This idea of maintaining a healthy weight by balancing the foods you eat and exercising, has been around for a very long time. It’s simple, to keep your weight stable, the calories you take in have to equal or be less than the calories you burn during the day. To be able to choose the best foods for you it’s necessary to have a look at the ingredients and know what you are putting into your body. Consider the calories, sugars, fat, saturates and salt in your food, it’s not as time consuming as it sounds, there are Guideline Daily Amount (GDA) labels on most food now.

GDA labels were launched in 2005 and can be found on the front of over 20,000 product lines. The label was specifically designed to tell the consumer what percentage of their guideline daily amount for calories, sugars, fat, saturates and salt, each portion pf food comprises. This enables them to build an informed picture of what they are eating in the context of their whole diet. To date 65 manufacturers including 8 retailers have now introduced easily recognisable GDA icons.

With all the available help and advice about healthy eating, even some celebrities are finally giving up on faddy diets with a no-diet diet.

The endless list of strict celebrity diets are enough to make any less-than-perfect woman beat herself with a celery stick for even sniffing a chocolate digestive. How can we mere-mortals feel motivated to get in shape when Jessica Alba tells us that a body like hers is due to cutting out bread and puddings, Kylie swears by a grapefruit diet to maintain her pert derriere and tiny Katie Holmes survives on nothing but raw vegetables?

Thankfully, there are some slim starlets who take a more realistic approach to healthy eating and have demonstrated that provided they eat a balanced diet, they can maintain their weight without the need for fad diets:

An active lifestyle and sensible approach to food is the formula for being a yummy mummy, as new mum Emma Bunton found, “I ate three meals a day containing meat, vegetables and carbs. If I felt hungry, I snacked on fruit”.

Girls Aloud’s Sarah Harding believes a little of what you fancy does you good and avoids faddy diets, “I don’t think it’s right to deprive yourself”.

Good old-fashioned exercise and a varied diet is Eastenders’ Kara Tointon’s secret, “I never diet, I just eat a little less if I have to.

So, if you want to stay a healthy weight, before you resort to cooking up a vat of cabbage soup, try these no-diet diet secrets of the stars, as recommended by nutrition scientist and dietitian, Gaynor Bussell

• Try to include some moderate activity every day, or at least 5 times a week, for at least 30mins (which can be done in 10 minute bursts at a time)
• Don’t deny yourself your favourite treats – just make sure you eat healthily most of the time.
• Keep an eye on what you eat by checking the guideline daily amount (GDA) labels on food for calories, fat and other nutrients – it’ll tell you how much is in a portion of your food and the percentage it contributes to your daily intake, as well as allowing you to see how a variety of food, can fit into your daily diet.
• Find out more at www.whatsinsideguide.com

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