Hi friends,
In a recent study, Harvard professor, Dr.David Ludwig, studied 3 groups of overweight children, feeding each group a breakfast containing an identical number of calories.  One group ate instant oatmeal; one group ate steel-cut oats (the type that take 45 min to cook) and a third group had a vegetable omelet and fruit. 

Their blood was measured before they ate and every 30 min afterward for the next 5 hours.  Then they ate a lunch identical to the meal they had eaten for breakfast.  After finishing lunch, they were told to eat whenever they were very hungry for the rest of the afternoon.  What happened was startling.

The group that ate the instant oatmeal (that turned into glucose the fastest) ate 81% more food in the afternoon than the group that had the omelet.  Not only were they hungrier, but their bloodtests looked entirely different. The instant oatmeal group had higher levels of insulin, blood sugar, blood fats, and adrenaline even though they consumed the same number of calories as the omelet group.  Though the steel-cut oats were better than the refined oats, the children who ate the steel-cut oats still ate 51% more food in the afternoon than the children who ate the omelet.  (adding nuts and flaxseeds to the steel-cut oats allows the meal to be absorbed more slowly if you're a died-in-the wool oatmeal eater).

The conclusion here is that the kinds of calories you consume have a big impact on how much weight you gain, because different types of food are metabolized in different ways and send different signals throughout the body.

The type of food you eat has a big impact on what your genes tell your metabolism to do.  This means that the types of calories you consume have a dual impact on the way you metabolize food.  They act as both a source of energy and a source of information or instructions to your genes that control metabolism.
(This study, reported by Mark Hyman, MD in "Ultrametabolism." )

My 2cents worth:  Remember the terms from former emails:  "Nutrigenetics"?  And "epigenetics"?  These are the words used to describe this new science of how genes get expressed by the foods we eat.  To borrow a colorful phrase:  "Our genes load the gun; lifestyle pulls the trigger."  It has been reported that 75-78% of the chronic illnesses we suffer as adults are controlled by the trigger we pull. Our choices really matter.  Both in the foods we choose to eat and the way we handle stress in our lives.  So, eat things that don't come with a label to read - and - meditate, do yoga, go for long walks - whatever it takes to stay slim and calm  
mary anne