COOKING UP A SOLUTION RECIPE FOR SLENDERNESS IS IN KITCHEN, NOT AT FAST-FOOD COUNTER.

Byline: Jillian O'Connor

THE latest campaign from the Department of Health and Human Services informs Americans that we've gotten dangerously fat, as if two-thirds of the nation isn't constantly brooding about that fact already over super-grande mocha Frappuccinos with a side of muffin.

McDonald's has decided to discontinue its roll-inducing super-size drinks and fries by the end of this year, which should sufficiently plump up at least one more preteen subgeneration in time for Christmas. Even soft-drink companies are saying they'll make much healthier beverages. (They're thinking of calling them ``water.'')

But the true culprit here is not the fast-food conglomerates with their kiddie meals fit for a medieval village; it's the demise of the kitchens in countless houses and apartments. Americans have decided that real food at real meal times at real homes is optional - unlike cable television, which is required by law in the 48 contiguous states of the union.

Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson, who is trying to save a few lives along with a few sofa springs, has said that more detailed food charts may help Americans, which is obviously unlikely, because few of us would voluntarily read.

Not to mention that we don't need a whole society obsessed with scanning little labels and calculating carb grams and fat globules, thereby separating ourselves so thoroughly from common-sense eating as to require a trip to a bookstore for research on what salad to order for lunch.

Our better instincts are all but gone from the food scene as it is, with the rise of fat-free, sugar-free, caffeine-free coffee ice cream (shriveled beans with jagged ice shards), and portable oatmeal bars, which have all the texture, body, hue and taste of real spackle. You'll note that ye olde peasants of yore never took their gruel on the go.

What would likely halt the creep toward obesity is a return to how real people ate before conveniences such as microwaves, upsized modern work hours, drive-throughs and vehicles large enough to accommodate enormous Americans got in the way of the standard home-cooked meal.

But when you have droves of diet-prone citizens running from their usual SnackWell's cookies and Sara Lee pita bread, hellbent on nothin' but steak and eggs, a society gets a little confused. (Are we eating pork fat-back this month or fat-free cream puffs? I hope it's not that cabbage soup! Is this the artificial sweetener that causes brain damage, or the one that causes cancer?)

If there is a label on the food, chances are you shouldn't even be eating it. With the notable exceptions of dairy, pickles and bread, labeled food screams its status as processed food, which puts us back into the whole little nasty loop of living on factory-prepared slop to make more time to work for related megaconglomerates.

We pay so much attention already to what the media finds is the next big healthy food trend that people become peculiarly attuned to what they're eating, but lose sight of the old simple rules:

Eat your vegetables. Drink your milk. No triple cheeseburgers for lunch.

And, yes, it can't hurt to stay away from the super-size fries.