Diets and Dieting
A diet is simply what a person eats, so technically, no matter what you are currently eating, you are on a diet already. However, this is usually not what people mean when they say they are on a diet. Most popular diets focus around health or weight loss and regulate your food intake accordingly. Some of the more popular diets include the South Beach Diet which emphasizes “good” carbs and fats, the Atkins Diet which emphasizes a low-carbohydrate diet, Natural Diets which emphasize eating the way ancient hunter-gatherers ate, Vegetarian Diets which emphasize not eating meat, and Food Systems which consist of a collection of products that one eats from exclusively.

The South Beach Diet defines “bad carbs” as ones with a high glycemic index. It further defines “bad fats” as ones with a high proportion of saturated fat or trans fat. It then emphasizes eating as few bad carbs and fats as possible.