Welcome to A Better Bag of Groceries, the official blog of the NuVal Nutritional Scoring System. We rate foods on a scale of 1-100, based on their nutrition. The higher the score, the more nutritious the food. There are more than 1,600 supermarkets across the country that use NuVal Scores, and these are seen by millions of shoppers each week.
Throughout this blog, we’ll be making references to the NuVal System and how you can use it to find better foods for you and your family.
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While some of the writers of this blog are registered dietitians, the advice given on this blog should not replace that of a trained physician. NuVal is a system designed to lead customers to the most nutritious food choices. It is not a diet or weight-loss plan. Before starting a diet, you should always consult your personal physician. The opinions expressed in this blog are the opinions of the writers and not necessarily the opinions of NuVal LLC.
I love my job! Where else do I get to embarrass my kids all in the name of work? Today I’m picking on Brooke. Poor dear!
Meet Brooke!
She’s my firstborn and also my first (and only) “almost vegetarian.” I’ll bet you’re wondering what an “almost vegetarian” is, right? Well, around here that means she might eat some chicken and, once a summer, she will put away a brat. But that is where her meat eating stops. The kid has never eaten a cheese burger or a steak. Never.
When Brooke was about 3 years-old, she looked up at me with her big blue eyes and said, with conviction, in her high little voice, “Mommy, I’m a meat vegetarian.” I asked her what she meant by that and she informed me, simply, that she didn’t eat meat. Ok, I thought, where did this come from? No meat? Did Sesame Street have an anti-meat campaign going on that I was not aware of? I then recalled her first years and how she would devour the little jars of sweet potatoes, squash, peas and carrots. I also remembered how she would spit out the tiny bites of beef and chicken. How she would eat the breading off of a corn dog and leave the dog. How could I not see it? She never liked meat.
Please understand her Dad and I were (and are) carnivores. We clearly appreciate a sizzling medium-rare steak fresh off the grill. We eat burgers and brats and turkey legs! Where did we go wrong? And, how long would this last?
What Does a Meat Vegetarian Eat?
Well, here we are today and our “meat vegetarian” is almost 17. She still avoids red meat and loves seafood. She’ll eat an occasional chicken breast, thank goodness! She eats almond butter, yogurt, beans and sushi. She has broadened our palates and helped our meat-loving family members try new foods. She has also consumed many a peanut butter sandwich without complaining as the rest of us ate roast beef.
NuVal® has been a wonderful addition to her diet and ours’. We’ve learned that not all foods are created equally. NuVal helps us compare everything from soup to nuts, so we can see at-a-glance which food items pack the most nutritional punch! We use NuVal to trade-up to more nutritious ingredients in our recipes and inspire us to create healthier meals.
On that note, here’s a delicious pasta recipe Brooke created that even her meat-loving family can appreciate.
Brooke’s Shrimp and Asparagus Pasta
Ingredients:
8 oz. Barilla Plus Pasta (any shape) – Nuval 91
3 Tablespoons Olive Oil – NuVal 11
½ medium yellow onion, sliced - NuVal 93
2 teaspoons garlic, minced - NuVal 91
½ pint cherry tomatoes, halved – NuVal 96
½-1 bunch asparagus spears, cut into 1” pieces (woody ends removed) - NuVal 100
½ pound shrimp (thawed, peeled and deveined) - NuVal 75
6 large fresh basil leaves, chopped (optional) - NuVal 100
Grated parmesean cheese to taste - NuVal 20
Instructions:
Cook pasta according to package directions.
While pasta is cooking, heat the olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Saute onions for a few minutes and add garlic, halved tomatoes and asparagus. Saute a few more minutes being careful not to burn garlic or it will make the dish bitter. Add shrimp and cook until they are pink. Remove from heat. Toss shrimp and veggie mixture with drained pasta and fresh basil. Top with grated parmesean cheese and serve.
Check out these step-by-step photos – courtesy of Bailey Hollencamp.
And there you have it – Brooke’s Shrimp and Asparagus Pasta! Simple, delicious, healthy…and, I have to say what a show-stopper!
Passionate about food and good nutrition, Kelly, a BLEND Program Specialist for CentraCare Health Foundation, is also a mom who wants to set her kids up for a lifetime of good health. The opinions expressed in this blog are the opinions of the writer and not the opinions of NuVal LLC, Coborn’s, Inc., BLEND, and the CentraCare Health Foundation.This blog post is used with permission from our friends at BLEND.
Oh, how I have struggled the past several months. For personal reasons, it’s not been easy to stay on track with a healthy lifestyle. I’ve been fighting this monster for a long, long time, but in reality, the fight never ends for people like me.
It was easy to stay on track when my life was simple. I was single, my kids were on auto-pilot, and my job was great and fulfilling. All I had to do was wake up, eat the same healthy food day after day (I can be a bit of a pattern eater), hit the gym/work out with the trainer, and see the pounds go away.
Now, life is getting in the way – in good and bad ways. I’m married – which is absolutely wonderful – but also challenging as you know. You can’t just live for yourself – even one’s eating habits change. That takes effort and compromise. I’m getting a handle on that, and thankfully, my bride is so supportive!
Like many people in America, my job is ending soon and I’m wondering what’s next. Frankly it scares me. Family and work – everybody has stress from it. Before I know it, I’m out of the routine, and I find myself slipping back into old destructive habits.
Can you relate? I’ll bet you can.
Slowly, I’ve been clawing myself back to the three things that brought me success. They are:
1) Food - I’m going back to the simple things which gave me success. I’m writing them down in a log. My nutritionist has been great for me but I’m expanding my universe a little – reading Bob Harper’s book “The Skinny Rules” as well as some very interesting thoughts on the Paleo diet. The key though is to WRITE IT DOWN. I use “livestrong.com” to write down all my food and activity.
2) Exercise – Cardio and strength training is king. Right now, for me, it’s cardio, cardio, cardio. I’ve had a great personal trainer, so I have a lot of things to pull from. It’s just to get back into the saddle again.
3) Accountability – I can’t do this alone. No one can. We need people to hold us accountable, to ask the hard questions, to give us an alternating pat on the back or kicks in the keister. You are not alone – don’t go it alone. Be accountable.
Everyone has ups and downs – even guys like me who have lost 242 lbs. Life gets in the way. The question is: will it keep us down forever?
I say NO!! How about you?
Lest I forget – since we just celebrated Cinco de Mayo, I came across a really nice guacamole recipe that is simple and tasty. My son, who is 19, was licking the bowl and he’s a picky eater to this day. Check it out – it’s from my RD buddy April Graff who works for Hy-Vee Foods in Mankato – which also uses NuVal.
Remember the “Unjunk Yourself” video? Our blog covered it last year–starring Gabe Katz and other members of the Katz clan, the video is a sleek, fun, and exciting clip encouraging healthy eating.
Well, they’re back with a new video, “The Process”! This video takes its themes from a popular sci-fi movie, but the message is the same: make the right decisions on what you eat! Check it out below!
What do you think of the video? Post in the comments!
A trade-up is a simple way to add more nutrition to your diet. The NuVal Nutritional Scoring System scores foods from 1-100, and higher is better. Why buy a cereal that scores a 10, when there is another one on the shelf that scores a 91? I’ve made a lot of trade-ups since I began shopping with NuVal.
Here are just a few…
Hey Cutie!
Before NuVal, I used to buy the Geisha brand canned mandarin oranges for our girls’ lunch boxes, thinking that they were super high in nutrition. After all, they are just baby oranges, right? I guess I didn’t factor in the sugar water they were canned in. Even though the can says they’re in “light” syrup, they only score a NuVal 15.
I noticed I could gain a few NuVal points by trading-up to Del Monte Mandarin Oranges, packed in water with no sugar added. But, somehow a 23 for a fruit just didn’t seem like a great score.
So, I went fresh. A Cutie (fresh clementine orange) scores 100 on the NuVal scale. Rich in vitamin C and low in calories, Cuties earn a perfect score!
Yogurt I actually LIKE….who knew?
So, those of you who know me know I am not a yogurt lover. It’s not a texture thing. I like puddings. It’s not a dairy thing. I like sour cream and cottage cheese. It’s a flavor thing. To me, most yogurts just taste like spoiled milk. I will eat yogurt in smoothies, provided I can totally mask the flavor with piles of berries and bananas. But, eating plain yogurt…no way!
I really want to like the stuff. It looks tasty and is such a convenient and nutritious treat, packed with calcium and vitamin D. So, I have been on a quest to learn to like yogurt. I’ve tasted (and often gagged on) many brands and flavors with no success.
Last weekend, at the Earth Day Run – BLEND Kids Health and Fitness Expo, we gave out samples of Food Club Light Vanilla Yogurt (71) topped with Bear Naked Fit Triple Berry Crunch Granola (91) to kids and families attending the Earth Day Run events. By late afternoon, my stomach was growling. Because we were setting up the booth, I had skipped lunch. Hunger was setting in. And, the kids sampling the yogurt were ooohing and aahhing over how tasty it was.
I have to admit, it looked good. So, I gave it a shot, figuring the sample was small and I had a water bottle nearby to wash it down if it was terrible. And, guess what? I liked it. It was creamy and vanilla-y and, well, I was hungry. The crunchy granola topping didn’t hurt either
The range of NuVal scores for yogurts is 11-100, with the average yogurt scoring 44. Many of those “fruit on the bottom” kinds bottom-out in their scores as well. So with that in mind, here are some Food Club Yogurt examples…
While I did like the Light Vanilla at a 71, I am not ready to trade-up any higher to the Food Club Plain yogurt just yet, even if it does score a 100.
Here’s hoping you make a great trade-up this week!
And, as always, thanks so much for reading my blog.
Kelly
Passionate about food and good nutrition, Kelly, a BLEND Program Specialist for CentraCare Health Foundation, is also a mom who wants to set her kids up for a lifetime of good health. The opinions expressed in this blog are the opinions of the writer and not the opinions of NuVal LLC, Coborn’s, Inc., BLEND, and the CentraCare Health Foundation.This blog post is used with permission from our friends at BLEND.
When I was a kid, I used to watch Col. Hogan and his POW gang disrupt the Nazi war machine in the Sit-com “Hogan’s Heroes.” Through a combination of a dim-witted enemy and clever sabotage, Hogan’s Heroes single-handedly ruined the war efforts of our WWII enemy and saved the day!
I’m all-too familiar with the concept of Sabotage. Any one who has taken up the challenge of pursuing a healthier lifestyle, especially in the area of diet, has encountered Sabotage. And in most of the cases – I am the dim-wit over-eater being out-flanked by Col. Calorie and the rest of his lard-butted saboteurs.
According to the all-knowing Wikipedia dictionary, Sabotage is a deliberate action aimed at weakening another entity through subversion, obstruction, disruption, or destruction.
A deliberate action aimed at weakening… The things that sabotage my efforts at leading a more healthy lifestyle are vast and varied – from a response to family and work issues – to moments of stress-induced weakness combined with opportunity.
My weapon for defeating sabotage is getting back into a healthy routine as soon as you can. Defeating a life-time of unhealthy habits is tough, and failures are bound to happen. Yet routine – a normal, healthy eating routine is the key to victory. Start the day right. If you fall to sabotage – get right back into a good routine. You can do it – don’t give in to sabotage.
One of my sabotage-busting routines is a healthy breakfast that snorts in the face of one of the biggest saboteurs of my past – McDonalds. In my 600 lb days, I started every day going through Ronnie’s drive-thru for 2 sausage egg McMuffins with cheese, a breakfast burrito, and, of course – a DIET Coke (to counter-balance my calorie laden intake, of course…. it just makes sense, doesn’t it?)
But now – every morning, I give the proverbial raspberry to that calorie laden Mickey-D’s breakfast with my own healthy version – which includes a lower calorie english muffin, toasted – Ground turkey Breakfast sausage – egg or egg substitute and 2% reduced calorie cheddar cheese. Total calorie is right around 300 cals, give or take.
Of course, the best thing about my sabotage-busting Turkey sausage McMuffin with Egg is that it is awesomely delicious and Nu-Val-itful!!
What are the things that try to sabotage your efforts toward a healthy lifestyle? What do you do to defeat them? If you have a chance, leave your comments so we can all learn and grow!!
Here’s to victory over sabotage. Have a great rest of the week!
The NuVal Nutritional Scoring System gives nutritional guidance to consumers frustrated with complicated nutrition labels and misleading packaging promises. Under NuVal, all foods and beverages are rated on a scale between 1 to 100. The higher the score, the higher the overall nutrition.
Awards
A Better Bag of Groceries was recently named by Medical Assistant Colleges as a Top 50 Blog for Understanding and Preventing Childhood Obesity. Hooray!
