The low-carb debate.

Thank you for printing Julia Fawkes Stuart's article on vegetarian low-carb lets ("The Low-Carb Conundrum" Eating Right, May/June 2004). I'd like to offer a low-carb vegan solution (yes, it can be done) inspired by Dr. Alan Goldhamer's The Pleasure Trap. He gives the clearest description I've ever read of how appetite control works for animals in their natural environment--and how it should work for humans. The answer? For the most part, it's fiber. Goldhamer's success with putting his patients on diets consisting of unprocessed whole foods convinced me I should try it. Twenty-five to thirty pounds later, it became a lifetime path for me.

Oblivious to carb counts, I ended up following the main proscription of popular low-carb diets: no refined carbohydrate foods. In fact, I ate few, if any, refined foods until I got to my target weight. Brenda Davis's Defeating Diabetes was also helpful in suggesting amounts and types of healthful whole-food fats to consume and which high-carb vegetables to limit. Eat your beans and whole grains, and by all means, enjoy those carrots!

Cynthia Holzapfel, Summertown, TN

I've always been pleasantly surprised with E's fearlessness to take an unpopular, though ultimately correct, position. While your article on low-carb eating was not as giddy and flowery as most so-called "reports," I was still disappointed.

First, low-carb dieting is not a lifestyle. Vegetarianism isn't even a lifestyle. Veganism is a lifestyle because it incorporates more than just diet, but low-carb dieting is just that, a diet. The "lifestyle" adjective was probably added by low-carb marketers to give it more allure.

Second, I believe it is irresponsible to refer to healthy eating as a "low-carb diet." Atkins started with a good idea, cutting out processed sugars and flours, and then took it to an extreme. Too often (as in the article), those who simply cut out junk food, which includes processed sugars and flours, refer to it as "cutting carbs," when in reality they're doing nothing but "cutting junk food." This lends credibility to extreme plans like Atkins.

Third, I wish the article had explained how Atkins actually works. The plan involves putting your body into a state of ketosis, which is a metabolic condition in which your body runs out of energy (carbohydrates), and therefore starts burning other fuels (fats and organs) to keep you alive. It's the state your body goes into if you were starving to death, or if you're seriously ill. It's not healthy, and while you will lose weight when in ketosis, it's sort of like complimenting the cancer victim on the weight they've lost.

Brian Leitner, Chicago, IL