When it's time to cut back, snacks are the first things to go. But swearing off between-meal eats can actually have an adverse effect on your waistline:

"Studies show that people who avoid eating between meals may end up consuming more calories overall," says WH weight-loss advisor Keri Glassman, R.D., author of The Snack Factor Diet.

"When you're famished, your blood sugar is low and your defenses are down, so you don't necessarily make the best choices."

As a nation of snack addicts with no sign of reforming--according to data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey 1999–2002, women snack more than twice a day, at around 192 calories a pop--it's time to embrace our need to nibble. To snack without adding bulk to your backside, fill your cupboard with foods that have built-in willpower.

Here are three snacking strategies that come with a no-gorge guarantee:

Just add air Foods that are pumped full of air make your stomach feel inflated without giving you a beach-ball belly. In a study published last year in the journal Appetite, Barbara Rolls, Ph.D., author of The Volumetrics Eating Plan and the director of the Laboratory for the Study of Human Ingestive Behavior at Penn State, served visitors to her lab either crunchy cheese snacks or more aerated puffy cheese snacks. Those munching the puffier snacks consumed nearly 75 percent more by volume, but they took in 20 percent fewer calories.

"When something is full of air, an equal amount looks bigger, so people tend to take in fewer calories," Rolls says.

• Popchips Potato, corn, and rice chips with 20 percent fewer cal­ories than traditional chips 120 calories per ounce
• Cheetos Natural White Cheddar Puffs 150 calories per ounce
• Quaker Caramel Corn Quakes Rice snacks 60 calories for 7 cakes Think thick As far as your muffin top is concerned, all calories are created equal. But your brain plays favorites.
• Jell-O sugar-free pudding cups dark chocolate and raspberry 60 calories per 3.75 oz
• Mott's Plus Sauce cups pomegranate 50 calories per 3.9 oz
• Dannon Light & Fit 0% Plus, vanilla flavor 50 calories per 4 oz

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