The Maggie diet - whisky, spinach and 28 eggs a week

In shape for power: Mrs Thatcher kept trim while at Number 10 with a diet consisting of 28 eggs a week

She fought hard to get the nation's finances back in trim.



But only now can the secret of Margaret Thatcher's own diet be revealed - 28 eggs a week.

The eggs, along with cucumber, spinach, tomatoes, steak and the odd swig of whisky, went towards a strict meal regime that promised to help her shed 20lb in two weeks.

On the brink of becoming Britain's first woman Prime Minister in 1979, the then Mrs Thatcher was said to be keen to lose weight in time for her historic photocall outside No 10.

Her crash diet plan was found typed on a sheet of yellowing paper folded up and tucked inside her 1979 personal diary.

The black leather Economist pocket diary - which also recorded her appointments such as '9.15am Hair' - is one of hundreds of her private documents being made available to the public from today.

The files, never seen before, have been released by the Margaret Thatcher Foundation and give a fascinating glimpse behind the scenes of the Iron Lady's first few months in Downing Street.

The diet included a daily breakfast of grapefruit, one or two eggs, black coffee or clear tea. Two eggs were served in each weekday lunch, while steak, lamb chops and fish were the staple of most dinners.

The majority of items were ticked off - but small crosses appeared next to some.

The neatly-folded piece of paper also warned the diet should not be followed for more than two weeks.

Historian Chris Collins, of the Foundation, said: 'It would have been before the election. I think she was looking to get in trim for the cameras. But she didn't need to, she never had a weight problem.'

As a woman, however, Lady Thatcher faced different expectations to her predecessors. In an interview at the time, she claimed she had 'no special dieting regime' and wore size 14 dresses and weighed nineanda-half stone.

Mr Collins said it was the first time a Prime Minister's personal notes had been made public during their lifetime. He said: 'The papers show what it was like to be at No 10, rather than just the policy stuff, which, however important, doesn't give the full picture.'

Many of the files can be viewed online at www.margaretthatcher.org

MY FACE ON A TEA TOWEL? NO WAY

A horrified Lady Thatcher gave a handbagging to an aide who wanted to capitalise on her election victory with tacky Iron Lady souvenirs.

Tea towels, mugs and postcards bearing her face were among the suggestions put forward by Conservative Central Office.



Five days after the Tories swept to power on May 4, 1979, Gordon Reece, a senior aide at Central Office, wrote a note saying: 'This is not a matter that we would want to worry the Prime Minister about but I am inundated with requests to have Mrs Thatcher's features reproduced on teacups, drying up towels, postcards et alia.'





He added: 'So far I have only agreed to one representation for the Iron Lady to be on one side of a pint pot and the Iron Duke on another.'

But the mere suggestion aroused indignation in Lady Thatcher, who scrawled in the margin: 'How come? Without any reference to me?'



Where Mr Reece said he saw 'no basic objection to allowing these things to go ahead', she wrote: 'NO permission to be given at all on any goods of any kind. Don't mind a straight photograph. MT.'

I WILL MAKE THE DECISIONS

Two years before seizing power, Lady Thatcher had already decided there was only one person capable of making all the decisions - herself.

Lady Thatcher's diet was found typed up on sheets of yellowing paper, above and below, in her 1979 diary





A memo on 'structure and strategy' written in August 1977 revealed her confidence at being able to boot out James Callaghan's Labour government.



She wrote: 'It is most important that we get the structure and strategy right and I have already come to the conclusion that I shall have to take most of the major decisions myself.'



BRUSSELS BEWARE

Long before her famous clashes in Europe, Lady Thatcher was spoiling for a fight, the files reveal.

European Community bureaucrats-were 'paid much too much', she wrote in 1979, incensed that senior administration staff received £52,529 - while the British Prime Minister received £33,000.

Lady Thatcher scribbled on a letter from her Parliamentary Private Secretary John Stanley: 'They are paid much too much - from our taxpayers' money! It looks like a real gravy-train.'

ERIC, THE GOOD LOOKING ONE

Lady Thatcher's aides wrote brief descriptions of celebrities who had sent her congratulations, in case she had never heard of them.





Comedian Eric Morecambe was 'the good looking one - not the one with the short fat hairy legs'.

Lulu, Barbara Cartland and Peter Sellers also added their congratulations. 'As an ex-Goon from East Finchley I send you many congratulations on your marvellous victory,' Sellers wrote.

Mrs Thatcher's backers also included Henry Cooper, Barbara Windsor, Petula Clark and footballers Gerry Francis and Bobby Moore.

DRAGGING DENIS TO DINNER

Long-suffering Denis Thatcher wasn't always happy to go along to official dinners, the files disclose.

His frustration boiled when officials roped him into an evening at Claridge's for a black tie reception hosted by the President of Indonesia.

A note from No10 diary secretary Caroline Stephens tells Mr Thatcher: 'Another dreaded State Banquet I'm afraid,' explaining she had accepted for him.