Food! Glorious Food!

Going on a diet is at the top of the New Year Resolutions list for most American adults. Come New Year's Day, it's tradition to review the dietary sins of the previous month -- to lament indulging in your sister's peanut brittle, your aunt's double chocolate fudge, your neighbor's plate of calorie-dense cookies, that third helping of your mom's turkey (with ALL the trimmings), your dad's famous rum-spiked eggnog, your cousin's homemade pumpkin pie (a la mode, of course), pizza night with your nieces and nephews while you watched movies and played board games all night, the popcorn and soda when the pizza ran out, those wonderful little canapes washed down with loads of champagne to ring in the New Year. All this you promise to forgo and vow to live a clean and healthy life.

At the beginning of January we honestly believe we can satisfy our taste buds with the crunch of celery and carrot sticks. We religiously count our calories and pack an apple for lunch. We drag ourselves out of bed in the morning, tie up the laces on our Nikes and head for the gym. We pretend to crave the 3-ounce skinless chicken breast and 1 cup of green beans (no butter) that stares up from our dinner plate, the ghost of Christmas past. We cajole ourselves into believing it for a week or two, maybe three, in January; but by the Super Bowl all bets are off and it's "pass the guacamole!"

No matter where you are on the annual diet cycle -- still virtuous or already out -- these four delicious-looking stamps from Gibraltar will send your taste buds into a paroxysm of joy. A tribute to gastronomes everywhere, these mouth-watering photographs of European gourmet delights are enough to derail even the heartiest dieter. To order, click the post title.

County Stamp Center has food stamps from the sublime to silly. If gourmet European delicacies like those pictured above aren't your cup of tea, you might want to try the more unusual concoctions pictured in New Zealand's Hokitika Wildfood series. Sheep's testicles, worms and possum are the featured ingredients in such culinary delights as curried worm burger patties and possum pate! If that's not enough to throw you off your diet, I don't know what is! Bon appetit from County Stamp Center! Visit the County Stamp Center website for all your philatelic needs.