There are a lot of reasons why nutrition and meal prep can be intimidating, especially when it comes to making a healthy grocery list or with figuring out the best way to shop for food. It doesn’t have to be! We are here to help you come up with the easiest way to focus on nutritious food while shopping.
Healthy Grocery List
What does your cart look like when you shop? There are three major ideas I want you to focus on when it comes to how to shop, where to shop, and what your cart should look like.
I’ll start by saying that there is a time and place for “organic” foods in your cart. There is also an understanding that not everyone can shop for organic foods, and that’s okay. Today we are going to talk about the types of food, and not so much organic or not.
Three areas of focus for a healthy grocery list:
- Limit processed and canned foods (raw and fresh or frozen without additives)
- Focus on the greens and protein sources in your cart
- Scope of out the perimeter first, and stay away from the inner aisles when possible
Limiting processed and canned foods helps with your grocery list for a multiple reasons. Not only does it help make sure you are that getting the foods with the most nutrients, it also helps you stay away from foods that are higher in additives (like sodium). The sodium and preservatives in processed foods can severely impact the nutritional value of the foods that you are adding to your healthy grocery list.
Focusing on the greens and protein portions of your cart is key. If you look at your cart and it isn’t full of fresh color, you are probably missing a few elements from it. Make sure to have at least one leafy green in your cart. Add in some other vegetables to fill in your meals with like bell peppers, squash, etc… and you have a much more colorful cart than before. Frozen vegetables, especially the kind in the steam packs, are also not bad. Make sure to look at the ingredient deck to check for added sodium or preservatives. Some have them, others do not.
Lean proteins (something you also find on the outer perimeter of the store) are really important as well. These can also be frozen, especially if it’s something you want to buy in a larger quantity. Shrimp is something that I always buy frozen, because it is pure protein and really easy to use from a frozen state, while still maintaining the nutrients. Chicken, ground meats, and salmon are some of the things that I always buy fresh, because I think they cook better and you can choose your cuts of meat, leanness, etc…
Something that might come in handy (that my training partner does) is focus on getting all of the canned/boxed/processed things to fit in just the front portion of your cart. If you have a larger family, this might not always work. But, you could still use the idea to help you maintain and keep track of all of the canned and processed foods for your own meal prep, outside of any extras that you get for your family or children.
Implementing these three steps won’t give you the perfect, exact healthy grocery list that you need. Guess what? We can help with the rest! If you need more ideas on meal prep, detailed grocery lists and foods to shop for, or just a start to your specific macro meal plan, feel free to reach out. We are here to help and we LOVE to chat about food.
– Joanna
