On a Diet? It Doesn't Have to Mean Rabbit Food!

Everyone knows the rules of dieting – you avoid all tasty food and live on nothing but salad and fruit. Just kidding. There are so many options now when it comes to eating healthily in order to lose or maintain weight, but a lot of us still think it means avoiding all the foods we love.

Despite what you might think, you don’t need to run down the sweet aisle of the supermarket with your eyes closed, say no to every biscuit offered to you or live a miserable existence on lettuce. You can still enjoy foods – even the ones you think you can’t – and see great results.

In fact, healthy eating is a lot easier to stick to if you aren’t denying yourself all the good stuff, as this way you don’t feel you’re missing out and are less likely to find you’ve eaten a whole packet of chocolate Hobnobs when all you wanted to do was smell them.

To help you stick to your diet but make life more interesting than slimming shakes, calorie counting and afternoon coffee with no cake, here’s how to carry on enjoying the foods you love:

What’s a more satisfying afternoon snack than a bag of crisps? That’s right, nothing. Crisps are everything that is right with the world, apart from the fact that they tend to be high in calories and fat.

This doesn’t mean you can only stare longingly at a pack of salt and vinegar goodness while gnawing on a celery stick, though, as you can easily make your own healthy crisps. All you need is a potato and an ActiFry – although a knife or mandolin might also help.

Just peel and slice your potatoes before using kitchen towel to dry them off. Pop them in your ActiFry with a bit of oil and you’ll soon be enjoying deliciously tasty crisps. You can even do the same thing with different vegetables if you fancy a change. Check out this recipe from The Inspired Home to see how simple it is.

Not only can you make crisps in your ActiFry, you can also whip up some delicious and healthy chips, which go perfectly with another favourite – burgers. While you can’t really run to the burger van when you’re trying to eat healthily – sorry to be the bearers of bad news – you can make your own burgers with less fat and fewer calories.

Swap out beef for turkey mince and you’ve instantly got yourself a healthier option that is just as tasty. The Kitchen Shed has a great recipe to try for creating delicious turkey burgers that everyone will love.

If you don’t like turkey, even using a lean beef mince will help reduce the calories in each patty – especially if you cook your burgers on a health grill to drain away any excess fat.

Who doesn’t love a nice big chunk of cake? Whether you’re a chocolate fan, love a Madeira or enjoy a cheeky piece of lemon drizzle, you can’t deny that cake is the food of the gods. But it’s also on many people’s lists of things they can’t eat when they’re on a diet, which we think is pretty unfair to cake.

Luckily, you can make cake healthier by swapping out many of the sugary and fatty ingredients for vegetables. Not only is this a great way to get extra veggies into your diet, but it means you can still satisfy your sweet tooth.

For some fab ideas for veggie cakes that still taste absolutely amazing, head to Veggie Desserts’ blog.

Sadly, being on a diet also means giving up your favourite takeaway pizza, no matter how hard you might try to convince yourself it was just the once. While you can get frozen pizzas that are advertised as being lower calorie options, we all know nothing beats fresh pizza.

Enter the Greek yoghurt pizza dough and soon to be your best friend while still on a diet. All you have to do is mix Greek yoghurt with flour to create a dough, knead like you would bread, spread the dough out on a baking tray and finish with your favourite healthy toppings before baking.

What could be simpler? Plus, we promise your family won’t even be able to tell that it’s healthier.

With all these great foods available to eat, you won’t even remember that you’re on a diet.