Healthy shopping advice for people with type 2 diabetes

With smart choices at the grocery store, people with type 2 diabetes can eat right.

So how can patients make healthy and delicious food choices at the store? Two diabetes educators give their advice.

Make a plan: Before you go to the store, take 5 minutes to decide what you want to cook next week and make a rough note of the ingredients you need. Afroz Subedar, a registered dietitian at the University of California, San Francisco, says this simple but helpful step is worth the time patients take to complete. “The list helps patients focus without being tempted by other foods,” she says.

Stay outside the store more often: Spend most of your time around the perimeter of the store, where fresh foods, including fruits and vegetables, dairy products, meat, chicken and fish, are often available. The shelves inside the store are stocked with packaged foods that are more processed and more likely to cause temptation. Of course, there will be some nutritious options on the shelves (such as canned tuna, beans and oatmeal). It’s just a matter of patients making strategic choices on the internal shelves – aiming for healthy foods.

Refer to your grandmother’s choices: When shopping, patients ask themselves: Are these foods that great-grandparents would recognize? “Think about how our ancestors ate 100 years ago,” says Maureen McGrath, a registered nurse, also from UCSF. “In the past, there was no frozen or processed food.” In the cereal aisle, think about how your great-grandmother probably never had a doughnut or cereal for breakfast, but she probably had some porridge or oatmeal.

Eat dark foods: Pick a dark food bar. That means choosing spinach instead of curly lettuce, sweet potatoes instead of white potatoes, brown or wild rice instead of white rice, and healthy whole wheat bread instead of white bread. Brightly colored vegetables are usually more nutritious than light-colored vegetables. Whole-wheat bread, brown rice and whole-wheat pasta contain more fiber than comparable white foods, which helps balance patients’ blood sugar and leads to higher levels of satisfaction.

Reconsider drinks: Take sugary drinks like juice, soda and sports drinks out of your shopping cart. These beverages are a major source of non-nutritional calories, as well as “pure liquid carbohydrates that can significantly raise blood sugar,” Subedar says. Instead, choose tea bags and lemon and make your own unique low-sugar iced tea. Or try a calorie-free soda, or buy some lemons and cucumbers to make your own favorite drink.

Find the right snack: Have some afternoon snacks on hand. Remember that “snacks don’t have to be packaged,” says Subedar. Instead of chips, crackers or ceviche, choose real food: half a turkey sandwich, a handful of nuts, a Greek yogurt. “I like different food groups for snacks,” Subedar says.

Consult your doctor