Eggs

I once spent an entire week going to work on a diet of eggs. Eggs and pretty much nothing else. I was allowed butter or oil to cook them in, as well as herbs, chillies, onions and any other secondary ingredient deemed appropriate to the matter in hand. A little cheese or ham could creep in for an omelette, say, but mustn’t become the star of the show. Bacon was a no-no, despite my protestations (fried eggs cry out for crisp shavings of smoked, cured pork), and mayonnaise verboten. This ovoid diet wasn’t done for pleasure, I hasten to add, nor culinary curiosity. Nope, it was a commissioned piece for the Mail on Sunday in reaction to news of the Charles Saatchi diet. The great advertising guru and contemporary art collector had lost huge amounts of weight on a similar diet, despite being married to Nigella Lawson. A triumph of the will, if I ever heard one. And I was to sample a mere seven days.