As a health reporter who has been following nutrition news for decades, I’ve seen a lot of trends that made a splash – and then sank. Remember olestra, the Paleo diet and celery juice?

Watch enough food fads come and go, and you realise that the most valuable nutrition guidance is built on decades of research, in which scientists have looked at a question from multiple perspectives and arrived at something like a consensus. Here are 10 science-backed pearls to carry you into the new year.