Although it's still a while before New Year's Day, diets and healthier eating will almost certainly be near the top of many lists of resolutions. One beneficiary is NutriSystem (NASDAQ: NTRI) – a buy recommendation from small cap expert Tom Bishop.

The editor of BI Research says, "NutriSystem is knocking it out of the ballpark, beating estimates and raising guidance." The company markets and sells the food for its proprietary weight loss system, which is based on a low glycemic index.

Bishop notes the company increased revenues by 141% and earned $0.63 in its third quarter, up from $0.19 last year, which was a "big upside surprise" over Wall Street's estimates.

Helping the company has been its ad campaign, in which former Dolphin quarterback Dan Marino has been pitching the weight loss program. Notes Bishop, "Already 30% of its customers are men, who like the anonymity and do-it-at-home nature of the product." Next up will be promotions aimed at seniors, featuring coach Don Shula - another former Dolphin - and his wife.

Meanwhile, those who wish to oversee their own healthier diets may prefer Whole Foods Market (NASDAQ: WFMI), which recently shed some pounds itself. The stock took a major hit when its lowered its growth forecast for 2007 from 20% to 17%.

Todd Schoenberger, editor of Red Zone Profits, says, "This knee-jerk reaction by traders and investors has presented a wonderful buying opportunity."

Investing in organics has been a hot trend in the past few years. Demand for organic products is so high that some companies, like Stonyfield Farms, can't find enough organic milk to deliver on its organic yogurt orders. Organic farmers are doing well and news that even Wal-Mart would offer organic produce has inspired headlines that queried, will organics soon be everywhere?

In a word, no. And what's more, it's looking like betting on organics is bad for you, financially. Whole Foods Market, Inc. (NASDAQ:WFMI), long the darling of healthy-minded investors, isn't growing fast enough. The stock is down 27% since last week. This, coupled with news that Wal-Mart might be struggling with its organics goals, has us all wondering if we should just embrace pesticides after all.

As Alyce Lomax points out and we've mentioned a number of times here on BloggingStocks, the true irony about all this is that truly faithful organics fans are almost angrily opposed to large, industrial farms. So that, by embracing this positive, healthy movement -- by making organic Rice Krispies, of all things -- in the blindly optimistic American way, which is by standardizing, industrializing, making really really big ... American businesses are perverting everything that is organic. [The Onion made hilarious fun of this trend in a satire here.] It's just not "sustainable" if it's done in tons for the Kellogg Company (NYSE:K). As BusinessWeek says so eloquently, it's "the organic paradox: The movement's adherents have succeeded beyond their wildest dreams, but success has imperiled their ideals."

Not only have ideals been imperiled, but also: profit. See here's the thing.