Blog Posts by The Editors of EatingWell Magazine

Wheat Berry Salad with Red Fruit1) Oatmeal
2) Bran cereal
3) Brown rice
4) 100% wheat bread

If you said bran cereal and wheat bread, give yourself an A. If you didn't, don't feel too bad: more than 80 percent of people who responded to a recent survey by EatingWell and the USA Rice Board also got that wrong.

So what's the difference and why should you care? Because whole grains have more fiber, which means they not only fill you up, but also help fight heart disease and cancer. That's why at EatingWell we create delicious whole-grain recipes that will help you get your recommended three servings of whole grains a day, without getting bored.

Here's an easy and delicious way to have a perfect whole-grain day:

Breakfast: Maple Nut & Pear Oatmeal Scones Delicate pears, pecans and maple flavor make these scones really special.

Lunch: One of my all-time favorite recipes is a simple, crunchy Wheat Berry Salad with Red Fruit. It's super-easy and the last time I bought wheat berries, they

My friend Henry, recently bought a huge box of Yogos, confident that these "yogurty-covered, fruit-flavored bits" were a healthy choice for his kids. No doubt Henry was deceived by the "health halo" effect. Words like "yogurt" and "fruit" positively glow with such halos, since we consider these foods healthy in their natural state. Don't be fooled.

Although most foods can fit into a healthy diet if you know your limits, do a reality check and read labels first. Here are some of the worst offenders:

1. Energy bars

Energy bars usually contain protein and fiber-nutrients that help you feel full-but also may be loaded with calories. That's fine if you occasionally make one a meal, but most of us eat them as snacks. You might as well enjoy a Snickers, which at 280 calories is in the same range as many energy bars.

Lesson learned: Look for a calorie-controlled bar with about 5 grams of protein or try EatingWell's Low-Fat Granola Bars.

2. Granola

Granola sounds

Flank Steak PinwheelsDon't do what I did last Memorial Day. We hosted a huge backyard BBQ with at least 50 people. We told our friends and neighbors to bring side dishes and desserts and we'd provide the main sustenance. "I'll man the grill," I told my housemates. What a mistake! Several pounds of drumsticks, many packages of tofu, a huge box of hot dogs and many, many hours later, it was dark, the mosquitoes were sucking on my neck and I was left eating pizza that a latecomer brought to the party. Never again!

I learned the secret to having a great party while still enjoying myself: keep it small and simple (and do as much as you can ahead of time).

This year, I'm inviting just a few select friends over and here's what's cooking:

• A simple summer cocktail. To make Island Limeade, combine 3 cups boiling water and 1/3-1/2 cup sugar, to taste. Stir until the sugar dissolves; chill. Add 1 1/4 cups freshly squeezed lime juice to make limeade. Fill 4 tall glasses with ice and divide 6 ounces

Lemon Poppy Seed CakeThe perfect picnic finish? A decadent cake. But cakes can pack a serious calorie- and fat-heavy punch, with several sticks of butter, sour cream, sugar and refined flour. The good news: it's easy to make most cakes healthy and still delicious.

Try our 3 simple steps to Healthy Cake Recipes:

• Substitute whole-wheat pastry flour for some of the all-purpose flour. It has more fiber and nutrients than refined all-purpose flour. Plus it contains less gluten than regular whole-wheat flour which makes more tender, delicate baked goods.
  
• Use canola oil, which is mostly heart-healthy unsaturated fat, instead of butter, which is mostly unhealthy saturated fat.
• Use less oil and keep the cake moist and tender with nonfat buttermilk.

Use these tricks to make a perfect picnic cake, such as:

Lemon Poppy Seed Cake (A classic sweet treat.)

One-Bowl Chocolate Cake (I love this one because it's so simple you can whip it up at a moment's notice, and it tastes

Quick and delicious snap pea recipesLast year, my housemates and I spent hours planning our garden, painstakingly plotting raised beds on graph paper. We had the perfect spot for sugar snap peas, my favorite spring vegetable, and we tied together tough branches from the lilac bush out back to create a trellis they could climb. One day, my housemate said she threw some morning glory seeds into a bed. Cool, we thought-not knowing any better. Soon, the morning glories twined themselves around our pea vines, literally strangling them. Sigh, no snap peas tonight.

I won't make that mistake again this year, and I'll use my bounty in some of my favorite snap pea recipes, like these quick weeknight suppers:

Better-than-Chinese take-out Sichuan Chicken & Snap Peas

• Better than Chinese take-out, Sichuan-Style Chicken with Peanuts & Snap Peas has loads of flavor and satisfies my craving for spicy food.
  
• Sugar Snap Pea & Shrimp Curry is a quick dish with crisp peas.
  
• Plate-licking good Chicken with Sugar Snap Peas & Spring Herbs in a velvety herb-flecked

EatingWell's New England Fried ShrimpEvery summer when I was a kid we went "down shore," to the beaches of New Jersey. Other than the great Italian water ices, this stretch of seashore was a little bleak culinarily. The New England coast, which I don't refer to as "down shore," but do occasionally visit, may not be a culinary mecca but it's got one very important thing going for it-the seafood shack.

Recently, in Brewster, Mass., I dragged my husband to Cobie's shack to savor one last dose of fried seafood before heading back to Vermont. The shrimp that day inspired this lighter, healthy "fried" recipe of New England Fried Shrimp. With all the savings in fat and calories, you have plenty of room to add a side of onion rings along with tartar sauce
or cocktail sauce for dipping.

Here are the 3 simple changes we made to improve the nutrition:

• We use a basic batter made with whole-wheat pastry flour and pale ale (which gives a delicious nuance to the flavor).
  
• We avoid the deep fryer and

Increasingly, employers are encouraging and rewarding healthy behaviors. At EatingWell, we took two half days this winter for our staff to ski, snowboard or snowshoe together, and of course we eat healthy lunches together every day, prepared by our talented Test Kitchen cooks.

But enough about us. Here you can get 5 great ideas from employers all over the country to inspire you to eat healthy and be green at work. Want even more ideas? Read our special report about 5 employers-of all kinds and sizes-that are helping their staffers to eat and live well.

Great Idea #1
Stock healthy snacks-like the fresh fruit and nuts that managers at Chandler Chicco Agency, a healthcare PR firm in New York City, bring into the office each week.

Great Idea #2
Ditch the vending machine and replace it with a refrigerator, as NRG Systems in Hinesburg, VT, did to save energy (the machines are notorious guzzlers). They also got rid of a tempting junk-food showcase; now the fridge is stocked with water,

Enter to Win a $2,000 Baker's Dream Shopping Spree!This is my first summer working at EatingWell and I recently found out it's going to be filled with cookies. (Good thing I'm planning to ride my bike to work most days!)

During the summer months the Test Kitchen staff will test all our readers' entries for the 3rd Annual EatingWell Holiday Cookie Contest. This year's winners will be featured in a "Cookie Swap" article to appear in the November/December 2008 issue of EatingWell Magazine.

While "healthy" isn't usually a term that one associates with cookies, the ones we test meet the EatingWell nutritional guidelines while still being sweet and satisfying. Each year EatingWell gets dozens of entries for healthy holiday cookie recipes. We bake them up in our Test Kitchen and then narrow the entries down to 10 semi-finalists. On one delicious day, more than 30 staff members and interns at EatingWell take on the serious job of taste-testing the top 10 semi-finalists.

After sampling the goodies (with palate-cleansing milk