How To Grocery Shop For Healthy Food I What To Buy At The Grocery Store To Lose Weight
In this instructional video, Eric Roberts explains how to create a sustainable, health‑focused grocery routine. He begins by emphasizing that the home environment drives food choices, urging viewers to audit their kitchen and keep nutritious options on hand. He then introduces a simple decision‑making framework for selecting foods: ask whether an item grew from the ground, flew, swam, or roamed, using this to prioritize nutrient‑dense whole foods and apply an 80/20 rule (80 % whole foods, 20 % treats). Roberts stresses the value of reading nutrition labels to compare protein, calories, and fat content, and he demystifies frozen foods, showing that frozen vegetables, rice, spinach, and sweet‑potato fries can be just as nutrient‑dense as fresh versions. The core of the video is a step‑by‑step construction of a grocery list, broken into categories: 4‑8 protein sources (e.g., chicken breast, lean ground beef, salmon, eggs, Greek yogurt), 3‑6 carbohydrate sources (sweet potatoes, rice, oatmeal, assorted fruit, rice cakes), 2‑5 fat sources (extra‑virgin olive oil, avocado, nut butter, plus inherent fats in protein foods), 3‑6 vegetable sources (spinach, peppers, asparagus, mixed veggies, frozen options), and 3‑6 snack ideas (Greek yogurt, beef jerky, tuna packets, fruit, pickles, rice cakes with toppings). Throughout, he encourages viewers to write down their own lists, shop with a plan, and maintain consistency to support weight‑loss, muscle‑gain, or general health goals. The video ends with a call to action to like, subscribe, and engage in the comments.
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All right. YouTube, what is going on? Welcome back to the channel. Welcome to this video. In this video today, we are going to be talking about healthy grocery shopping 101. I'm gonna give you 3 main things to think about, and then we are literally going to build your healthy grocery shopping list. Seriously, go get a pen, go get a piece of paper. We're gonna be working through things in this video. It's like high school. We're going back to high school. We're doing homework. This is so fun, but this is actually gonna help you in your life, unlike high school. I digress. High school's great, but I just didn't really like it. In this video, that's what we're gonna do. Seriously, go grab a pen, go grab a piece of paper. We're gonna dive into some things here. Number 1, quickly starting off. The reason healthy grocery shopping is important, you probably know why it is, but the reason that it's important, because one of the biggest rules of nutrition is your environment is going to dictate your actions. Your environment leads to your actions. If you have nothing but chips, cookies, fast food, all of those things in the house, Well, guess what? You're probably going to eat those said foods. And that's not to say those foods are bad because we know, you and I both know, there are no good and bad foods. But with that being said, if you don't have healthy foods in the house, how are you going to eat said healthy foods? They're not there. So, setting your environment up for success is a big thing. Like for example, something I do oftentimes with my clients is If they're having a lot of trouble, you know, eating certain foods, not eating certain foods, whatever the case may be, I'll ask them to take an audit of their kitchen counter. You know, what foods are on your kitchen counter? What foods are readily available to you? Do you have nothing but chips and pretzels and brownies and sweets and treats? Or do you have a big bowl of fruit? Do you have, you know, low-calorie snacks there that you can kind of grab and go, right? Because your environment is going to dictate your actions. Let's be honest, with all that you have going on between kids and work and a social life and school and all these things, all these responsibilities that you have to do during your day, you only have but so much willpower. So if you get to the end of the day and you're like, oh, these pretzels look pretty good, these chips look pretty good, those cookies I bought the other day, those donuts look pretty good— again, not to say you can't have those things, but if that's what your environment is, You're going to lead towards that. Your environment's gonna dictate your actions that much more. So making sure you have these foods in the house. And again, if you don't have— if you wanna make a great healthy dish for dinner and you're super stoked and there's no food there, well then how the hell are you going to make said healthy dinner because you don't have the foods you need to make this dinner? What happens then? You go off and get fast food. So, Making sure you have this grocery shopping list available to you and you have these foods inside of your house, that is going to set your environment up for support and success. And so again, that is one of the number one rules of nutrition. Your environment is going to dictate your actions. So make sure you have these foods in the house. And very quickly, I will just say, sometimes people will be like, oh, well, you know, Friday, Saturday, Sunday rolls around and I'm getting really low on foods and, you know, I just kind of grab whatever then. I understand, but just buy more food. Like, if you grocery shop from Monday to Monday, that's great and I love that. Grocery shop from Monday to Wednesday. That way you know you always have food. Or for example, if you go from, you know, Monday to Monday, make sure you go grocery shop on Saturday to make sure that when Monday rolls around or when Sunday rolls around, whatever the day is for you, you're not extremely low on food and your environment is not going to not be supportive of you and your goals. And so that is number 1. Number 2, just a very quick kind of thing I want you to think about. Oftentimes we try to eat less processed food, right? Something that stuck with me, and I believe I heard it from— I believe his name is Cody McBroom. He's a very, very great coach. He owns a great coaching, a nutrition coaching business. But something I believe I heard from him was these 4 things right here. When you're going to buy food, you wanna typically lean towards the less processed foods, right? Which we'll talk about here in a second. But you typically wanna lean towards the more nutrient-dense whole foods. And I always throw that out to people and sometimes they're like, great, Eric, but what does that mean? Like, here's what has helped me kind of think about it. I'll give you a few things. Number 1, did it grow from the ground? Did it fly in the sky? Did it swim in the ocean? Or did it roam the earth? Any one of those 4 things. One more time. Did it grow from the ground? Did it fly in the sky? Did it swim in the ocean? And— almost forgot that one. Did it swim in the ocean? And did it roam the earth? One of those 4 things. When you go buy a piece of food, Ask yourself one of those 4 things. If it's not one of those 4 things, then it's more towards the processed side. It's more towards the made-in-a-lab side. And that's not inherently bad, by the way. It's just we want the majority of your nutrition coming from these nutrient-dense whole foods. There's something called the 80/20 rule, which I did a video on here on YouTube, so feel free to check that out. But essentially what that rule states is 80% of your nutrition should be coming from nutrient-dense whole foods. 20% of your nutrition should come from treats you enjoy, right? It's not the other way around. It's not 80% treats and 20% nutrient-dense whole foods. That's where most people go wrong. So that being said, one of those 4 things, ask yourself one of those 4 things, and then from there, you— that will map your decision-making when you pick up a piece of food. To put it in your grocery cart at, you know, the store, ask yourself one of those 4 things and you'll kind of start to realize, oh, this is more of a nutrient-dense whole food, this is less of a nutrient-dense whole food, more of a processed food. And the more you do that, just like anything else in life, the more it's going to become a habit to lean towards those more nutrient-dense whole foods, not just in the grocery store But when you go out to eat, for example, like if you're consistently buying nutrient-dense whole foods, when you go to a restaurant and you've, you know, for the past 3, 4, 5 weeks in your head you're asking yourself these questions, you're looking at food labels and all these kind of things, when you go out to eat, like what do you think you're gonna do? Because all this time you're very focused on, you know, getting these nutrient-dense whole foods, you're probably gonna lean more towards those foods as well when you go out to eat. And one last time, This is not to say you can't eat processed foods or processed foods are the devil or you can't ever have, you know, a cheeseburger or something you enjoy. Totally can. That's totally fine. But the majority of your nutrition should be coming from these, one last time, nutrient-dense whole foods. Alright? So that is something that can help you guide your decision-making when you go into the grocery store. And kind of just one last piggyback note off that. Take your time and look at nutrition labels. I had to start buying my groceries when I was like 16, 17 because I ate so much food. I wanted to gain weight and I was eating so much food and my parents were like, have fun, we're not buying this much food for you, go get a job and go buy your groceries. And I was like, sweet! So that's what I did. But when I first started buying groceries, I had no clue because my mom cooked everything for me. I had no freaking clue. When I went in there, I took the time to look at food labels. I took time to say, oh, this has, you know, 200 calories for 20 grams of protein, but this has 150 calories for 25 grams of protein. This thing has 8 grams of fat, whereas this one only has 2 grams of fat. And you start looking at these things. And so I'm not telling you to sit here and obsess over it because that's not what I want at all whatsoever. But you know, take your— almost like make it a game, like make it a game to go in there and like, you know, make it a game to pick 1 to 3 things every time you go into the grocery store and really look at it. Look at the food label, look at the ingredients, look at how many grams of protein it has for how many calories. And over time you're going to start to realize the foods that are, for example, higher in protein but lower in calories very quickly. You know, a chicken breast, for example, is much higher in protein and lower in calories than a chicken thigh. For example, a chicken thigh has more fat, more calories. And so the more you do this, the more you'll start to learn those things and the more it is going to kind of, again, bleed into that decision-making you want to have when you're grocery shopping For healthy foods. So that's number 2. And number 3, just very quickly, we talked just now about processed foods, right? And oftentimes I think people's heads go to, well, I can't have anything frozen. Don't underestimate frozen foods. You can buy nutrient-dense whole foods that are frozen. I do it all the time. I know you're watching the video, but I wanna quickly interject because I wanna show you what I mean when I talk about frozen Foods. Okay, so these are the 4 main things I buy that are frozen foods, and they're just nutrient-dense whole foods. They're just the food frozen. So first off, we have this rice right here. I go through at least 5 of these per day. And again, if we look at the ingredients, it's just rice. It's rice and water. That's it. That is, that is the only ingredient. So it's still a nutrient-dense whole food, just frozen. That's all. Again, we have the spinach right here. Some organic chopped spinach. That's it. It's just frozen. So I just put it in the microwave and it's good to go. Again, I have some mixed veggies right here. Again, if you go to the ingredients on these things, the ingredients are just broccoli, cauliflower, carrots. It's just frozen. That's it, right? Same thing with these sweet potato fries. I love these right here. Again, they're just sweet potato fries with some salt. That's it. So don't underestimate the importance and the value that these frozen foods can bring to you. They're the same foods you'd buy fresh, just frozen, all right? And it's not— listen, is maybe buying— so like, for example, sometimes I will buy spinach in a big bag that is frozen. I buy it from the frozen section. It's just spinach. That's literally all it is. The ingredient— the ingredients just say spinach. They just freeze it, right? Is spinach leaves that is not frozen and it's pure and it's fresh, whatever, is that better? No. Yes, no, maybe so, I don't know. But point being, I know myself and if I buy— it happens all the time. If I buy this big thing of spinach that's not frozen, I'm just not gonna use all of it and it's gonna go bad. It happens all the time and I get pissed off every single time. So I'm like, you know what, screw this. I'm just gonna buy the frozen one. It comes in a huge bag, I use it when I want it, and it doesn't go bad. So for an example like that, that is still a nutrient-dense whole food. It's just spinach. That's literally all it is. And so, for example, I buy sweet potato fries. I buy these frozen sweet potato fries, I throw them in the air fryer, and they're amazing, and I love them. And again, it's just the ingredients, just sweet potato fries. It's just sweet potatoes. That's it. So, don't underestimate the value of frozen foods, whether, you know, for example, rice as well. I buy a ton of frozen white jasmine rice every single week, and I go through literally like 7 bags of rice a week and I love it. It's great. And again, it's just rice. It's just frozen. So don't be afraid, especially if you are busy or, you know, you have to travel or whatever the case may be. Frozen foods are not inherently bad for you. Again, like we kind of just talked about, maybe take some time to look at the food labels, take some time to look at the ingredients and the protein, the calories and all those kinds of things, but you can still buy nutrient-dense whole foods. That are frozen. And again, if you look at the ingredients of the frozen food, it'll tell you, like the spinach I buy, it's just spinach. That's it. It's just frozen, right? So don't underestimate that because that can be massively beneficial for you, especially if you're busy or you don't want to take a lot of time cooking. I just throw those things in the microwave or I put it in the air fryer and they're good to go. So don't underestimate that. Now, those 3 things being said, Let's dive into your list, and what I do here is I do this for all of my clients that I coach as well. So I'm not holding anything back from you. What I do here is we are going to make up a list of basically what your grocery shopping list is going to be. So we are going to cover first and foremost, we're going to you, we, I'm going to lay out mine, but you are going to do this as well simultaneously while I'm laying out mine. Okay, so I'm going to lay out 4 to 8 protein sources because again, one of the biggest things when it comes to grocery shopping, shocker, just like anything else in life whether it's fitness, nutrition, business, anything, you wanna have a plan. You wanna go into the grocery store and have a plan for what you are going to buy, right? Because if you don't have a plan, you're just gonna go buy anything and everything especially if you're hungry. You're just gonna buy anything and everything and all that sounds good and all the chips and the cookies and all these kind of things, right? Going into the store with a plan is massive. So what we're gonna do here is we're going to lay out 4 to 8 protein sources. I'm gonna do mine and I want you to do yours as well. All right, so I laid out mine right here. So my 4 to 8 protein sources are going to be chicken breast, it is going to be beef, and I personally, I have 2 different variations. I buy ground beef, I believe it's 93/7, like the amount of leanness, 93/7 ground beef, and I buy some steaks as well, sirloin steaks. So those are my 2 beef options. I have Greek yogurt, I have salmon, and I have eggs. And I buy those things every single time that I go into the grocery store. Every single time. It is in every single time I go into that store and I leave that store, I have those 5 things. Because again, the foods you buy, you're going to eat those foods. Your environment dictates your actions. And so Come up with 4 to 8 sources of protein that you are going to buy every single time you go into the grocery store. This is massively important. And I say 4 to 8 because give yourself some variety, right? You don't have to eat chicken every single day. You don't have to eat salmon every single day. You can give yourself some variety on top of the fact that, you know, you can cook things differently. You can cook things on the grill, you can cook things in the oven. You can cook things in the air fryer or the pressure cooker, which if you don't have those 2 things, air fryer, pressure cooker, buy those 2 things immediately. You can change things up, but making sure you have your 4 to 8 protein sources every single time you go into that grocery store and you leave that grocery store. When you get home, you're going to make up meals and snacks with those foods in mind. And so make up your list of 4 to 8 protein sources. I will put a quick list here of protein sources that you can kind of choose from. Feel free to stop the video right now, write yours down, do whatever you gotta do, make up your list of 4 to 8 protein sources. Next, we're gonna come up with 3 to 6 carbohydrate sources. And again, we are, you know, looking for the more nutrient-dense whole foods, but if you wanna throw some treats in there here and there, that's totally fine as well. I'm gonna write mine down. We're gonna talk about it and then you're gonna write yours down, all right? Woo! So, my 4 carbohydrate sources, every single time I go into the grocery store, I buy these things. Sweet potatoes, I talked earlier about my sweet potato fries. Sweet potatoes, white rice, oatmeal, and fruit. All kinds of fruit. I buy clementines, I buy bananas, I buy watermelon, I'll buy peaches sometimes, I'll buy mangoes sometimes. Any kind of fruit, I'm smashing those fruits. Strawberries, I have strawberries all the time, and so I'm smashing those fruits, right? Those are my 4, quote unquote, 4 options. Obviously fruit, I'm buying more than 1 fruit, but you get the idea. And that's it. Again, very nutrient-dense, very whole foods. I'm not buying a ton of like processed carbs and pretzels and chips. And actually, I don't buy any of those things. I live by myself, so it's different. So if you have kids, I know you're probably gonna buy some different things. But point being, again, you can use this activity for yourself to think about what good quality, nutrient-dense, whole carbohydrate sources you want to buy. I forgot one, just came to mind— rice cakes. I buy rice cakes every single time as well that I go to the grocery store. So come up with your list. Once again, I'll put a list of carbohydrate sources here. Feel free to take your time, write yours down, make up yours. And again, you can do this right now, you can do this after the video, whatever the case may be, but take some time to physically write this stuff down. Don't— I wouldn't even put it in your phone. Take some time to write this stuff down. You could put it in your phone if you want to, but I like writing stuff down. So, write this stuff down and make up your list. And so, 3 to 6 carbohydrate sources. Now, we're gonna go to 2 to 5 fat sources. I'm gonna write down my fats right now. Alright, so I wrote down my 2 to 5 fat sources and I wanna say a few things. Number 1, a lot of— the majority of the fat I eat and what most people eat throughout their day is gonna come from trace sources. And what I mean by that is like, for example, when you have eggs, eggs have fat in them. It's— eggs are a protein, but they're also a fat, right? So they kind of dip into different categories. And so if you're having whole eggs, then that's going to have some fat in there. Awesome, that's totally fine. If you're having beef, for example, if I'm getting 93/7 ground beef, awesome, that's going to have some fat in there already. So you can— again, this is why looking at food labels can kind of help you, but A lot of the things you will buy will have some different fat sources in there as well, so just kind of keep that in mind. Beyond that fact, there's 3 main ones I buy: extra virgin olive oil, that's what EVOO is, extra virgin olive oil. I use some of that when I do my cooking. I buy avocados and I buy some nut butters, so I buy peanut butter. So, those are my 3 sources of fat. Again, I wouldn't like go crazy about specifically buying fats. Honestly, in my opinion, because a lot of what you're gonna buy probably already has some kind of fat thrown in there. But if you do want some healthy fats, again, I'll put a picture here of what the healthy fats are. Again, feel free to either take your time right now, stop the video, write it down, or just do it after the video. All right. Now we're gonna do 3 to 6 vegetable sources, your favorite, and you're a grown adult, so you're gonna eat the Goddamn vegetables! No, but seriously, you're gonna eat your vegetables. I'm gonna write down my vegetable sources and then we're gonna talk about it, all right? My vegetable sources are spinach, any kind of peppers— red peppers, green peppers, yellow peppers, I like peppers— asparagus, and mixed veggies. And I talked earlier about don't underestimate the frozen. I buy some frozen bags of veggies. Like, there is nothing wrong with that at all. It's better than you eating no vegetables at all, which is probably what you're doing right now. I don't even want to, you know, I'm just saying like it's probably better than what you're doing right now. And remember that like it goes on this like good, better, best. If you're not, you know, if you can't get the best and the most fresh vegetables and this and that, I don't care. Get a bag of frozen vegetables, put it in the microwave, and you're good to go. Alright, so that is my sources of vegetables here. Again, spinach, Spinach, peppers, asparagus, and mixed veggies. Come up with your list. You can— the whole rainbow. You can do butternut squash, you can do pumpkins, you can do the whole rainbow. Again, I'll put a picture here of some vegetable sources. Please feel free, take your time, write yours down, and now you're really starting to come up with your grocery shopping list. Last but not least, I actually added it in at the bottom because I forgot about it, but I wrote it on here right now. Make a list of 3 to 6 snacks, and I say that because oftentimes you'll have the meals down, but people enjoy snacking, right? So, I would come up with 3 to 6 snacks that you can have throughout the day that aren't necessarily meals, but you'll find that this grocery shopping list will probably overlap with the snacks. I'm gonna write down my snacks right here, and then again, you are gonna write yours down as well. Alright, so I want to show you my snacks as well. So, um, listen, first and foremost, remember how I talked earlier about what does your kitchen counter look like? You can see on my kitchen counter I have all the snacks here, right? Obviously just for this video right now, but I do keep most of this on my kitchen counter. And, uh, even, you know, back here I have my protein shake as well if I want a protein shake for a snack. Either way, so again, we have some fruit. I have these tuna packets right here, super low calorie, very high in protein, 33 grams of protein. Greek yogurts, 15 grams of protein, super low calories as well. I didn't say this in the video, but my pickles, man, my pickles are my go-to. I got my beef jerky right here, once again high in protein. Got the fruit bowl as well, I'll put some fruit in. And, uh, yeah, so, you know, again, simple, quick, easy snacks. I don't really complicate things, I keep things super simple. I think it can help you as well. So my 3 to 6 snacks are number 1, what I put first, Greek yogurt. Um, I eat Greek yogurt all the time. Again, it's a very quick Very easy, very simple snack. Number 2, beef jerky. I'm a huge fan of beef jerky. Again, very high in protein, super quick as well. Number 3 is gonna be tuna packets. Once again, very high in protein. As you can see, I'm a big protein guy, which by the way, I should have said this earlier, but if you want some ideas on high protein foods, I did a whole video on high protein foods, so please feel free to check that out. Beyond that, the number 4 is gonna be fruit. And like, for example, I'll throw in Greek yogurt with some fruit, or I'll do beef jerky with some fruit. I'll combine those 2 things. There's so many that come to my mind. Like, for example, I'll do rice cakes with Greek yogurt on top. Some of my clients will do rice cakes with peanut butter on top. Like, there's so many ways you can go about doing this. What I would say for the snack guidelines are, typically speaking, try to get some source of vegetable, some source of fruit, or some source of protein for your snacks. Not every single time are you gonna be able to have all the protein and all the fruit and whatever the case may be. Listen, that's totally fine, but for the majority of the time, try to make your snacks vegetable-based, protein-based, or fruit-based. If you do that, I promise you're gonna have a pretty good day. And that's really it right there. Like, that is— so when I go into the grocery store, every single one of these things on this list I'm buying every single time. It happens every single time because I have a plan, I know what I'm doing, and I have those foods in my house. And again, your environment is going to dictate your actions. And so if you have these foods consistently in the house, you are going to consistently eat these foods. And I guarantee if you consistently eat the foods that you put on your list right here, you're probably going to achieve your physique-based goals, whether it's weight loss, whether it's muscle gain, whether it's fat loss, whatever the case may be. You're probably going to achieve those goals because you now have a plan. All right, so that is the video for today, guys. Hope you enjoyed it. If you have any questions, please feel free to drop below. I thought this was a pretty good video, so if it was a pretty good video, let me know in the comment section. If it was a good video, give it a thumbs up, man. You know, that's why it's there. Thumbs up, wherever the— wherever the thumbs up is, give it a thumbs up. That's why the thing is there. Subscribe to the channel, click the notification bell, and before I just freak out, like, have a great day and we'll talk soon. Bye.
