But let’s face it, it’s not that simple to be disciplined and no one’s going to go to a restaurant with friends and tell restaurant that they can’t eat that rice because its white rice and it’ll send my blood sugar levels sky high and release insulin into my body, can I have basmati instead ? – well, maybe just hardcore diet enthusiasts.

So what to do about fast food nutrition – well, I am going to give you my five most important principles for choosing food generally, but also quick things to look for when you’re out in order to complement your healthy diet:

1. Find Out How The Food Was Cooked. It’s not actual food that matters, it’s way it was cooked. Little things like this can make a world of difference.

2. Drink Lots Of Water. When you’re out, have a water bottle close by – you’d be surprised what a difference it makes.

According to a recent survey by National Health Institute, about a third of overweight Americans who are trying to lose weight, are doing so by eating less carbohydrates (carbs) largely because of increased popularity of fad diets like Atkins Diet and South Beach Diet.

Who Invented Low-Carb Diets?

The term "low-carb" was coined around 1992 when USDA recommended that Americans include six to eleven servings daily of grains and starches in their diet.

In fact, low-carb dieting dates back more than 100 years to 1864, before trendy Atkins diet, when a pamphlet titled "Letter on Corpulence" was written by William Banting. This was as close to first commercial low-carb diet as you could get.

Banting's diet eventually fell out of favor, but low-carb diets began appearing again in 20th century. The most famous of these are Atkins and Scarsdale diets that came to popularity in 1970s.

While Scarsdale has a set 14-day meal plan that must be followed and greatly restricts calories, Atkins diet allows for unlimited calorie consumption as long as those calories are from protein, fat and vegetables and carbohydrate intake is kept low.

Atkins and Scarsdale fell out of favor in 1980's when USDA encouraged consumption of grains and grain products.

It was only in 1990's that we began to see a return to low-carb dieting that seems to be more than a fad. Low-carb is now a lifestyle!

As more and more people realize weight loss and other health benefits that are available to people who eat low-carb, number of diets and stores that sell specialty low-carb products continue to rise.

In a nutshell, most low-carb diets carry same basic premise: that too much of simple, refined carbohydrates leads to over overproduction of insulin, which leads to storage of too much fat in body. This fat storage is especially prominent around middle.

While there are degrees of difference among many diets, they all agree on negative effects that excess insulin production have on our systems.