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Going Grocery Shopping
Sarah Bowser
April, '09
Sarah Bowser is a northeast
Kansas ag producer and Kansas Farm Bureau Promotion and
Ag Education Committee Member.
In the middle of your long
list of weekly “to-dos” is grocery shopping. Yes, you
might be a super hero but the likelihood of you
personally raising all of your daily nutrition in the
backyard is not high. And since basic human survival is
sustained on nutrition rich calorie consumption we must
pack up our list each week and head to the store.
Grocery shopping
incorporates so many demands into one list: your
cravings, your health-kick, your life-style needs, and
your ability to best meet these needs without breaking
the bank. With food trends and contradicting information
floating everywhere it is difficult to feel confident in
the decisions we make as we stroll through the store.
To best arm yourself in the
driver seat of the grocery cart I would like to refer
you to the United States Department of Agriculture’s
(USDA) food pyramid. This pyramid breaks down the basics
of a health diet and reminds us in the mist of our
shopping complication that a balanced diet that avoids
oils and fats is our best choice.
There is another realm of
complication in our weekly chore. Organic, natural,
reduced fat, fat free, and many other labels fill our
product packaging. What do these labels mean? Sometimes
labels do not tell the whole story, and knowing what the
labels mean is important for making decisions. So does
“reduced” fat make a product healthy? Not necessarily.
For instance, if you take the second coat of glaze off
of a donut, you probably will still not be able to
convince your doctor that this is a healthy diet staple.
Also, it is important for consumers to know and
understand what different labels mean. For instance,
what is organic food? If you just read all of the
descriptions that accompany the word, you would come to
the conclusion that it is a food group that is
equivalent to the fountain of youth. In reality though
it is food raised without fertilizer or pesticides –
this means that these crops are affected by things like
insects. So you must make your own decisions on what
fits your needs.
Whatever the label is or
new diet fad, there is one easy rule. The rule of “no
quick fixes, and no magic wands.” Eat good nutritional
foods, and eat a balance. Shop with practicality and an
open mind. At the end of the day though, smart consumer
choices can be made by following the food pyramid and
eating a balanced variety. So as you head out to check
off your weekly “to-do” list, use common sense and
follow the food pyramid.
See the food
pyramid at:
www.mypyramid.gov
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