regular or diet food?

I eat a little of both.

Depends on what it is really... some "diet" stuff tastes like crap and some is not really that bad or tastes just as good as the full fat regular version.

Mostly diet food. Low carb yogurt, healthy delight wheat bread, dressing with low carbs, etc Even started eating better lettuce, now stay away from iceberg totally.

With the exception of diet coke everything I eat is regular.

I compared full fat greek yogart and 0% fat greek yogart same brand and realised the 0% fat had a ton more cals so I now stick with full fat stuff.

I have smaller portions and alot less carbs but more protein. I'm not saying carbs are bad but it works better that way for me.

Most of what I eat is regular food, with a few exceptions, like most others. Most of my exceptions are dairy, except for cheese, always has to be real cheese.

2% milk. It's what I grew up on and what I have always drank.

4% cottage cheese. Don't know why, just what I eat.

Yogurt can be real or light, depending on what's on sale and what the flavor is.

Almost never do anything fully fat free or sugar free. They don't taste as good and they tend to up the opposite of what they're leaving out (sugar free = more fat, fat free = more sugar).

I do a mix up of both regular and diet foods. I mostly stick to regular foods and fit it into my diet.

I do a mix of both to help meet my macro/calorie goals. I buy fat free Greek yogurt and cottage cheese, I'll buy lite breads for the fiber content, and I drink diet Coke because regular soda makes my teeth feel gross. I used to be one of those low-fat/fat free all the time people, then I learned that fat is good.

I pretty much eat regular food most of the time. Sometimes I'll chose the "diet" options if I feel like it. A lot of times, I find the diet food compromises on taste.

It all depends on what the ingredients are.
If it's "regular" and has high fructose corn syrup as the 2nd ingredient. No thanks, upsets my stomach.
The reason I do not drink most regular soda, hfcs makes me sick.
But I have will power, so if it is diet and tastes like cardboard I won't eat it, instead eat the real deal and eat less.

Besides skim milk, most is full fat. I do usually use 2% cheese though, tastes the same to me n i gotta get my cheese fix in lol

I eat regular food as much as I can and stay away from the artificial diet foods-low fat etc. Regular food tastes a ton better and keeps me full longer too.

Just curious: Who here eats "diet" food - meaning food that has been made sugar free/fat free/calorie free? And who here only eats regular food?

Example - Will you eat a regular yogurt or a reduced fat/calorie yogurt? Will you eat regular bread or reduced fat/calorie bread?

I know there are pros and cons to both, so I was just wondering what most of you all choose.

TMB;

Have (in a previous life) "swung both ways" (on "diet" foods<g>).

When I was still under the "spell" of the low cal, low fat, USDA Pyramid charlatans, we went straight to the "diet foods" aisle did not pass Go and didn't collect $500 because that's what the "experts" said to do. LoCal - first, last, forever!!

Cal reduction worked (we both lost ~1#/wk average over a couple months) - but "food" no longer tasted like the food we had come to know, love, and enjoy for our many prior decades of existence.

Like many others though, there were "some" items we just couldn't give up - butter, eggs, a glass or two of wine, red meat, etc. So "perfection" be damned!!

The more "research" we delved into regarding the (pathetic) "outcomes" (radically increased rates of obesity, diabetes, etc) of such "expert" advice over the last 40 years - the more we came to understand that while cals do matter, they're NOT the "holy grail".

Macro nutrient "balance" (as in LCHF) matters MUCH more - not only for long term weight reduction and maintenance, but, more importantly, for overall health and wellness.

Others can agree or disagree and I'm the first to offer the disclaimers that "no method works for everyone", "everyone is different", and "what matters most is that the method you select is one that you can sustain, long term".

We know what works (worked) for US and have no interest in "converting" anyone - that's a job for others more skilled in that arena.

BUT, for US - the "rule" now is, "If it says "diet" on the label - it STAYS on the shelf"

The "reasons" are legendary, many of which have been mentioned in this thread and all of which can be uncovered by anyone willing to spend the time and effort to do their own "DD".

Adding back "full fat" (which is where most of the "taste" comes from), "real" foods, to our "diets", while continuing to lose weight (in my case), or to "maintain" (in my bride's case), AND eliminating the HFCS they add to "improve the taste" of the LoCal, processed, "diet" JUNK - was the BEST thing we've EVER done - both for our long term "wellness" outcomes, AND for our ability to sustain, long term.

Mostly regular food with a few exceptions. One is drinking 2% milk instead of whole because I can't stomach whole milk. I also drink diet coke because I like it better than regular.

Everything else is just based on flavor variety. A lot of times I'll buy low fat yogurt instead of regular because I want the strawberry cheesecake flavor (or whatever) and that one happens to be the low fat one. Same with ice cream. I usually stick with the basic cookie dough, but sometimes the low fat flavors intrigue me and I'll buy it.

Regular food. When I go on maintenance I'll just up my quantities.

I mostly eat regular food with some exception. I don't like drinking my calories so I stick to water, unsweetened almond milk and coffee with Splenda and the occasional diet drink. I do have a few go to lower calorie salty snacks like Special K cracker chips because I love the taste and can moderate my portion better than potato chips. I used to eat low fat yogurt but I find the full fat versions of foods just stick with me better. I choose lower calorie meats because the fats from meat like beef make me feel ill. For the most part we eat healthy whole foods with some treats in the mix for my sanity lol.

Hmm. I would deny eating "diet" food and claim that I eat just regular food, but there are lower calorie, lower fat options that I eat and have since well before I was watching my weight. Mostly, certain kinds of lower fat dairy.

I also prefer to make my own salad dressing but when I'm out or feeling lazy I'm likely to go for lower calorie options, since I don't generally want to waste the calories on salad dressing. I wouldn't necessarily defend this as a great choice, but for me they are a trade off. (I know fat is good when eating vegetables, but I'm talking about salads that already have some kind of fat source on them.)

Oh, also diet drinks sometimes. Not as an alternative to the sugary versions, but just to have something other than water, coffee, and iced tea.