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For many of us, food and drink are the context around our social get-togethers. Some social rituals are indelibly intertwined with food: imagine a family reunion without a potluck or a birthday without a cake. Many of us use restaurants and bars as our places to connect with friends, so if you opt out of the eating and drinking, you’ll miss out on the bonding. Even if the social occasion isn’t about eating, food is almost always offered—or it hovers temptingly in the background, like the concession stand at the movie or ballgame or the snack bar at the golf course.

Talk about easy! Almost everything in this pesto-cranberry tart is store-bought. Although the tart can be enjoyed shortly after it comes out of the oven, it’s just as good served at room temperature.

Everyone has lapses—but what’s the difference between those who can recover, and who can’t? When researchers looked at the successful weight losers in the National Weight Control Registry, and compared them to some who’d regained back some of their weight after one or two years, they found that even a small weight gain was hard to reverse: those who’d regained the most weight were the least likely to be able to take it off again. That’s extra incentive for you to act quickly on a relapse—and also to keep weighing yourself regularly. (If you can’t seem to face the scale and have stopped weighing yourself, it’s time to do something. First get on the scale and confront the reality. Start weighing yourself every day, at the same time. A growing body of research supports daily weigh-ins as a method to avoid weight gain or regain.)

This easy, comforting pear crumble is sure to please. Serve it as is or with low-fat ice cream.

If you’ve celebrated your fortieth birthday, you probably suspect that your metabolism isn’t quite what it used to be. The bad news is you’re right: calorie burn does decrease with age. But there’s also good news: you’re probably burning more than you think. New research in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition reveals just how many calories, on average, men and women in their forties, fifties and sixties burn each day. Drum roll… please! According to the study, men aged 40 to 69 expend about 2,900 calories. Women of the same age burn 2,300 calories daily. (These averages vary based on a person’s height, weight and activity.)

Kale is matched up here with white beans and chunks of lean pork tenderloin to create a soup that’s satisfying and quick to make. Smoked paprika gives the soup a Spanish flair so some warm bread and sliced Manchego cheese would go well on the side.

What foods can you count on to go the extra mile, and which foods fall short? See what recent studies reveal before your next workout.

Start your day off right with these easy pancakes, packed with cranberry’s sour spike. One of you can make the coffee and heat the maple syrup while the other makes the pancakes. It’s instant relationship bliss.

Your eating patterns—such as the timing between mouthfuls and the order in which you eat the food on your plate—can have a real impact on how many calories you consume in a day. Modifying these little details to work in your favor can be a help when you’re trying to lose weight. Here are some simple tactics that can help you cut calories without changing what you eat.

Curry complements seared scallops, tart apples and sweet dried cranberries while toasted almonds add crunch in this quick fall dinner salad. Serve with toasted whole-wheat baguette and a glass of sauvignon blanc.

When you are grocery shopping your goal is to stock up on healthy food and only buy what you truly need. But remember that your supermarket’s goal is to get you to buy as much as possible! Between enticing free samples and displays filled with junk food, you will need to be prepared for temptation. Here are a few tips to keep you on course one aisle at a time.

Grilled teriyaki chicken with pineapple can be made with just a few pantry staples. Although it’s delicious when made with canned pineapple, fresh pineapple and its juice can easily be used in its place. Serve with brown rice and snow peas.

Opting for a fast-food meal isn’t the diet disaster it used to be. For one, fast-food restaurants are now required to post their nutrition information, so you’ll know what you’re getting. (If you don’t see it, ask—or check it out at the restaurant’s website first.) And, because they’re tuned in to what consumers want, most places now offer some "healthy" options. Take note of these usually smart selections:

Making good food choices, eating appropriate portions and following some simple guidelines will help you achieve your weight-loss goals.

The "Divide Your Plate" strategy:

Staying in control of what we eat can be challenging in our world, where tempting foods seem to loom at every turn. "In the past, we’d teach people how to handle predictable food situations, like what to do in a restaurant and how to navigate the supermarket," says Cynthia Bulik, Ph.D., director of the Eating Disorders Program at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and co-author of Runaway Eating: The 8-Point Plan to Conquer Adult Food and Weight Obsessions (Rodale, 2005). "But what do you do when you bump into a candy display by the checkout counter at the shoe store? We need a bigger set of skills." Here, Bulik and others offer advice for beating the tendency to binge and improving your relationship with food.