Overcome Challenges to Healthy Eating
It can be challenging to shop, cook, and eat well. Here are some common challenges and ways to cope with them.
Common Challenges
Challenge:
- Shopping this way costs too much.
Solutions:
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Use coupons
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Buy in bulk
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Buy things on sale
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Grow your own veggies and fruit.
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Buy frozen veggies, fruit and proteins
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Shop seasonally-only buy the veggies and fruit in season.
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Shop at your local farmer’s market
Challenge:
- Shopping and cooking this way takes up too much time.
Solution:
To free up time in general:
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Be more organized.
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Ask friends or family to help you get things done.
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Take your kids with you to the grocery store and turn it into a fun field trip.
To find time to shop for healthy food:
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Shop on the weekend.
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Shop in bulk.
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Use a list to make sure you get everything you need quickly.
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Buy healthy convenience items, like prewashed salad and veggies.
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Shop online and get it delivered to avoid going to the store.
To find time to cook healthy food:
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Look for recipes for fast, healthy meals.
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Do some prep work before work in the morning.
Buy ready-made healthy items like premade meals or salad kits.
Challenge:
- I don’t like the way this food tastes.
Solution:
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Change your favorite dishes to make them healthier.
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Choose cheeses that are strong- tasting and fairly low in fat, such as Parmesan and feta.
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Choose high quality items (like organic meat and produce)
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Choose items with a variety of flavors, textures, scents, and colors.
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Cook veggies like green beans and broccoli lightly, so they stay crisp and colorful.
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Dress up food with herbs, spices, lemon juice, vinegar, hot sauce, chutneys, and salsa.
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Grill or roast veggies and meat to bring out the flavor.
Challenge:
- It’s unpleasant boring, hard to shop, cook, and eat this way.
Solution:
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Shop, cook, and eat healthy with friends and family.
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Learn new cooking methods and recipes from books, articles, and videos. Or take a healthy cooking class.
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Experiment with new ingredients.
