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DO you feel pressured to cut back on your daily snacking? Here are six great ways to disguise the amount of junk you’re eating.

Do not include partially eaten snacks

A few chips left in the bag, half an inch of warm noodles in the pot, some cereal bars you’re sick of when you’ve eaten a four-pack all make a snack invalid. Using this method, you could eat three times as many snacks a day without consuming a single extra calorie!

Count periods of time, not snacks

Allow a time when you are allowed to have a snack, for example between 10am and 11.15am if a small diet is required. Or just do it from 9:01 a.m. to 11:59 a.m and 1:01 p.m. to 5:59 p.m. (during the day). Add to that the nice trick of counting only time periods (single digits) and not snacks eaten, for example. four donuts, two bags of chips, three cokes, four chocolates and about 20 other things.

Anything containing fruit does not count

Years ago, you tried to go on an all-you-can-eat-any-fruits diet. So if something has fruit in it, it can’t be a junk snack, and that includes chocolate raisin, fig scones, Jaffa brownies and Bounty bars. Also, anything topped with a cherry and anything with jam. And takeaway duck with plum sauce with a twist.

Forget shared snacks

Hardcore snacks are a solitary activity. So if a friend pops over for a coffee and a packet of Hobnobs goes missing, that’s a “dinner together” you can’t control. Like anyone who brings brownies to work and munch on a Lion bar in the restroom with someone in the next cubicle.

Pay attention to the packaging

If the word “snack” is missing from the packaging, then it is not. So Dairylea Dunkers, Jammie Dodgers and the like are not snacks. You’re not trying to make excuses for eating junk food – Britain has strict rules about false advertising and you’re just following the law as a responsible citizen.

Disguise the snack with bread

Put so-called “snacks” between two slices of bread. Then they are a sandwich that counts as a meal. Bread and chips are a classic sandwich. Mars bar in bread is probably Scottish fusion food. The M&M’s are a little weird, but you could probably stick them in place with peanut butter. Because they’re already covered in breadcrumbs, scotch eggs are as much a default dish as fish fingers.