CHAPTER 9

The New Abs Diet Dinners and Desserts

THE BEAUTY OF THE NEW ABS Diet is its simplicity. Unlike most diet plans

that declare “don't eat this, don't eat that,” the Abs Diet tells you exactly

what to eat in order to lose weight and improve your health. It's this

positive approach to healthy eating that makes incorporating the diet's

principles into your life extremely easy and intuitive. That comes in

especially handy when dinnertime rolls around. Dinner, after all, is the

most complicated of the three squares: It's the meal during which we

catch up on our days and launch our nights, and it ought to look, feel,

and taste substantial. Sure, you can have omelets and toast (“breakfast

for dinner”) or soup and salad (“lunch for dinner”), but sometimes you

want a real dinner for dinner. And for good reason.

The evening meal should be a celebration of sorts. After all, you've

worked hard all day long dealing with craziness and pressure. There's

nothing wrong with rewarding yourself for making it through another

grueling day and taking some time out to enjoy food with your friends

and family. Thing is, when most of us bust our butts on the job, it's not

the way our granddads busted theirs back in the day—using their

muscles to swing hammers and pickaxes or toil in the steel mills and

dockyards. They burned a ton of calories bringing home the bacon.

Their bodies could handle a big meal—even one with a lot of greasy

bacon—without turning flabby. Things have changed dramatically.

It's not the same for most of us who toil at a desk for 8 hours or

more flexing our finger muscles over a computer keyboard. We are just

not doing the heavy manual labor that once helped us burn through so