Christian SAHM's Whole Foods Grocery Guide

Label-free, whole foods are complete with natural, biodegradable, and sometimes even edible packaging. It works out that they're the best ones for your health, too! Good for your body, your wallet, and the environment. Isn't God an amazing designer and problem solver?

Buy at least two whole foods of each color and at least one leafy green vegetable for each day. Foods of the same color have similar nutritional compositions. You should buy at least two red, orange, yellow, white, green, purple, and blue foods.

Chop and cook them all at once. Next, freeze the cooked foods to eat later. This will help prevent waste from spoilage. Chop some of the veggies and fruits up every few days and separate them into baggies for snacking. Stay-at-home moms are more prone to eating due to habit or just because food is there. It's okay to do this provided that it's a healthy item. As a matter of fact, snacking is great for weight loss. It keeps your blood sugar regulated and keeps you from overeating at meal time. You'll be more likely to grab your fruits and veggies and munch on them in the middle of the day if they're already chopped.

Complex carbohydrates

Look for products with whole wheat as first ingredient (pasta, bread, English muffins). Buy whole grains such as brown rice and whole grain cereals. Your stop-word for carbohydrates is "enriched". This simply means the food started as a whole grain, had all the good stuff stripped from it, and was then "enriched" with a small amount of some good ingredients. Don't buy many enriched foods. Make half the grains you eat every day whole grains.

Fiber-Rich Foods

Fiber that is important for managing your weight. In order to make sure we get enough fiber each day, buy a fiber-dense cereal like the ones made by Fiber One. Some of them have more than half of the fiber we need each day in just one cup! Measure a cup of cereal and separate them into snack baggies for each day of the week. Then add your favorite goodies to enhance the taste such as Craisins, raisins, nuts, Honey Nut Cheerios or whatever you feel like having. Then all you have to do is finish one little baggie by the end of the day. It's a lot harder to get too hungry and overeat when you're munching on fiber-rich snacks between meals.