It's a lifestyle, not a book

“It’s not a diet, it’s a lifestyle” is one of those phrases that I’ve heard almost every person on a diet say. I’m not sure whether these people truly believe it, or whether they are trying to convince themselves that they’re content to spend their remaining years on this earth not eating a single slice of pizza. Either way, I think it’s rarely ever the case.

Deliciously Ella Every Day is the physical manifestation of that sentence. Perhaps aware of the criticism that her first book got as promoting a restrictive and complicated relationship with food, her second is instead focused on emphasising how Deliciously Ella recipes can be implemented into your every-day life. Its whole 254 pages are focused on promoting the message that it’s not only possible, but positively simple to adopt a plant-based (a term which is apparently interchangeable with the word “happy”) diet. Throughout the book Woodward truly is selling a lifestyle in some subtle, and not so subtle, ways.

On the front inside cover Ella writes, “FOOD FOR HAPPINESS / FOOD FOR ENERGY / FOOD FOR EVERY DAY” and on the back inside cover, “LOVE YOUR LIFE / LOVE YOUR FOOD / LOVE YOUR SELF”. This progression suggests that living the “deliciously Ella way” is a process: Learn to cook plant-based food, learn to live a happy life. On top of that, the repetitive, three-word sentences mirror the book's insistence that attaining such happiness really is as simple as a diet change. This is reinforced in the introduction, where words like “straightforward”, “simple” and “speedy” (7) are sprinkled in more liberally than chia seeds at a plant-based banquet. Similarly, Mimi Spencer and Dr Sarah Schenker write, “We believe that the Fast Diet’s success had to do with its flexibility, its simple, basic tenets” (6), where the the use of the use of synonyms "simple" and "basic" shows that she is as keen as Ella to highlight that the book's way of life is "easier than you think" (Woodward, 7). What's more, Spencer and Schenker categorise their recipes into chapters such as "Simple Suppers" and in much the same way Woodward uses titles such as "Simple Sweets" and "Healthy Eating On-The-Go". As such, whilst these writers are perhaps quite blatantly selling the dream of living a thinner life, they are also suggesting that their diets will create one that is altogether less stressful. Who knew that matcha powder was that powerful, eh?

The idea that with Ella’s recipes “you can look and feel your best” (7) – quite a presumptuous statement, if you ask me – is a theme that is carried throughout the book in its use of images. Sure, there are pictures of the recipes themselves, but the photography also extends into giving the reader insight into Ella’s personal life. There are pictures of her on holiday, of her home, of her dog and various pictures of luxurious bouquets. Similarly, the beginning of her recipes are prefaced as being “My favourite post-yoga or -gym dinner” (147) and a dish that “Most of my girlfriends would say…is their favourite” (150). The underlying suggestion seems to be that if you buy this book and treat it like your food bible, you too can get yourself a sexy body, a sexy husband who buys you flowers and sexy friends that you can jet off to the sexy Bahamas with. And this isn't a stand-alone example of this sales tactic by any means. In The New Beverly Hills Diet Judy Mazel says that her "lifestyle eating program" (3) - that's right, this totally isn't a diet - is one that "allows you to indulge in your every food fantasy" including "Hot dogs at the ball game" (3). Mazel isn't just promoting her diet through the promise of hot dogs, but through the promise of care-free living that is encompassed within the image of this "ball game". In a quote that almost seems too cliché to be true she even states “Welcome to the world of dreams come true - to a “diet” that’s a dream come true.” (3), this time explicitly suggesting that her eating plan truly can solve all of your worldly problems.

Reading Deliciously Ella Every Day and other diet books from a literary perspective (instead of the perspective of someone who is just pretty angry about being told not to eat bread) made me realise exactly why franchises like this can be so successful. Clever uses of language and photography make the perfect life into something we can attain with just £20 and a Holland and Barret points card. That's pretty irresistible, isn't it? When we purchase books like this, we’re not simply purchasing the words on a page or even access to the recipes that they provide, we’re purchasing the life that it overtly and covertly promises us.