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How to Shop Healthy at Grocery Store
By Shaun Swilling
Whether you are trying to lose fat, gain muscle or just improve your fitness level you need to eat correctly if you want the hard work that you put in at the gym to work. But it can be time consuming reading all the nutritional values on the product you are purchasing.
Just like your training, shopping needs to be planned if you want to get results. From losing fat to gaining muscle if you are counting calories or just trying to eat better to improve your health you need to have the required foodstuffs in your kitchen, if your fridge or pantry is empty you will wind up just grabbing a burger and fries.
But if you plan ahead and make a list of foods you want to purchase before you get to the grocery store, you will be prepared. First you need to decide what your short-term objective is so that you know before you get to the grocer what kinds of carbohydrates you want to buy as well as the protein and fat.
Dietitians tell us that it is always a good idea to try some new fruit or vegetable that you have never tried before. Fruits and vegetables are usually free foods that will not add a lot of calories to your meal if they are prepared correctly. A good example is the difference between a fried egg and a boiled egg.
A fried egg in butter or margarine will be 220 calories but a boiled egg will only be 70 calories so you can see that the preparation of the foods you eat are a vitally important factor if you are trying to lose fat and gain muscle. Ideally you should eat fresh fruits and vegetables every day.
However when purchasing packaged and processed foods one should always be very careful with canned vegetables or other foods to check for salt content and the sugar content. Both are effective preservatives but they obviously increase the calorie content dramatically.
Always look out for trans fats both saturated and unsaturated as this will increase the calorie count of the processed food by more than double. Your source of good fiber will come from peas, beans, bananas, oranges, strawberries and apples. Good complex carbs will come from raw or slightly cooked snacks like celery sticks, carrots or broccoli.
If you are the type who likes desserts then stick to fresh or canned fruits without any added sugar or some form of gelatin containing fruit instead of just stuffing yourself with pastry and baked desserts and sweets. If you already have something in your kitchen then you will not rush out to purchase junk food.
The last point when trying to shop healthy at the local grocer is to stop buying any and all fruit juice as it provides no fiber like fruit offers. Fruit juice is just a drink loaded with calories that is only going to add to your daily calorie consumption without offering the benefit of important fiber.