So, Just How Much Should I Cheat On My Diet

Is It a "Cheat Day" or a "Cheat Meal"?

The researchers granted their participants a "cheat day", a whole day in which to gorge on anything and everything they desired. Before you get excited and start planning fried breakfasts, cake at lunch, and whole pizzas at dinner, be aware that most nutritionists are wary about promoting whole cheat days.

Some nutritionists now think that that spending a whole day indulging your naughtiest food desires may run the risk of undoing all your hard work throughout the week.

Professor Jillian Guinta, of the Health and Physical Education Department at Seton Hall University, said:

"If you allow all of your hard work to unravel for an entire day, you can quickly void the progress you have been making all week, especially if weight loss is a goal.”

So what do you do? How do you satisfy your sweet tooth and lose weight?

Try the 90/10 Rule

Rather than having a whole day of naughty indulgence, try confining your indulgence to single meals. While most of your meals should be healthy, the 90/10 rule means that you enjoy three to four cheat meals a week.

Anything I like?

Ah, you've got me. It's now generally recommended that you add only around 300 calories a day to your daily calorie allowance per "cheat meal". That's not a whole pizza.

However, you could still have pizza, by limiting yourself to two slices at your treat meal, along with a hefty helping of side-salad. This would satisfy your craving, without providing too heavy a calorific load. Ditto, while slipping into the tub with a whole pot of Ben & Jerry's is probably behind you, you could still enjoy a quarter pint with some fresh fruit (or on its own). You could also enjoy a slice of Victoria sponge cake, or some chardonnay and garlic bread with your lasagna.

The possibilities are endless.

But don't only weak people need to cheat on their diet?

According to David Grotto, Licensed Dietician and author of 101 Foods That Can Save Your Life, this "structured cheating" ought to be a compulsory part of dieting. Grotto says that strength comes, not from total self-denial, but from deciding how much of your desired indulgence you will have before:

"[eating] it with full consciousness ... [licking] your lips, and then [moving] on with your life."

Registered Dietician, Carolyn O'Neil, agrees:

"I think sensible splurging is really the key to being able to achieve a healthy lifestyle."

She adds that anyone can stick to a restrictive, rigid diet for a short period of time, but that many people will eventually lose control and ruin their diet, indulging on all the sweet and naughty treats they've denied themselves for weeks or months. O'Neil asks:

"Why not come up with a sensible diet, so your chances of success are much greater in the long run?"

Cheating isn't an excuse to splurge. It's a vital mechanism that helps you make it to the finish line of your diet.

Each little cheat gives you a mental boost, helping you know you can see your diet through to the end. Each scheduled treat also acts as a reward, helping inspire you to stick through the days in between when those healthy, healthy salads are starting to grate on you.

Prolonged dieting also makes our energy levels plummet. When that happens, you don't want to work, exercise, or do anything other than sit around waiting for your next meal. Packing in a few extra calories will give you a hit of energy and help give you the energy you need for a full life.

READ Four Celebrity Diets You Should Avoid At All Costs

Added to which, as soon as we call something "bad" or "off-limits", we want it even more. Like naughty children told "no, you may not", our brains seek out anything they're denied. Allowing ourselves a little of everything in moderation prevents fixating on one item, stopping those pesky cravings.

As Marcel Zeelenberg, of Tilburg University in the Netherlands, says:

“The findings...show it is important to plan hedonistic moments when it is ‘good to be bad’.”

So remember, there's nothing wrong with "cheating" on your diet, as long as you plan in advance. But make sure that you balance your cheeky splurging with healthy eating 90% of the time and portion control when you do "cheat". As Carolyn O'Neil says:

"The more you know, the more you can eat."