The Baby Food Diet

What it involves:

Eating small portions of mashed or puréed food is easier to digest, which can then aid weight loss. Rather than being a long-term weight loss plan, the baby food diet is only supposed to be a short-lived diet trick.

Who follows it:

Reese Witherspoon was reported to have swapped two meals per day for baby food. Although she denied eating actual baby food, Jennifer Aniston was linked to the diet in 2010 after her celebrity trainer, Tracey Anderson, devised a 'baby food cleanse' which involves fourteen portions of puréed food and a normal-sized dinner. Typical components of Tracey's plan are fruit smoothies, puréed oatmeal, soups that contain dandelion greens and for dinner, lean meats and vegetables.

The bad points:

There are few calories in baby food, which is one reason why it can be popular for weight loss.

Expert view:

Mason says, "This diet plan is a very low calorie diet (VLCD) and that's why it works. By consuming a small number of calories daily, the body will lose weight. This is only sustainable for a very short period of time and contains an unhealthily low percentage of protein, which is essential to keep our bones and muscles healthy. This weight loss plan would be difficult, if not impossible, to fit in with your day to day life."