Breakfast like a princess … 49 they make us feel full and this is worth more in the fight against overeating. I would rather people had a few more calories and felt full at the end of the day than a few less and then break their new healthy eating plan and binge, because they are chronically starving. Soup is something I think we should all have more of in the evening. Many diets that have come and gone include soup for good reason. Soup is primarily water-based making it one of the least energy-dense foods we can eat. And soup comes in all flavors to suit all palates. Soup with protein in it gives us the best of both worlds – the protein triggers satiety while the low energy, high bulk of the soup promotes feeling full. For these reasons, soup should be a feature of our new eating lifestyle – either as a starter or on its own as a light evening meal. Soup is also convenient. You can make your favorite soup when you have time and then freeze meal-size portions. After a long day, they are on hand as an alternative to a take-out, kill-you-faster-than-look-at-you food. What is energy density and why is it so important? There is a 20- minute delay between our stomach being full and when we feel full – a state known by researchers as‘ satiety’. Two things make us feel full – one is protein, as we know, and the other is simply the volume of material in our stomach. So, the more we can fill our stomach with food that is low in calories the better. When we feel full, it is much easier to stop eating. I believe that trying not to eat while we feel hungry, especially with yummy foods nearby, is simply too much to ask of human beings. Perfectly normal human beings are not able to resist an enticing dessert while they feel hungry. In fact, I have often wondered if the 10 – 20 % of people who can lose weight on a traditional, low calorie diet are simply those rare individuals, better than me, who are unusually self-disciplined! Low energy dense foods typically include vegetables, salads and fruit where the bulk of the food is made up of water and fibre. The trouble with these foods on their own is that, while they are healthy, not long after a meal our blood glucose level drops because there was not much energy in them and we feel hungry again. Often we did not even feel full