Eat These and Watch Pounds Drop

Trying to lose weight? Go ahead and spoil your appetite. It makes sense to nibble on these foods before you eat.

Fat. Did we say fat? Yes, but we're talking about the good kind: unsaturated fat. Eating some healthy fat 25 to 30 minutes before a meal can keep you from reaching for servings the size of an elephant's ear. Eating good fats stimulates the production of a hormone called cholecystokinin (no wonder it's usually called CCK). It's released when fat hits the wall of your small intestine, signaling your brain that you're not as hungry as you thought. Then, it keeps you feeling full by slowing the emptying of your stomach. All you need is about 70 calories of healthy fat -- 6 walnuts, 12 almonds, or 20 peanuts. But try not to have a beer or glass of wine with your nutty appetizer. Alcohol shoos away leptin, another hormone that also helps turn off your appetite.

Apples, pears, mangosteens, or other juicy, high-fiber fruits. (Mangosteens? They're like dark-red peach-plums, and they're prized in Asia.) These fruits are nature's true diet pills -- you know, foods that help you lose even more weight when you diet. When a group of women dieters had fruit before three meals daily, they lost more weight than fruit-free dieters . . . even though they all ate the same number of calories. Choose fruit that's high in fiber but low in calories, which generally means fruits that are high in water content (think apples or, yes, mangosteens, not bananas).