It's National Junk Food Day folks.

It's National Junk Food Day folks.

You'll never guess what today is everybody. It's on the tip of your tongue which in many ways, given the nature of that famous phrase, should give you a clue. You'll kick yourself when I tell you. It's something to do with a multi billion pound or dollar industry and we do like to treat ourselves to it every so often. If your mouth is salivating and you can hardly wait any longer then this may be the time to tell you.

According to my reliable sources today is National Junk Food Day. Yes, honestly I kid you not. It's that day devoted to conspicuous consumption of the kind of food that's bad for you and expands your waistline no end. It's a day for excessive eating of burgers, chips, pizzas, crisps, mountainous bars of chocolate while there's nobody around and generally giving in meekly to the temptation of cholesterol coated, sweet things that stimulate the senses and generally leave you feeling happy but guilty at the same time.

Don't think I didn't see you sneaking into the biscuit tin or raiding the fridge for mouth watering cakes from last night's party. And yet seriously folks this is National Junk Food Day, a day when insatiable appetites can never be satisfied because it seemed like a good idea at the time. But fear not because our learned dieticians and nutritionists never tire of telling us about the remarkable amount of sugar in all of those food products that were once considered as perfectly edible.

It does seem that wherever you look some perfectly innocent supermarket product that might have been declared safe to eat 40 years ago is now regarded as a potential killer if eaten or drunk obsessively. How often are we now told that sugary drinks for kids can be so harmful and dangerous to their health that at some point they may be in urgent need of immediate medical attention or a swift visit to the local hospital?

And yet for years and years the likes of Burger King, Pizza Hut, Pizza Express and, above all, the allegedly worst culprit Mcdonalds, have been beckoning us into their junk food parlours for too many decades to mention.  Now, one of the world's most famous or infamous restaurants - depending on your point of view, Mcdonalds is one of the most visible burger and French fries eateries in the world. It is a huge, global marketing brand, stretching its influence to every corner of the planet and still at the forefront of everybody's attention where sport is played and money is to be made in the mainstream commercial world.

So what was the attraction of Mcdonalds in the first place? Is it that rather outlandish red sign with that very prominent letter M in yellow that lures us into its golden palace of burgers, chips and everything rich in so called fat. Or do we genuinely believe that if you happen to be rushing around at lunchtime for a comforting snack and you're too busy to buy what seems to be the healthier option then junk food can be the only plausible option?

But we love indulgence and what's wrong with a little gluttony. Besides it can't hurt and who are our wonderful doctors to tell us what's right or wrong for us? Junk food can make you, albeit temporarily, feel good about yourself, a socially acceptable member of the human race and what's the point in going to a party if you're told to refrain from nibbling at the dreaded crisps, savouries and the hundreds of those sandwiches. There can be little to be derived in the way of enjoyment if diets and abstinence are uppermost on your mind.

Yes ladies and gentleman. Today should be a day for riotous junk food eating, stoking up a medieval banquet of food in your garden, digging out the trusty barbecue, throwing thousands of sausages, steaks and burgers onto a sizzling griddle and making hay in the sweltering British summer sun.  You may even be tempted to provide the children with as many boxes of chocolates and sweets as you possibly can, mixing together an enormous bowl of Pimms and then relaxing with a liberal sprinkling of deeply alcohol drinks just for good measure. It is, after all summer, so who cares?

Hold on a minute though. Many of us can still hear those healthy eating do gooders crying out for commonsense and moderation in everything. They believe, perhaps rightly, that junk food can only damage your heart and eventually lead down the road to ruination. It could, quite possibly, play havoc with your blood pressure, leaving you feeling both bloated, heavy and deeply uncomfortable. You'll put on vast amounts of weight, never be able to catch the bus or train and you can forget about that svelte six pack stomach at some very exotic beach.

For today is National Junk Food Day. a day for snacking, comfort eating, abandoning yourself wildly to huge KFC buckets of chicken in abundance, trays of Coca Cola, fizzy lemonade and all of those dreaded fried foods  designed to satisfy that taste sensation, that craving for more and more until you're simply fit to burst.

Then there's the simple matter of ice cream, delicious helpings of ice-cream, the traditional favourite among many of us on those warm, lingeringly hot days of summer when the sun shimmers over the rooftops of the City and suburbia for ever and ever. Ice cream, while never strictly a junk food, still exerts the most powerful hold on children across the world because this is the one treat of the day we're always likely to remember.

This is indeed National Junk Food Day folks, for feasting on mouth watering burgers that look suspiciously like shoe leather and must leave you with a sense that you've been horribly short changed and of course hungrier than ever before.

Of course before we forget, that alluring chocolate cream gateau in the fridge has to be devoured and those Friday night kebabs with gallons of chili sauce have to be wolfed down. Yes folks it's time to celebrate National Junk Food Day with a massive celebration of everything that can only clutter up the kidneys, liver, digestive system and then all of those arteries that keep us ticking over. Sometimes a balance has to be struck, a happy medium met but then the sensitive issue of obesity that is currently pre-occupying us may never ever go away. Anybody for a choc ice.