Those who add potatoes - which are carb-rich and dense - to their plate become full faster, therefore preventing them from trying to fill up on more calorific foods after. .

Meals should be based on potatoes, bread, rice, pasta or other starchy carbohydrates, ideally wholegrain, according to the NHS.

• Base meals on potatoes, bread, rice, pasta or other starchy carbohydrates, ideally wholegrain.

But they also contain up to half the calories of bread, pasta and rice, when eaten in the same quantities. 

But researchers were quick to point out that the method of cooking and preparing the potatoes is important — and that eating chips and crisps should be avoided, since frying lowers the nutritional value. 

Study co-author Professor Candida Rebello, a dietitian at Pennington Biomedical Research Centre in Baton Rouge, Louisiana in the US, said: 'People tend to eat the same weight of food regardless of calorie content in order to feel full

But because food weight is a cue that impacts how much people eat, the researchers believed that those eating the low-energy dense food — meaning it contains few calorie per gram — would feel fuller faster

For the eight-week study, the participants all ate 85g of meat or fish at lunch and dinner, with either 57g of potatoes or 57g of cooked pulses with bread, rice or pasta

Those eating potatoes boiled them with the skin still on and then refrigerated them for 12 to 24 hours — with the cooling process increasing their fibre content and lowering the blood glucose response the potatoes usually trigger. 

The results, published in the Journal of Medicinal Food, suggest the diets contained equal health benefits — regardless of whether people had potatoes or pulses