Healthy Grocery Shopping - Tips For Choosing Nutrient Dense Foods

I just made my way home from the natural organic market. I had to pick up a few grocery items and most importantly, I went to their deli and I picked up a nice meal for tonight. This article will provide a little glimpse into some healthy grocery shopping tips along with some nutrient dense food choices and healthy eating steps when you're at the grocery store.

I had to bring my reusable grocery bag when I went shopping today since I like to do my part for the environment. The item I chose from the deli area was an excellent salad and some nice cut up avocado, carrots, cucumbers, a blend of spinach, and some romaine lettuce. I always like to get the dressing on the side so I can kind of control how much I put on the salad. The dressing for this salad is the ultimate dressing that is healthy and tastes amazing. It is a blend of olive oil, lemon juice, and garlic. It's very simple with not a lot of extra salt or strange flavors added. Just some good quality fat and some nice lemon for flavor. It's a very large salad but there's nothing wrong with that since it contains healthy ingredients. Along with all the veggies in the salad, I also like to get some extra protein so I got a lentil burger that's cut up and mixed in with the salad. A big salad like this isn't too expensive either. A lot of this stuff is in season in the warm summer months. It's a pretty good, solid and healthy to-go meal. It's easy, fairly inexpensive and it's super nutritious.

The next item I picked up at the organic grocery story was a beverage called Hint and basically what that means is it's water with a hint of lime flavor. No extra sugars or anything strange like that so it's pretty much water and lime. It's good stuff to get rehydrated especially in the warm, summer months. I did a lower body workout today so I need my extra hydration. One of my favorite milk beverages is called Almond Breeze. I prefer the unsweetened variety. It's excellent to mix with your favorite protein powder also. You can pour a little bit of this on oats in the morning or whatever you desire. You can make a smoothie also. It's nice because it's not loaded with calories and it provides a nice almond flavor. Plus, you get some nutritional benefit from almonds, such as a little bit of nice monounsaturated fats and even a little bit of protein. You can get it sweetened too but that will just add up to some extra sugar calories. I prefer the unsweetened variety.

When I was at the store, I had to buy my bulk oats also. I chose organic since I always like to choose organic products when possible. I like to buy in bulk because it's extremely cheap since you can save on the cost of packaging. A nice large bag of oats will last me a while and it cost me less than $1.50 which is very inexpensive. Whenever you start stocking up on whole grains like brown rice and yams, you can buy them in bulk and save a ton of money!

I also picked up a pound of collard greens, carrots, onions, a nice vegetable mix, along with a little bit of olive oil and garlic to give them some flavor. What I like to do on Sunday is prepare my meals for the week up until Wednesday. Then on Wednesday, I pick up my last two meals for the week. A pound of veggies doesn't set you back too much in the cost department plus it's super nutritious. You can't go wrong eating a bunch of vegetables as well as some healthy fats.

I picked up a couple of yams at the store also. I really like to have yams either first thing in the morning or right after my workouts just because they're a little more dense in carbohydrates and they taste excellent! You can't beat these when you bake them in the oven for about 45 minutes at around 425 degrees. Open them up, put a little maple syrup on there or some brown sugar along with a little cinnamon and even some blueberries or walnuts. Just make sure and have a protein shake on the side and you'll be good to go.

For fruit, I picked up a couple of apples. I always have apples on hand since they are my favorite fruit. They are super easy to grab, easy to pack and easy to bring them to work or to school. Have them with a little bit of all natural peanut butter for some protein and healthy fat.

Finally, I picked up nice chewing sticks. Otherwise known as toothpicks. I like the cinnamon variety. These are kind of nice. I kicked the gum habit a little while ago since I was kind of going nuts with sugar free gum. I like toothpicks since they help clean my teeth after a nice meal.

I'm going to make sure and store my refrigerated items in the fridge so I don't have the potential to get any food borne illnesses. I'm sure everybody knows the healthy temperature in the fridge because we all have our fridge thermometers, right? Well, the answer is to keep your fridge between 34 to 40 degrees. Get your fridge thermometer and make sure it falls within that range and you will protect yourself from food borne illness. I hope you got some great tips out of this article to help you utilize and enjoy healthy grocery shopping.

By Ryan Andrews