How to indulge on holiday but still lose weight: I lost a stone without trying and at 60 I'm the exact same weight I was at university

There are few certainties in life but one is that the tempting dishes you sample with gusto on a summer holiday will also mean you return home with an unwanted souvenir: a few extra pounds. Yet it is not only possible to stay trim on holiday, but to come back even slimmer than before you left. And the secret lies not in calorie-counting, a high-protein plan or a crash cleanse, but in adopting some simple habits that French women have sworn by for centuries – something I discovered for myself when I moved to France 25 years ago. I quickly noticed, somewhere between the cheese course and second glass of Languedoc red, that I had lost weight without trying. In fact, from a starting weight of about 9st when I arrived in the town of Pézenas in the south of France in my 30s, I lost 11lb within 12 months and settled at my present trim 56 kilos, or 8st 11lb on my 5ft 8in frame. I’m now 60 but weigh almost exactly what I weighed when I was at university. Friends from England who came to stay in those first few years asked me how it’s even possible to lose weight while living in a country that makes the world’s greatest wines and where breakfast for most of the population consists of a crescent-shaped pastry made mainly from butter. In the early 1990s, scientists identified what they called the French Paradox. Despite eating masses of runny cheese – did I mention the 246 varieties of cheese here? – kilos of pâté and foie gras, drinking generous amounts of alcohol and smoking with considerable enthusiasm, the French were far less likely to die of heart disease than their counterparts in the US or northern Europe. They also suffered less from bowel cancer and circulatory problems and had fewer cases of osteoporosis. I’m now 60 but weigh almost exactly what I weighed at university, writes Helena Frith Powell She says the secret lies in adopting some simple habits that French women have sworn by for centuries The standard response to this paradox is to point to the Mediterranean diet and more specifically red wine – made from grapes that contain a substance called resveratrol with antioxidant, anti-inflammatory properties – olive oil and fresh fruit and vegetables. Of course, these are all important factors. But there is more to it. It’s not just about what the French eat. It is how they eat it. Many of you are no doubt heading to the south of France this summer, perhaps to Provence or the Dordogne. So this is your chance to try out my exclusive ‘go on holiday, eat like a Frenchwoman and lose weight’ diet. I have been doing it for more than two decades, while still enjoying those indulgent pastries, rich sauces and gorgeous wines. Indeed the really good news about my diet is that it’s not really a diet at all; it’s simply the way people in this part of the world have always eaten. Olive oil at every opportunity. Fish above red meat. Tomatoes, courgettes, aubergines, peppers, the ‘légumes du soleil’ that form the backbone of Provençal cooking. Wine drunk with food rather than the British way, which is instead of it (and if you are worried about wine being fattening: a medium glass of red has around 140 calories, which is roughly the same as a handful of almonds and arguably just as good for you). The goal isn’t really to be thin; that’s just a pleasing side-effect. The aim is être bien dans sa peau, to be comfortable in your own skin. French women are not, in general, chasing a number on the scales. They want to feel good, carry themselves well and enjoy their food without guilt. It is a subtly different ambition from the one most diets are peddling and, as a result, is far more achievable and enjoyable. Every summer, I eat bread, drink wine, linger over long lunches with friends in the garden, help myself to cheese, and by September, I feel better in my body than at any other point in the year. No gym, no calorie-counting, no planning. What’s more, these are good habits you can easily continue at home too. So here’s my guide to the no-diet diet for summer living. The first thing I noticed when we moved here in 2000 was that not sitting down to eat as a family was viewed as at best foreign, and by some downright weird. The French eat at a table, never on the move. They sit down, en famille, and enjoy their food in a leisurely and relaxed manner. This means you chew your food properly, which has the double effect of giving your stomach time to send ‘I have eaten enough’ messages to your brain and helping you to digest your meal. Where I live, everything except the big supermarkets closes between midday and 2pm so that everyone can enjoy lunch. Snacking between meals is not really done. In short, only eat while you’re seated at a table. There is still the tradition here of shopping for the day, whether it’s at the local market or the supermarket. You come back with produce to prepare and eat on the day. This means you never touch pre-packaged ready meals, which are not only unhealthy but also less satisfying, leaving you hungry and reaching for more. This daily shopping can, of course, be time-consuming. Heaven forbid you get stuck behind someone at the butcher’s discussing the relative benefits of pâté de canard versus mousse de canard. But it’s also sociable and in France the food shopping is done just as much by the man of the house as the woman, another habit to bring back from your holiday! Eat as many greens as you can. If you’re unsure what to have as a starter in a restaurant, adopt the well-known French women’s trick of ordering a green salad. The dressing will be delicious and you can add some parmesan shavings to sex it up. Salads are never boring here. Think melted goat’s cheese with a honey and olive oil dressing. A goat's cheese salad with honey, rocket and tomatoes. Helena recommends making salads exciting And while we’re on the subject of olive oil, a wonderfully healthy breakfast option is Greek yoghurt with honey and super high quality virgin olive oil. I used to drink a teaspoon of olive oil every day, which was good for me but tasted awful. Now I just pour it on to my yoghurt, which is far tastier. It might sound strange but trust me, the combination of the sweet honey with the tangy oil and creamy yoghurt is magnificent. Coco Chanel said, ‘Elegance is refusal.’ Always go for quality, not quantity. A small piece of top-quality dark chocolate is much more satisfying than an entire bar of something sickly sweet. The same logic applies to cheese, wine, bread – everything. Eat less of better things. There really is no reason to have too much of anything. We all eat more than we need to. I remember talking to the super-chic, model and style icon Ines de la Fressange about this in the 2000s when I was researching my book about French women and asking her how she stayed so slim (especially considering her favourite snack is a Crunchie bar). ‘I simply stop eating when I’m not hungry,’ she told me, which might sound obvious, but do you do it? Take a moment next time you’re about to reach for another piece of bread or cheese and ask yourself if you’re still hungry or just eating for the sake of it. The little but better rule applies to wine, too. French women drink wine before meals (the apéro, and usually only one glass) and during meals. Never after. They do not, like English women often do, call for another bottle to round off a meal. They might have a tisane, a herbal infusion, but never more booze. This not only cuts the calories from the extra alcohol but also stops you ordering that extra chocolate mousse your fourth glass of wine convinces you that you need. There’s a quick cheat here, too. If I ever feel like I’m edging north of my ideal weight, I just give up booze and bread for a fortnight and I immediately lose a kilo or two. That’s it: no app, no plan, no calorie-counting. The French adopted doing the latest healthy regimes long before they became trendy. Among the dominant trends of 2026 is protein-maxxing. This involves maximising protein intake at every meal to rev up metabolism and increase feelings of satiety. You can still eat carbohydrates, fruit, dairy – whatever you like – as long as you’re hitting high protein targets (typically 1.6 to 2.2 grams per kilogram of body weight per day). The French have never been short of protein, having plenty of charcuterie and cheese at almost every meal The focus is on body composition, more muscle, less fat and keeping hunger at bay. This diet grew out of gym and bodybuilding culture and has gone mainstream largely through social media – but it’s not new to the French. With their fish, their eggs, their charcuterie at almost every meal, they have never been short of protein. They just don’t feel the need to label it. The 30/30/30 method – 30 grams of protein within 30 minutes of waking, followed by 30 minutes of low-intensity movement – is another big trend right now. The scientific argument is that it stabilises blood sugar and reduces cravings throughout the day, but it’s also deeply ingrained in the French lifestyle: just swap the protein shake for two eggs and some smoked salmon and follow it with a morning stroll beside the river or on the beach. Embrace eating – and take it seriouslyAll of these approaches – 30/30/30, protein maxxing – are really variations on a theme the French have been living quietly for generations: eat real food, prioritise quality protein, don’t overdo the carbohydrates and move your body without making a fuss about it. None of these new health fads are wrong per se – but they all require effort, planning and a degree of self-denial that the French would find faintly ridiculous. The rather wonderful truth is that you don’t need a diet at all if you do it their way. The French gastronome Brillat-Savarin wrote: ‘Tell me what you eat and I will tell you what you are.’ Two hundred years on, that is still the most honest diet advice available. The French have not discovered a secret. They have simply held on to something the rest of Europe lost during the industrial revolution, the idea that eating is a pleasure to be taken seriously, not a problem to be managed. Processed food and ready meals have no place in their thinking. There is no single rule. It is more of an attitude, a collection of habits so deeply ingrained that French women barely even notice them. But spell them out and they are remarkably easy to follow. Wherever you live, or wherever you’re heading on holiday, the most effective and least painful way to go into the summer looking your best is to eat (and drink) like a Frenchwoman. Helena Frith Powell is the author of Two Lipsticks and a Lover (Arrow Books, £12.99).