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It’s eight days until Christmas and if, like me, your trousers are feeling tight and waistline panic is setting in, it might be wise to take stock. If we consume what we want from now until the new year, will we have undone all our good pretox work? Not necessarily. There are many ways to ensure that your weight remains level and there are myths that need to be exposed for being just that. Below, I aim to answer some of the most repeated fears with a calm voice of reason.

Could I really put on half a stone over Christmas?

It depends on how you define ‘Christmas’. You need to eat an extra 3,500 calories to put on a pound and so it takes some doing to gain 7lb (3.2kg) in weight in a short period of time. To put on half a stone between now and Chrismas Eve, you would need to consume everything from the following list, every day, in addition to your normal daily diet (1,900 calories for a woman, 2,500 for a man): A Bucks Fizz. A large bowl of peanuts. Two small glasses of mulled wine. A piece of Christmas pudding with brandy butter and two mince pies. 12 Roses or Quality Street chocolates. Four small glasses of wine with lunch. A piece of Turkish Delight. Stilton cheese with four crackers. A slice of Yule log.

However, if you are eating normally, but also having the odd glass of wine and mince pie, beware. Two medium-sized glasses of mulled wine contain 686 calories and a mince pie has 240 – a total of 926 – so if you were to consume all three every day for 28 days, you could put on half a stone.

Are party canapés really so bad and how can I limit my intake?

Apart from the fact that you never know quite where and for how long these little nibbles have been hanging around before appearing at the party, most contain 50–75 calories each. You can end up consuming a whole meal’s worth of calories by the time you leave. The shinier they are, the more fat-packed and calorific you can assume them to be. Any encased in pastry or deep fried are usually the worst offenders.

The best way to limit intake is to do a bit of crafty “pre-party eating”, ie, don’t go to the do hungry. The queen of the party circuit, Tamara Beckwith, advises having a big breakfast and lunch during the day, but you can also stick to your normal routine and just have a small, bloat-free snack before setting off. Something simple such as a sliver of cheddar with an apple will take the edge off your hunger, as will a quick slice of granary or sourdough toast. Canapés will seem dull and less tempting when you are not hungry.

If pre-party eating is out of the question, then get savvy about canapés and snacks. A handful of peanuts or Japanese crackers have 171 calories, a tiny bowl of Bombay mix 148; much leaner (and more filling) choices are little meat and fish-based canapés such as grilled prawns and pork or chicken satay sticks or sushi. But avoid the dips that accompany them: they are messy as well as fatty and inevitably drip down your outfit.

You can also try surreptitiously deconstructing canapés. The literary agent and serious socialite Ed Victor, the author of The Obvious Diet (Vermilion, £9.99), says this is now a socially acceptable party pastime. He takes off the low-calorie protein bits, eats them and wraps the fatty, waist-expanding pastry remains in napkins, which he then politely discards.

I will be eating in restaurants quite a bit over the Christmas break, how can I enjoy my meals yet still take care of my waistline?

It depends on where you are eating. Vegetable-based soups and melon are almost always the starters with the fewest calories –around 100 to 200 maximum. Skipping the roll or chunk of rustic bread, plus butter, saves at least 200.

For main courses, select plain meat or fish and never have fries: even a smallish serving can pack in 300 calories-plus. For pudding, fruit or simple ice-cream (one scoop is about 300 calories) is almost always the safest choice. Even the smallest sliver of cheesecake has 250.

Be aware of “menu speak” – whether it appears in a restaurant or takeaway – so that you are not fooled by any misleading lingo.

I don’t mind putting a bit on over Christmas, but I want to know how to maximise weight loss in January.

First of all, don’t panic. It is relatively simple to peel off 5lb or so if you just do the maths. You need to achieve a combination of cutting calories and upping physical exercise to be in a deficit of 1,000 calories a day to burn off 2lb of fat per week. The best way to do this is to burn 500 calories in exercise, and cut 500 more out of your daily diet. Do this and within two-and-a-half-weeks you will be back in shape.

Here’s how:

Give up alcohol. Next cleanse your diet of any unnecessary extras by pruning it down to basics. In other words, have three meals a day of simple, straightforward food. For example, porridge or sugar-free muesli for breakfast; soup and a granary “healthy eating” sandwich followed by fruit for lunch and meat (or fish) with two vegetables at dinner. It is also worth making use of clever products on the market that will help to control your appetite. These include:

— adding soluble fibre such as psyllium to a glass of juice (the soluble fibre swells in your stomach a little and makes you feel full).

— taking ZoTrim supplements (Boots, £21.95 for 180 tablets) which contain extracts of the herbs damiana, gurana and yerbe mate (clinical trials have indicated that these slow down the speed at which your stomach empties).

— having the new smoothie drink Naturally Gorgeous (Waitrose, £3.29 a litre) for breakfast. It is made from low GI (glucose index) ingredients and contains a natural extract of pinenut which keeps you feeling fuller for longer and reduces the desire to snack. You can have one instead of breakfast.

— having half a grapefruit before each meal. While it does not contain any fat-busting enzymes, research suggests that people who have a grapefruit with every meal lose an average of almost 4lb – and some lose up to 10lb – over 12 weeks without making any other changes to their diet.

Scientists say that eating grapefruit causes a drop in insulin levels, which reduces hunger and ensures that you eat slightly fewer calories. (It is important to note, however, that you should not eat grapefruit if you are taking cholesterol-lowering drugs, as one of its super nutrients affects their absorption.)

These tips combined should shave a good 600 calories off your daily intake. If you also get active and clock up 10,000 paces each day, you will burn around 400 calories. Together, your dietary changes and walking will give you the 1,000 calorie daily deficit that you are aiming for.

Do I need to detox in January?

The dietary steps mentioned above will be a form of detoxing anyway, but you can take things a few steps farther to give your gut, liver and kidneys – which are likely to have been put under extra stress at Christmas – a helping hand.

I can recommend two excellent products from the Organic Pharmacy. The first is called Colon Cleanse and Gut Repair (£26.95 for 60 capsules; theorganicpharmacy.com). The capsules contain extracts of clay, psyllium husk, apple pectin and linseed that help to draw in toxins and are then carried out of your body in your stools. Alfalfa, barley grass and chlorella in the capsules help to bind heavy metals while the aloe, slippery elm, L-glutamine and liquorice help to repair and reduce inflammation in your gut wall.

The second is its Liver and Kidney Detox Tincture (£10.99 for a 50ml bottle). The drops contain an organic tincture of milk thistle, red clover, turmeric, berberis and marshmallow, which help to support these crucial organs and regenerate new cells. In addition, try to eat broccoli, cabbage, kale and watercress, which contain super nutrients that boost a liver enzyme known as glutathione, a strong antioxidant that protects the liver from damage as it processes toxins.

Avocado is good, too, as it is one of the few foods to give you “ready-made” glutathione. Also include artichokes in your meal plans. They are great sources of cynarin, which increases production of bile and helps to carry excess cholesterol from the body in the stools.

Finally, strawberries, raspberries and blackberries provide you with ellagic acid, another super nutrient that ups production of liver-detoxifying enzymes. Eat with meals as pudding and between meals as snacks to maximise intake. They have the added advantage of being low in calories, so will help your detox along.

RESTAURANT EATING

French restaurant

Go for
Au vapour (steamed)
En brochette (skewed and baked)
Grillé (grilled)
Salade verte (green salad)
Crème caramel

Avoid
À la crème (in a cream sauce)
En croute (in a pastry case)
Hollandaise (made with butter and eggs – the fattiest sauce on earth)
Remoulade (mayonnaise-based – eggs and oil – the second fattiest sauce on earth)

Italian restaurant

Go for
Minestrone (vegetable soup)
Alla marinara (with seafood)
Piccata (lemon-wine sauce)
Insalata mista (mixed salad)
Insalata di mare (seafood salad)

Avoid
Alla panna (with cream)
Fristo misto (fried mix)
Alla carbonara (pasta with bacon, eggs, cheese and sometimes cream)
Alla parmigiana (with parmesan)
Salami (very fatty)

Japanese restaurant

Go for
Miso (light fermented soya broth)
Mushimono (steamed)
Nimono (simmered)
Sashimi (raw plain fish)
Yakimono (grilled)

Avoid
Agemono (deep fried)
Katsu (fried pork)
Sukiyaki (onedish meal with fatty beef)
Tempura (batter-fried)

Canapés to avoid
Shiny ones
Ones encased in pastry or deep fried
Accompanying sauces
Peanuts
Japanese crackers

Canapés to opt for
Grilled prawns
Pork or chicken satay sticks
Sushi Devils on horseback (prunes wrapped in bacon)
Cocktail sausages

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