Tuesday evening I had the opportunity to work with the American Diabetes Association in Indianapolis and put on a grocery store tour at a local Fresh Thyme store on 82nd Street. It was a great opportunity to help provide people who some healthy tips about navigating the grocery store. It can be extremely challenging to know what items to purchase, what is the best time to buy certain fresh produce, what wheat bread means and how alcohol may affect your blood sugar if you are diabetic. These are all issues that you can run into while navigating the grocery store.

Here are some great tips to help you next time you head to the grocery store:

Make out a plan for the week. It helps to know what recipes you want to prepare at home during the week. I dislike having to go back to the grocery because I forgot something, so make sure you make a plan. Then planning out your meals/recipes for the week will help to create your grocery list.
That is a good segue into the second point. Always make a list! This is a must. You can't head out of the house without a list of things that you actually need. Check the items in your pantry and refrigerator and only put the items on your list that you need.
When you get to the grocery, stick with that list. Don't get distracted by the tempting foods, only purchase the items that you wrote down on your list. This also will help to stick with a budget and may help to save you some money.
Shop the perimeter of the grocery store. In most traditional grocery stores the fresh produce, meat and dairy items are located on the outside of the shopping area. All of the processed food items are in the middle items/freezer sections.
Purchase produce that is in season. This is important to help make sure you are getting delicious produce and not spending too much money on fresh fruits/vegetables. There is a great chart that is put out by Purdue --> Click here for the Harvest Calendar for Indiana.