New Miracle Diet (Honest)

I am, I confess, fascinated by the stream of often contradictory advice that nutritionists provide. Red meat is bad for you, but on the other hand red meat is good for you. Fat is the root of all evil, but perhaps fat is quite good for us. Coffee kills us, but coffee can be quite beneficial. It is I'm sure completely coincidental that the good for you side often comes from studies sponsored by those marketing an item. [Ha, a couple of years later and the experts who told us eggs are bad for us now say the opposite. Soft-boiled best, both eggs and (perhaps?) nutritional experts]

Elsewhere here I've put forward the very simple idea (and I don't pretend to be the first to do this) that diversity in what we consume is the likeliest way to eat healthily. Now I want to put forward the Pilkington Diet, not suggesting we all eat Pilkingtons, but expanding on the idea of range.

The government's 5-a-day regime (apparently the professional advice was 7, but they bottled it) is clearly short term. If we were to eat just a portion every day of the same five, say carrot, apple, rhubarb, lentils and lettuce, we would meet those guidelines, but it doesn't take a genius (thankfully) to see that it would be a very limited diet indeed, and we'd be missing out on lots of complicated things with big long names.

My solution is to use a number as arbitrary as the 10000 steps a day target about which my wife is obsessed. Why stop there? Let's make it two arbitrary numbers.

Arbitrary number the first: I aim to eat 30 different fruits, vegetables and nuts (30 combined, not of each) a week). Arbitrary number the second, I aim to eat 100 different f, v and n over the year.

In my book (unpublished, indeed unwritten) 'The Pilkington Diet - My Way to a Richer Lifestyle' (ambiguity of richer intended) I will set out the rules for combining the foods, and most importantly for establishing what a portion is. Here's an extract about portions: 'The amount of a portion varies according to numerous factors, but in most cases it can be taken as 2.7 tads, or in Imperial a smidge and a bit.' If I recall the official guidelines a portion is to do with spoonfuls of some sort. Heaped or level I can't remember.

Other than people with allergies foolish enough to ignore them, following the Pilkington Diet is unlikely to kill anybody, give them foul breath, or bore them rigid, except in counting and logging the different produce eaten.