At Eat Out, we’re not big on diets; we believe in having everything in moderation. (Well, everything except cheese, chocolate and carbs). So all the hype about banting has us nonplussed, because we could never give up our love affair with potatoes. However, it has got us thinking about some of the truly crazy diets out there. My granny always swore by ingesting nothing but biltong and water to lose weight. The cured meat gives you protein, iron and energy, and the water makes you feel full. You might die of scurvy, but heck, at least you’ll be thin! Marie Claire has a hilarious retrospective on some old kilo-dropping methods, such as ‘Wonder Sauna Hot Pants’ (seems legit) and a fat-reducing soap. For the sake of entertainment, we rounded up a list of extreme regimes for your flabbergasted enjoyment. But remember, kids, don’t try this at home.

Alkaline diet
Advocates of this eating plan strive to keep the body’s pH balance between 7.35 and 7.45. The book Eating the Alkaline Way (famously endorsed by Posh Spice) details how an alkaline diet of vegetables and fruit nourishes the body, while acid-producing foods such as meat, pasta and dairy products stress the digestive system. We surmise that wine, with a nice acidic pH of around 3.5, is no-no, so the diet’s a non-starter for us. This handy chart of acidic and alkaline foods is pretty neat, though.

(New) Atkins
The ‘new and improved’ version of the Atkins seeks to banish the outdated view that the diet calls for bacon and cream alone. (Tragic, really.) The more modern principle is to eat protein- and fibre-rich foods that leave you feeling more satisfied. A four-phase approach involves removing carbs from your diet for the first two weeks and then slowly introducing them until you ‘find you own carbohydrate balance’. Atkins has now become a global brand that sells low-carb snacks, such as the Endulge (sic) choc-coconut bar. (Maybe the weight that’s dropping off is due to lost brain cells?) Long-term effects of this kind of diet include heart disease and an inclination towards stroke and cancer. So: no, thanks.

The baby food diet

The baby food diet
Terrifying, but true: this diet involves replacing meals with jars of baby food. (So that it looks the same at any stage of the digestive process?) Apparently, the little pots of puréed vegetables and fruit are a more tidy variation on the smoothie theme. The downside? It’s ridiculous for grown adults to scoop up goop with teaspoons – even more so if you do ‘here comes the aeroplane’.

Cabbage soup
Boiled cabbage soup as a meal replacement, with as many ‘free’ fruit and vegetables as you like? You might have to call a plumber in for this one. Side effects of this low-calorie diet include mood swings, dizzy spells, low energy and irritability. Basically, you can expect to be hangry – simultaneously hungry and angry – at all times.

Crazy celeb diets
As you’d expect, any celebrity diet worth talking about – not the usual bore of eating vegetables, drinking water and getting exercise – is going to be crackpot cray-cray. Marilyn Monroe used to start her day with two raw eggs whipped into warm milk, skip lunch, and then sit down to a plate of liver and five carrots for dinner, finishing off with a hot-fudge sundae. Elizabeth Taylor swore by breakfasting on dry toast, eating tuna with grapefruit and tomato paste, and dipping raw vegetables into a mixture of sour cream and cottage cheese. The only thing we can really get behind is Liz’s belief in ‘controlled pigouts’, which helped her to stay on track. More recently, Gwyneth Paltrow’s extreme eating habits have been blamed for the breakup of her marriage. Read this excellent piece by New York Magazine’s Rebecca Harrington, who tried one of the actress’s cookbooks and (barely) lived to tell the tale.

Dukan Diet
Devised by French doctor Pierre Dukan, this eating plan – probably the least crazy on our list – rejects counting calories and ‘allows’ you to eat as much as you like. There are four phases: attack (where you eat only protein); the cruise phase (add some green vegetables) until your goal weight is achieved; followed by the consolation phase (add bread, cheese and fruit – the end is nigh!); and, finally, the stabilisation phase (revert to attack phase one day a week). You can buy the book. At Eat Out we don’t look at our dear friend, food, as an enemy that needs to be attacked, so Mr Dukan is categorised as crazy in our books.

Cabbage soup

Macrobiotic diet
This diet, pioneered by the Japanese in particular, bans processed and refined foods, as well as wheat, eggs, meats and dairy, and focuses on grains and vegetables. Madonna is reported to be a long-time proponent. Judging by her history, the diet does indeed help you to look younger, but the years of lasagne-starvation might eventually cause you to go mad and buy yourself a grill of gold teeth à la Madge.

Master cleanse
As detoxes go, this one is perhaps the most upsetting. The ‘lemonade’ (water, squeezed lemon, maple syrup and cayenne pepper) on which you are required to subsist contains no actual nutrients and you are directed to take a laxative nightly before going to sleep. During the three days of the ease-in phase you start removing processed food from your diet; then you have 10 days of lemonade only; then another three-day ease-out phase, where you slowly start to eat food again – if your teeth haven’t fallen out of your head. You can buy a kit and everything! Just make sure to leave a note for your loved ones.