You can have your Lucky Charms - and fiber, too, if you add All Fiber cereal into the mix.

Let's face it: there are certain foods we love, but that don't give love back to our arteries or waistlines. I love mayo with my french fries or steamed broccoli. My fries can be oven baked and the mayo cut with Dijon mustard to make these junk foods healthier (and I really do this, anyway).

Stores around town have already stocked their shelves with Halloween decorations and bags of sweet treats. My downfall is candy corn, especially the type with chocolate. Made with real cocoa, of course.

A 10-oz bag packs 140 calories in a serving of 22 pieces. The candy corn is so popular that, if placed end to end, there would be enough to go from California to China and half way back (is that going East or West from San Francisco?) Add to this that October 30th is National Candy Corn Day.

I have been casually wondering about the quality of fruits and vegetables that my family and I eat. The FDA informs us that five servings a day of fruits and veggies are required in maintaining our health, due to the produce’s numerous vitamins, minerals and soluble/insoluble fiber. What has begun to make me wonder (worry?) is that we also hear this: much of the produce bought in grocery stores have lost a significant portion of their nutrients, as they have traveled a long distance or have been sitting for a while on the shelf.

“Sweetness is the most important ingredient for life,” reads a Splenda packet.

However, the debate continues on whether artificial sweeteners or natural sugar is best to ingest.

Sugar, or sucrose, is a natural product separated from beet or cane plants. This product is 99.95% pure sucrose, says the Sugar Association.

By Carolyn Colwell
HealthDay Reporter

TUESDAY, July 8 (HealthDay News) -- A new sweet treat that actually prevents children's cavities should please children and their parents, researchers say.

The tasty syrup, which contains the sugar substitute xylitol, prevented early decay in infants' teeth and may play a role in protecting permanent teeth, says a team from the United States and the Marshall Islands, in the South Pacific.

Xylitol has long been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and is already found in food products such as chewing gum.

So I grabbed a soda the other day and noticed it was loaded with Aspartame -- yummy. I know that products made with Sucralose cause my stomach to cramp intensely so generally skip the artificial sweeteners, but these kinds of things always get me thinkng about what I'm putting into my body. Turns out Harvard Medical School was thinking about it and went one step further by compiling a report on the safety of artificial sweeteners and whether we should use them. Is the trade off in calories worth possible health issues? Find out by clicking on the link below.

Do you use any energy drinks? If so, have you had any positive results? I understand the excessive amount of caffeine and sugar aren't considered "healthy", but in moderation are they OK?

I've also heard of energy drinks being mixed with alcohol. Is this OK? (since the alcohol is considered a "depressant" and the energy drink is more "stimulating"...do they kind of cancel each other out?)