• by Amy Corr , Staff Writer @MediaPostOTL, October 22, 2007

Many people believe that to eat healthfully, one must sacrifice flavor, taste and quantity. Not so, says General Mills.

The company created a Web site and online game that that lets users get dirty and check out hundreds of  easy-to-make recipes that are healthy and delicious.

"Start a Food Fight" are the opening words of TheGoodFoodFight.com, developed by mono. I like this game already.

The next step is choosing your weapon -- or, what food to throw. Visitors are given three options: bean and veggie wraps, spaghetti with spicy veggie meatballs or spinach-filled fish rolls.

Each culinary option is ranked by splat factor, hurlability and stainage. Once I selected the bean and veggie wraps for their hurlability factor, it was time to pick a worthy adversary.

Opponents Ruthless Ruth, Sake Tuya (get it?) and Chuck Frank each have strengths and weaknesses. Ruthless Ruth might be the queen of power and trash talk, for example, but her accuracy and speed are sub-par.

As the game loads, viewers can read the nutritional value and recipe of the food being used in their battle. Then the real fun begins.

Your opponent literally comes out of a box on the screen and runs frantically across the screen, through copy and advertisements, throwing food at you. As splattered food inhibits your ability to see your opponent, your object is to grab any piece of food from the screen (even a piece of steak in a banner ad is fair game) and throw it at your opponent as they duck in and out of the screen while trash-talking you.

I lost my first two matches against Ruthless Ruth and Sake Tuya (he certainly did). I was, however victorious against Chuck Frank. "I guess I'm the weenie," he admitted sadly.

When the food fight concludes, users can ambush friends with a surprise splat attack via email that invites them to view a healthy recipe. Clicking on the link, however, leads to a splat of food and an invitation to join a food fight.

Once you've tired of playing each opponent with a different food (don't think I didn't), users can visit EatBetterAmerica.com, the site housing recipes, diet and nutrition advice in a simple, easy-to-understand format. Eat Better America was promoted via an offline and online campaign, while The Good Food Fight was promoted virally.

Searching the recipes, I found a simple, delicious recipe for peanut butter and banana wraps, which looks good and can be made in less than 10 minutes. General Mills created the site as a destination to find nutritional information and advice that's straightforward, easy to follow and easy to make.