Eggs, fish, meat are the stand-bys. You can eat as much as you like of these, preferable fried in plenty of fat, BUT WITH NO FLOUR, BATTER OR BREADCRUMBS.

Cheese comes next. You can have all you want-especially the high-fat kinds like Brie, Gruyere and Camembert. Ordinary English or New Zealand Cheddar is excellent, cheap and contains no carbohydrate at all.

Your drinks must be sugar-free. Beer, which contains a lot of carbohydrate, is strictly forbidden. You can drink unlimited coffee or tea with restriction of milk as mentioned above, or water. Wine may be taken but it must be dry (i.e. without much sugar). This means claret, Chablis, or a dry white Bordeaux. The question of alcohol is still under investigation and will be discussed in the next chapter, but as Banting managed to lose weight on a quite considerable consumption of alcohol, it seems probable that sugar-free alcoholic drinks like gin are not fattening when taken with a high-fat diet.

"Diabetic" preparations will help you when you are entertaining people who normally eat sweet things. They will also help you to taper off your desire for sugar. But please do not imagine that you can gorge these things. They do contain a certain amount of carbohydrate, and should be taken in the greatest moderation. The packet, can or bottle usually states the carbohydrate equivalent. So you can allow yourself a little relaxation from time to time, and know where you are, from a carbohydrate point of view.