Bjorn,

You don't need weight watchers or any of the fad diets... and least of all a crash-starvation diet (which is, ironically, what fAtkins amounts to). It's fairly simple. You need to adjust your diet so that you eat less (no) saturated fats, eat smaller meals more often, don't eat within 3 hours of going to sleep and most importantly, stop eating when you're no longer hungry instead of eating until you're full.

Quick, short list of how to eat healthy:

1. No more cow. No cow's milk, no beef.
2. No more pig. It's nearly as bad for you as cow, and worse in some regards.
3. Nothing with hydrogenated (or partially hydrogenated) oils of any kind.
4. No MSG, (aka: modified food starch, autolyzed yeast)
5. Nothing over 9% fat content per serving (5-7% is better, even).
6. No empty calories: Soda. Cookies. Brownie bites. Chips that don't meet the rest of the rules (mostly all except baked lays).
7. Read ingredient labels. No casein (milk protein) or any of the psuedo-msg contents listed above.
8. Drink 8 glasses of water a day or more.
9. Avoid things with artificial flavors and colors or that are highly processed.
10. Be wary of "light" foods that contain artificial sweeteners. They slow down your metabolism and make everything you eat have more "effective" calories. Better to just eat natural foods and real sugar.
11. Olive oil is "good" fat, just be conscious of how much you're using. Try to be sparing and use just enough to do the job when cooking.
12. If you have to, drink wine instead of beer or spirits.
13. If you have to, drink decaf. If you can manage, don't drink caffeine at all. (See: things that screw with your natural metabolic systems)

Recommendations for food / substitutes:

Foster Farms boneless/skinless (watch for "broth/solution percentage" on chicken packaging.. anything more than 2-3% and you're buying sewage-slime mystery marinade)

If you've got the jones for red meat, find a store (like Whole Foods) that sells Ostrich filet/loin. It's very, very tasty and has less fat than chicken believe it or not.

8th Continent Vanilla Soy Milk
Earth Balance 'butter' (only non-dairy butter I've found)
Egg Beaters (costco has these cheap)
Paul Newman non-dairy cookies (take your pick, there's a bunch. I'm a mint-chocolate cookie guy myself)
Licorice for snacking
Good Slice soy cheese
Tofutti "better than cream cheese" Cream Cheese

Without additional physical activity or excercise, Michelle's parents lost 50 and 35 pounds each in the first 2 1/2 months of being on this diet, eating things like french toast, pancakes, mashed potatoes, pan roasted chicken, salmon, cookies, pasta... and her dad lost 100 points on his bad cholersterol count to boot, even with the occaisonal shrimp-laden meal. Mostly, by eliminating artificial shit from food intake and by eliminating saturated fats.

When Michelle was diagnosed with her dietary sensitivity to chemicals and artificial flavors/colors a few years ago, this is more or less the food plan we went on. Her restrictions are more harsh due to other issues, but this is more or less what I and her folks are doing. I lost 35 pounds and 4 inches on my waist without anything other than what I've listed above.

Anyway, not trying to get all preachy. Just wanted to help out. In the end, whatever works is a good way to go. However, I think most of the fad diets and guilt-systems aren't very effective long-term solutions.

If you want some recipes for different easy to make dishes, let me know. Cooking healthy but tasty is kind of a side hobby of mine now. =0

Man, that got a lot longer than I intended. LOL.

~O.