IF you want to lose weight, eat a piece of chocolate cake.
That's the controversial view of an advocate for "real food" and nutritionist Cyndi O'Meara, who is coming to Mackay next week to speak about weight loss and the causes of obesity.
She disagrees with low-fat, low-calorie diets, thinks chocolate can be good for you, butter is better and coffee is not so bad.
"Thirty years ago the Australian population ate bacon and eggs, hot chips, meat pies and lamingtons - there was very little obesity," she said.
"The food eaten in the seventies and eighties was made with real food, a small number of ingredients that would last only a day or two.
"These same foods today can be made up of over 90 ingredients, many of them made in a chemical laboratory and the food can last for weeks.