Meal Planning
Planning meals ahead helps ensure you eat a variety of these daily.
What are fruits and vegetables?
This diet avoids all animal products, including meat, dairy, and eggs.
What is a vegan diet?
This part of the label tells you how much food counts as one portion.
What is the serving size?
These two types of fats should generally be limited in the diet because they can raise LDL (“bad”) cholesterol.
What are saturated fat and trans fat?
This document provides science-based advice to promote health and prevent chronic diseases for Americans.
What are the Dietary Guidelines for Americans (2025–2030)?
To control sodium, added sugar, and saturated fat, meal planning often involves checking these on packaged foods.
What are nutrition labels?
People following this diet do not eat meat but may eat dairy and eggs.
What is a vegetarian diet?
This number shows how much energy you get from one serving of the food.
What are calories?
This type of fat is often found naturally in foods like butter, cheese, and fatty cuts of meat.
What is saturated fat?
These two nutrients are often under-consumed and emphasized for bone health.
What are calcium and vitamin D?
Planning meals for a week and creating this can help reduce impulse purchases of less healthy foods.
What is a shopping list?
This diet emphasizes fruits, vegetables, whole grains, fish, and olive oil and is common in countries like Greece and Italy.
What is the Mediterranean diet?
This percentage on the label helps you understand how much a nutrient contributes to your daily diet.
What is % Daily Value (%DV)?
This type of fat is commonly created during food processing through hydrogenation and is found in some baked goods and fried foods.
What is trans fat?
The guidelines recommend limiting added sugars to less than this percentage of daily calories.
What is 10%?
The guidelines recommend making at least half of your grains this type for better nutrition.
What are whole grains?
This diet focuses on reducing sodium to help lower blood pressure.
What is the DASH diet?
If a food has 20% or more of the Daily Value for a nutrient, it is considered this.
What is high in that nutrient?
This type of fat is considered the most harmful for heart health because it raises LDL cholesterol and lowers HDL cholesterol.
What is trans fat?
Mindful eating and planning meals can help manage this chronic health risk.
What is obesity and related diseases?
Including a mix of protein sources, fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and dairy in each meal ensures adequate intake of these.
What are essential nutrients?
This diet focuses on increasing protein intake to support muscle growth, repair, and overall body function.
What is a High-Protein Diet?
This nutrient should generally be limited because too much can increase the risk of high blood pressure.
What is sodium?
On a nutrition label, health experts recommend aiming for this amount of trans fat per day.
What is as close to 0 grams as possible?
Limit sodium intake to less than this amount per day for adults.
What is 2,300 mg?