Finding Your Way to a Healthier You
Dietary Guidelines
- Make smart choices from every food group.
- Emphasize fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and fat-free or low-fat milk and milk products.
- Include lean meats, poultry, fish, beans, eggs, and nuts.
- Low in saturated fats, Tran’s fats, cholesterol, salt (sodium), and sugars.
- Find your balance between food and physical activity.
- Be physically active for at least 30 minutes most days of the week.
- Increasing the intensity of the amount of time that you are physically active can have greater health benefits and may be needed to prevent weight gain.
- Children and teens should be physically active for 60 minutes everyday or most everyday.
- Get the most nutrition out of your calories
- To know the facts use the nutrition facts labels on packaged foods.
- Keep these low: saturated fats, trans fats, cholesterol and sodium.
- Get enough of these: potassium, fiber, vitamins A and C, calcium and iron.
- Use the % Daily Value (DV) column when possible: 5% DV or less is low, 20% DV or more is high.
- Play it safe with food.
- Clean hands, food-contact surfaces, fruits and vegetables.
- Separate raw, cooked and ready-to-eat foods while shopping, preparing and storing.
- Cook meat, poultry and fish to safe internal temperature.
- Chill perishable foods promptly and thaw foods properly.