%
• Atkins - $100.52, 84.6%
• Weight Watchers - $96.64, 77.5%
• Zone Diet - $92.84, 70.5%
• Ornish - $78.75, 44.6%
• South Beach - $78.76, 44.4%
• SlimFast - $77.73, 42.8%
• Sugar Busters - $69.62, 27.9%
• Subway - $68.80, 26%

Whatever happened to good old fashioned "eat less, exercise more?" I think that's free.

Just about any diet will work if you stick to it, even if your diet consists of eating only banana bread. The problem with diets is that people do not stick to diets and even if you love banana bread, there are so many other good things to eat out there that it would just be too boring. Not to mention, of course, that very restrictive diets are not usually the healthiest ones.

Forbes has worked out their list of the top 10 diets that work. They correctly point out that restriction is the reason that many diets fail. Because most people will only have enough willpower (or interest) to stick to a diet for a short time, a very restrictive diet will produce maximum results quickly and is more likely to be selected by someone looking to lose weight. This is not the right way to lose weight. Diets are also a multi-billion dollar business, so there is a question as to whether the originators of some diets actually want people who try them to maintain their weight loss.

Last week's Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) published some findings about the effects of long-term weight loss with a low fat diet. The study was done in the context of the popularity of low-carb diet regimens (Atkins, South Beach), which are not necessarily low in fat. Supporters of the low-carb diets have suggested that it is low-fat, high-carb diets that have contributed to the US's obesity problem. The JAMA's conclusion? From the abstract, "A low-fat eating pattern does not result in weight gain."

No. Effin'. Way.

I am not poking fun at the JAMA, because, like, they're doctors and stuff. However, I am poking fun at everyone who 1) finds this information the least bit surprising, and 2) will twist the information and use it as license to reach for a dozen doughnuts with utter abandon.

No, no o ye of little restraint.