With coffee breaks, morning tea and office birthdays, full-time workers are consuming at least 70% of a week’s calories on the job.

Failing to adapt can result in a series of small slips adding up to a very big deal.

The flip side, however, is that it gives you between 10 and 30 opportunities a week – depending on whether you’re a square meal or grazing girl – to reconcile your goals with your work environment and schedule. Here are our tips to beat the cravings .

Problem no.1: Take-away lunches at your desk

Solution: “Take-away food is higher in fat, salt, sugar and kilojoules but usually much lower in vitamins and fibre,” says Aloysa Hourigan, head nutritionist with Nutrition Australia. “Just because it’s only one meal a day, don’t think it doesn’t matter. Most take-away food supersizes your portion – which means that a huge bread roll or sandwich that is packed with three fillings or huge serve of chicken coconut curry and rice will pack a huge kilojoule punch, which, over years, may substantially add to your waistline. This is also true when your whole office posse hits a restaurant for lunch. Meanwhile, if you gobble the food down while sitting in front of your computer, you will inhale it and then may still feel hungry.

Waist protection:

• Bring a healthy lunch from home such as soup or salad, rye bread roll and fruit – this will save you money as well as shaving kilojoules off your daily intake.
• Keep healthy staples in your drawer: That way if you can’t get out for lunch you can improvise with some brown rice cakes and pull-top tuna followed by a piece of fruit.
• Make dinner smaller: If you’ve had a big restaurant lunch with colleagues or a client, make sure you eat a smaller dinner to ensure your kilojoule intake for the day has not blown out by day’s end.
• Eat mindfully. Get away from your desk and savour every mouthful of lunch and you will feel