Smart Shopping Tips for Healthy Family.

Meal time is fun family time.All family members come together during meal time. Planning your meals a head of time will give you an opportunity to feed your family members healthy,delicious and nutritional meals. What you put end of your fork will decide your health. This month I would like to discuss with you some smart ideas to create a healthy kitchen pantry.

1. Keep your pantry free from processed food like potato chips,ready to eat meals,deep fried snacks etc.
2. Avoid Aisles in your grocery mart. Focus your shopping on circumference of the mart. Shop produce section as much as possible.
3. While purchasing a  groceries make sure you check the ingredients list. Prefer food products that have  fewer ingredients. Select products with five or less ingredients.
4. The major ingredient in the product will be listed first in the ingredient list. For example if enriched flour is listed first in ingredient list, it indicates that enriched flour is added in highest quantity.
5. Avoid products that contain enriched wheat flour, high fructose corn syrup(HFCS),Colors, preservatives, any thing in Greek and Latin.
6. Be cautious about hidden sugars and salts. Dextrose, maltose, are other forms of sugars added in food products. Avoid products that contain these forms of sugars. Salts are present as monosodiumglutamate. Take time to check this list.
7. While purchasing canned food prefer sodium free and sugar free products.
8. While shopping produce section follow dirty dozens and clean 15 list. Prefer organic produce for foods that come under dirty dozen and you can go for normal produce for clean 15 foods. Here is list for you.

• Dirty Dozens:                                 

1. Apples
2. Celery
3. Sweet bell peppers
4. Peaches
5. Strawberries
6. Nectarines (imported)
7. Grapes
8. Spinach
9. Lettuce
10. Cucumber
11. Blueberries
12. Potatoes

• Clean 15 :

1. Onion
2. Sweet corn
3. Pineapple
4. Avocado
5. Cabbage
6. Sweet peas
7. Asparagus
8. Mangoes
9. Egg plant
10. Kiwi
11. Cantaloupe (domestic)
12. Sweet potato
13. Grape fruit
14. Water melon
15. Mushrooms

9. Prefer to purchase seasonal produce. It is healthy,economical and pollutant free.
10.It is better to purchase salsa than ketchup.You can avoid preservatives and improve your veggie servings. Aim to have 3 servings(100 gms/serving) of vegetables and 2 servings of fruit a day.

References:
1. http://www.ewg.org/foodnews/summary/