One of the most common New Year’s resolutions is to lose weight or at least eat more healthfully. Several Web sites offer tips and tools for getting there.

A Better Food Pyramid: Harvard nutritionists say their revamped food pyramid is based on the latest science and is “unaffected by businesses and organizations with a stake in its messages.” It starts with exercise and encourages adding more plant-based foods and cutting back on “American staples” like red meat, refined grains, potatoes and sugary drinks.

Dr. Gourmet: New Orleans physician Timothy S. Harlan, also known as Dr. Gourmet, has created free diet software that helps you plan more healthful meals. He calls it the Quality Calorie Diet Plan to reflect his belief that it’s the quality of the calories we eat that counts the most. The site creates meal plans and even offers ways to use leftovers later in the week. It includes food and exercise diaries as well as goal-tracking features, and a place for users to analyze their own recipes.

3FatChicks.com: This Web site began as a personal source of diet support for sisters Suzanne, Jennifer and Amy and has now grown into a community of over 70,000 registered members. It has the typical diet-site resources and tools, but the main appeal is the forum for dieters to share stories and find support.

Cooking Light: A great site for finding healthy and delicious foods that won’t make you feel like you’re on a diet. You’ll find recipes, nutrition information and advice on cooking techniques.

Food Blog Search: It’s not a diet site, but if you’ve resolved to cook at home more, this is a great resource for finding new recipes. This custom-built search engine uses Google technology to search for recipes in more than 2,600 food blogs.

National Body Challenge: Discovery Health’s National Body Challenge is a free fitness and weight loss program. After registering online, participants set their personal goals and create a customized eating and exercise plan. Registration gives users access to customized meal and fitness plans, a community of other Challenge participants, weight and fitness trackers and video and interactive tools as well as a 30-day free health club membership.

Weight Watchers — Although the site is offering a one-week free trial to it’s online plan, you’ll have to pay $65 for a three month subscription if you stick with it. While it’s true that most people who diet end up gaining back their weight, much of what Weight Watchers claims is backed by science. An April 2008 article in the British Journal of Nutrition looked at success rates of lifetime Weight Watchers members. They found that a year after reaching goal weight, 80 percent of participants had maintained at least 5 percent of the weight loss a year later and 27 percent of the dieters had stayed below their goal weight. While that means a lot of people regained their weight, it’s still more evidence for success than offered by most commercial diet plans.

South Beach Diet: This diet gained popularity as an alternative to the strict low-carb regimen of Atkins, with an emphasis on “good carbs” like high-fiber vegetables and whole grains. It also offers a free week trial, followed by a $5 a week membership fee.

So what have I missed? Are there other websites you’d recommend to help people lose weight and live healthier in 2009?

And for more on resolutions, read New Year, New You? Nice Try.

The Web has opened up a whole new world for foodies and, as regular readers of the Well blog know, cooking at home can be fun and healthful. There are great cooking blogs, easy-to-search recipe sites and search engines like Google to keep cooks well supplied in new ideas for the kitchen.

But for me, there’s nothing like a cooking demo video to motivate me to try something new. Basic recipe sites help you find new dishes to prepare, but cooking videos go beyond the recipes and are typically packed with tips on techniques and tools. My main complaint is that many Web sites, including my own, don’t do a great job of making videos easy to find.

Here’s a look at a few great places to find how-to cooking videos. If you don’t find what you need here, just do a Google search for a recipe name and include the word “video,” or search for a food on YouTube, where you’ll find more examples of cooking videos.

Gourmet Magazine. I never miss the magazine’s The Test Kitchen videos, featuring food writers and editors sharing simple tips. I’m planning to try this home-made organic ricotta recipe, clearly demonstrated by food editor Gina Marie Miraglia Eriquez. And I’ve already blogged about this great pomegranate deseeding technique in You vs. the Pomegranate.

Tiny Kitchen. I love this new video column featuring New York Times magazine food tester Jill Santopietro. Her last video for a Roquefort and walnut salad took me beyond the recipe. Since watching it, I’ve made only home-made salad dressing and now dress my salads differently. So far she’s only made a few videos, which you can find on the Moment blog, but Tiny Kitchen will make regular appearances on Well in the new year.

The Minimalist. New York Times food writer Mark Bittman has a devoted following to his cookbooks and columns. But his video cooking demonstrations prove his mantra that cooking doesn’t have to be complicated. One of my favorite Mark Bittman videos shows a simple recipe for chocolate ganache.

Bon Appetit. These videos lack the fun production values of some of the others, but they are packed with tips. Check out How to Whip Cream, How to Make Gravy and Knife Skills: Dicing for a new look at some basic techniques.

Epi Video. This site features cooking techniques from around the world, such as this recent post on how to make sushi rolls as well as videos submitted by viewers, including the recent Crunchy Grilled Shrimp Po Boy.

What’s missing from my list? Share your favorite cooking videos by joining the discussion below.

How tough is it to eat healthy on a budget? The advice Web site DivineCaroline gets you started with a list of 20 healthy foods for under $1.

Some items on the list, like oats or eggs, aren’t all that surprising to experienced budget shoppers. But a few, like kale, wild rice or garbanzo beans, may not be regulars in your shopping cart. Not surprisingly, none of the foods on this list are prepared or processed, meaning that healthful eating on a budget will require more time in the kitchen.

For people who don’t see many foods on the list that they would eat, DivineCaroline suggests finding similar foods in the same areas of the grocery store where these are stocked.

Getting the most nutrition for the least amount of money means hanging out on the peripheries — near the fruits and veggies, the meat and dairy, and the bulk grains — while avoiding the expensive packaged interior… Although that bag of 99 cent Cheetos may look like a bargain, knowing that you’re not getting much in the way of nutrition or sustenance makes it seem less like a deal and more like a dupe. Choosing one of these 20 items, or the countless number of similarly nutritious ones, might just stretch that dollar from a snack into a meal.

Here’s the DivineCaroline list of 20 healthy foods for under $1: Read more…

Few meals are more exciting and filled with anticipation than Christmas breakfast. Not only is the meal typically bigger than most daily breakfasts, but for many families, Christmas morning is one of the few times a year the whole family eats the morning meal together.

On the Be It Ever So Humble blog, blogger Mrs. Mordecai recalls a family tradition of eating Christmas breakfast before opening gifts.

We were allowed our stocking and the one, unwrapped Santa gift before breakfast, but we had to wait until after we had eaten (or pretended to) for the rest…. It was hard to wait, but I’m sure it was good for us. And as excited as we were, we usually managed to do at least partial justice to my mom’s homemade cinnamon rolls.

The blog includes a link to baked doughnuts from the 101 Cookbooks blog.

On “The Leonard Lopate Show” on WNYC, chef Michael Lomonaco of Porter House New York recalls how his family began Christmas right after midnight mass. The WNYC Web site offers Mr. LoMonaco’s recipes for both breakfast foods and drinks, including Read more…

A recent post about cooking latkes with less fat generated a chorus of complaints from readers.

“Spare me. I’ll take my latkes fried in lots of oil,” wrote reader VT.

“Whatever happened to ‘Eat, Drink and be Merry?’ ” Zale wrote.

“Is nothing sacred? Have we gotten so carried away with politically correct eating … that we can’t just enjoy the season and the holidays?” queried Gail Abramson.

While it’s true that eating any food in moderation is fine, the track record of most Americans is that we don’t eat in moderation, and the holiday season is typically a time of gluttony. As I wrote last year in Science Times, no holiday eating binge is risk free. Read more…

Potato latkes are a delicious and popular food on the Hanukkah menu. But for people who are health-conscious year round, it’s hard to imagine ingesting fried potatoes, no matter what the occasion.

For me, if I’m going to try something new in the kitchen, I want it to be something I would consider making regularly. My daughter wants to me to make latkes, so I have been searching for a version with a little more nutrition and a little less oil. Here are some suggestions:

Cooking Light offers up a lesson on how to fry a latke with less oil as part of its Modern Hannukah menu. Their recipe for leek and potato fritters uses a combination of cooking spray and just 4 teaspoons of cooking oil. And instead of light sour cream, they serve up lemon-cumin yogurt. Based on the nutrition label provided on the site, this version gets just 28 percent of its calories from fat — not bad for a fried potato dish.

Gourmet magazine suggests zucchini latkes. The recipe uses lots of oil, but it’s an interesting way to introduce zucchni to picky kids. Check out the magazine’s four different Hannukah menus.

The food blog Slashfood suggested a baked-version of latkes that I plan to try. Even though baked latkes often are less crispy (and tasty) than the fried version, Slashfood promises that this one turns out crispier than most.

Aura’s Kitchen also has an interesting baked latke recipe that uses whole-wheat flour and extra onions for flavor.

And over at the Erin Cooks food blog, read about her baked sweet-potato latkes, complete with several pictures of the process.

(Hiroko Masuike for The New York Times)

Last night on the reality cooking show “Top Chef,” food guru Martha Stewart offered advice to the remaining contestants. “Keep it simple, but not too simple,” she told the chefs, who were instructed to make a one-pot dish.

Ms. Stewart said she was paraphrasing the wisdom of Albert Einstein, but her words also reflect the general sentiment of the season. In its annual predictions for food trends, Gourmet magazine this week sees a return to home cooking and a demand for easy recipes.

“If there was ever a time for the return of the casserole, this is it,” wrote the magazine’s editors.

Bon Appetit is offering a week of simple dinners, including fish cakes and vegetarian black bean chili, all for under $100. And this month, the James Beard Foundation newsletter reprinted a basic sugar cookie recipe along with a quote from Mr. Beard, a legendary food writer, calling for holiday foods that are “simple and good to eat.” Read more…

(Philip Greenberg for The New York Times)

As cocktails go, the bloody Mary is easily counted among the most healthful, with its simple combination of tomato juice, vegetable garnishes, spices and alcohol.

But new interest in seasonal and fresh ingredients has led to a makeover of the traditional Bloody Mary, according to “Arrive,” the Amtrak travel magazine. The magazine reports:

“The Bloody Mary is having a big resurgence because it’s fresh, and it really should be made with seasonal ingredients using fresh vegetables,” says Todd Thrasher, the bar guru behind the D.C.-area hot spots Restaurant Eve and Px, a swanky speakeasy. Thrasher ditches commercial juice in favor of fresh tomatoes for his Tomato Water Bloody Mary. The resulting drink is a refreshing, clear Bloody Mary, more like a cocktail than the meal-in-a-glass most people have come to expect.”

Thankfully, the magazine publishes Mr. Thrasher’s enticing recipe, which is also posted below. Read more…

A well-prepared salad is often my favorite part of any meal. Done right, it packs tons of flavor for very few calories. Salads are rich in nutrients, and studies show that eating a salad with a meal helps fill you up sooner, so you don’t overindulge on less healthful foods. There’s even research to show that using full-fat dressing on a salad unlocks more nutrients in the salad than a no-fat dressing.

While I’m not much of a cook, I have honed my salad-making skills over the years to the point that even my daughter and her friends love them. When it comes to kids and salads, I think tearing or cutting the greens into smaller pieces makes a difference. That way every forkful usually contains a better mix of flavors, rather than just a big piece of lettuce.

I’ve also learned that adding fruit to a green salad makes it more tempting to kids. I rarely use tomatoes, carrots or any of the standard garden salad ingredients. In addition to organic greens, we add dried cranberries, pears or apples and then add something crunchy like sunflower or pumpkin seeds, walnuts and sometimes croutons. We usually add a little crumbled cheese, and depending on what else is in the fridge, we might toss in grilled chicken, broccoli or corn.

This week, I learned a great salad-making tip from New York Times recipe tester Jill Santopietro, who has launched a new fun video blog called Tiny Kitchen. Read more…

Given the focus on cooking and eating during the holidays, this is a time of year when any deficiencies in your kitchen will quickly become apparent, says New York Times food writer Mark Bittman.

But if you’re one of those people who whines about your kitchen, don’t expect any sympathy from Mr. Bittman. After a recent photo featured him in his own small home kitchen, he was flooded with questions about how he makes do. (To see the photo and the discussion, go to “Mark Bittman’s Bad Kitchen.”) Read more…

My favorite food blog, of course, is Bitten by Mark Bittman, a food writer at The Times. I’m also a regular reader of The Times’s Diner’s Journal, by writers and editors in The Times’s Dining section. But if I need a recipe I can’t find in The Times, I usually go to Cooking Light.

Given my limited culinary talent, that’s pretty much all I need to read about food. But for those who want to branch out, Bon Appetit magazine has posted a great list of 22 favorite food blogs with recipes from each. The slide show is a little cumbersome to navigate, but the pictures offer some tantalizing dishes. To me, the best recipe in the show looks to be the saffron roasted cauliflower offered at the well-named Chocolate & Zucchini.

Other selections from the Bon Appetit list include:

• gingered jeweled salad from 101 Cookbooks;
• butternut squash and sweet potato gratin from Pinch My Salt;
• spicy sweet and salty rosemary nuts from Pink of Perfection.

To see the rest of the magazine’s favorite food blog choices, check out the full slide show, called “Blog Envy.”

Nuts are high in calories, but they may not be as fattening as once thought. (Joyce Dopkeen/The New York Times)

Nuts are a big part of many holiday celebrations, whether it’s pecan pie, chestnut stuffing or just a handful of cashews grabbed at the office party.

While numerous studies have linked nut consumption to better heart health, most nuts are loaded with calories — from about 160 to 200 calories per ounce. For years, I have avoided nuts despite the health benefits, because I was worried about gaining weight.

But a recent report in the Berkeley Wellness Letter spreads some good cheer about nuts. The Wellness Letter notes that despite the calories and fat found in nuts, eating them regularly may actually help with weight control. Read more…

As a child, Jill Bloomfield remembers pouting at meals until her mother would reheat pizza or give her peanut butter and jelly. So what happened when she grew up?

Jill Bloomfield.

“I became an adult who sought out peanut butter and jelly,” said Ms. Bloomfield, 33, a former middle school and high school teacher in St. Paul, Minn. “I was a picky adult. I wanted things like grilled cheese.”

But Ms. Bloomfield quickly learned that colleagues look askance if you order a grilled cheese sandwich at lunch. Realizing that fussiness about foods is a handicap in a grownup world, Ms. Bloomfield began looking for ways to retrain her taste buds.

“I had to train myself to branch out and like more foods, and with that came learning how to cook,” she said. “”It’s not impossible to retrain yourself, but it’s difficult.”

What’s unusual about Ms. Bloomfield’s journey is how far she has come. Today, she is a food educator and cookbook author. Her personal struggles as a picky eater have fueled her interest in helping children learn to cook and to avoid the social and health problems associated with picky eating. (Just two years ago, Ms. Bloomfield was diagnosed with high cholesterol.) After creating a popular cooking course for her high school students, she began offering kids cooking classes and birthday parties.

In the spring, she edited DK Publishing’s “Grow It, Cook It,” which teaches children how to cook with vegetables they grow in a pot or garden. And this fall, she co-authored the “Jewish Holidays Cookbook,” aimed at kids and families. Some of the dishes make it hard to believe Ms. Bloomfield was ever picky about food. She offers simple recipes for harvest rice with pomegranate seeds, pumpkin soup, and chickpea and couscous salad.

Now she’s working on a new book that teaches basic cooking techniques — including seemingly obvious methods like boiling water. “Why do you start potatoes in the water, but you add pasta to water that is already boiling?” she said. “It breaks down a cookbook in the way you don’t normally see and offers recipes to help you practice that skill.” Read more…

Cheap, festive eats. (Hiroko Masuike/The New York Times)

The budget-conscious dinner party is getting a lot of attention these days as home cooks search for affordable foods to serve holiday guests.

The Boston Globe offers a particularly interesting meal for less than $8.50 per person. Health-conscious revelers will like the gingered mashed sweet potatoes and the interesting cabbage and pomegranate slaw. The glazed braised pork shoulder looks delicious and will be a hit with low-carb eaters.

The personal finance site Kiplinger.com offers several tips to keep holiday dining within budget. One fun idea is a wine-tasting and fondue party — ask guests to bring favorite wines and provide marinated meat, chicken or shrimp that can be cooked in hot broth. Serve fruits and cake bites that can be dipped in chocolate.

Collene Eller, director of catering operations at Blue Collar Gourmet restaurants in Flint, Mich., suggests an Italian pasta buffet or a fajita/taco bar to create an affordable but festive mood. Read more…

Lara Vapnyar (Evan Sung for The New York Times)

The holidays have always been infused with food — spiced eggnog, potato latkes, cranberry sauce and even candy canes. But for Russian-born author Lara Vapnyar, food fuels the stories of our everyday life.

This weekend, Ms. Vapnyar, whose latest book is “Broccoli and Other Tales of Food and Love” (Pantheon, 2008), will be speaking at the Brooklyn Public Library about the role that food plays in both life and fiction.

As my colleague Julia Moskin writes, in Ms. Vapnyar’s books, “food has the power to define characters, propel plots, cause riots and even commit manslaughter.” She continues:

In the short story “A Bunch of Broccoli on the Third Shelf,” the character Nina is defined by her infatuation with American vegetables. (Her husband — who, clearly, will soon leave her — introduces her to his poetry-reading, guitar-playing friends as “a vegetable lover.”)

Healthy Holidays

30 Days of Holiday Eating

A series of daily tips, tidbits and insights about holiday food.

• Serving Up That Old Chestnut
• You vs. the Pomegranate

Nina buries herself in a lavishly illustrated Italian cookbook, with pictures of a woman’s smooth, capable hands working in the kitchen: “Nina fantasized that … it was she who pushed the hard, stubborn stuffing into the bell peppers, or rinsed grit off lettuce leaves, or chopped broccoli florets, scattering tiny green crumbs all over the table.”

Read more…