Now she focuses on the pleasure of eating fresh, home-cooked food. She has started cooking with olive oil and occasionally butter, and has increased her consumption of nuts and peanut butter. She even got to know her grocer to find out which fruits and vegetables are in season and grown locally.

The market research firm NPD Group gets a glimpse of national eating habits through the food diaries it has collected from 5,000 consumers since 1980. The percentage of those consumers who are on a diet is lower than at any time since information on dieting was first collected in 1985. At the peak in 1990, 39 percent of the women and 29 percent of the men were dieting. Today, that number has dropped to 26 percent of women and 16 percent of men.

The diarists also report eating more organic foods and whole grains, said Harry Balzer, an NPD vice president.

“Instead of trying to avoid things, they’ve started adding things,” Mr. Balzer said.

Even the Calorie Control Council, which represents makers of commercial diet foods, notes the percentage of people who are dieting has declined  to 29 percent in 2007 from 33 percent in 2004.

Image NOT COUNTING? Rina Gonzalez-Echandi, with her daughter, Raven, eats better, not less. Credit... Stephanie Diani for The New York Times

And there are other indicators of a shift in eating habits. In May, the market research firm Information Resources reported that 53 percent of consumers say they are cooking from scratch more than they did just six months ago, in part, no doubt, because of the rising cost of prepared foods.