Fat profits: how the food industry cashed in on obesity

Ever since definitions of healthy bodyweight changed in the 1990s, the world has feared an obesity epidemic. But the food giants accused of making us fat are also profiting from the slimming industry.

The demon drink: war on sugar

Alex Renton reports on the new health war, and reveals why some fruit juices may be as bad for you as cans of fizz

Eat breakfast if you want to reduce your risk of coronary heart disease

Simon Roach: Breakfast reduces risk by a factor equivalent to exercising two or three times a week compared with not exercising at all

Should schools ban packed lunches? We ask school cooks, pupils and parents

Headteachers in England are being urged to ban packed lunches to ensure children eat healthy school dinners. What do school cooks, children and their parents think of the proposal?

School dinners: pupils given a taste of quality

Chips, over-boiled vegetables and packed lunches are banned from the Reach Academy free school, where the head eats with the pupils

Packed lunches: pupils face ban in new school food plans

No 10 aims to boost take-up of school meals as report by Leon suggests link between nutrition and academic performance

Margarine v butter: are synthetic spreads toast?

Sales of margarine are in decline, due to a combination of reformulated recipes, price, health and taste. Do you defend marge, or is butter simply better?

Labour unveils plan to promote food-growing culture in Britain

Plant fruit trees on housing estates and vegetable patches in schools to address 'nutrition recession', party says

Tokyo’s traditional diet

Michiko Ono and Masaru Nishimori are both in their 80s, have never suffered a serious illness and deal with the Japanese capital's city heat better than their interviewer

The Okinawa diet – could it help you live to 100?

Japanese people are more likely to reach 100 years old than anyone else in the world, a fact that some researchers attribute to their diet. So, are they right – and is eating tofu and squid the place to start?