March is National Nutrition Month—a time to celebrate food, nutrition, and making healthy choices. Since 1973, the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics designated this time to promote healthy eating and the value of making informed food choices based on scientific nutrition information. This year’s National Nutrition Month theme is “Go Further with Food”. This can mean starting your day off with a nutritious breakfast, or energizing your body with food before being active. It can also mean working to decrease food waste by planning and preparing meals ahead of time. Celebrate National Nutrition Month by going further with food in a way that fits your life!
“Go further with food”
- Incorporate a wide variety of nutritious foods into your meals and snacks.
- Check out what is already in your pantry before grocery shopping or meal planning. Do you have yogurt that has been sitting in your fridge for awhile, or frozen vegetables nearing freezer burn? Build meals and snacks around ingredients that need to be used up before purchasing new food. (Have you seen the TV show Chopped?)
- Batch cook large meals and separate into portion-sized containers to enjoy throughout the week.
- Choose serving sizes that make you feel healthy, satisfied, and energized, rather than famished or “weighted down”. Food is your fuel—choose fuel that will promote active living.
- Practice food safety while preparing and preserving food to extend its life and prevent waste.
- Avoid clutter in your refrigerator, pantry and freezer. Things are more likely to be forgotten about if left unseen. Create a system to organize your inventory and try dating perishables with a label.
- Reinvent leftovers into a new meal. A whole roasted chicken can be used in a salad, soup, or sandwich, or leftover chili can be eaten over a baked potato, on a bun, or in a bowl with warm
cornbread.
What the Kendall Reagan Nutrition Center has to say
“This year’s National Nutrition Month theme Go Further with Food encourages us to plan ahead, pay attention and be intentional with our food choices and food use. It inspires innovation and creativity in the way that we create and enjoy foods that in turn can minimize waste, support our environment and improve our health.” — Shelby Cox
“Go Further with Food has a variety of meanings: decreasing food waste, choosing foods that help not only your personal health but also the environment. It also means increasing the range of food items. I try to ‘Go Further with Food’ by trying new foods or new ways to prepare foods, and thus increasing the range of the foods I buy. Going further with food for me also means choosing foods that properly fuel my body as well as nourishes my mind.” — Charlotte Lakin
“I tend to think more about how to make food go further. How can I cook once, and put the leftovers to good use? How can I preserve the bounty of fresh produce during the summer and enjoy it
throughout the winter? How can I capture the flavor each ingredient has to offer? Keeping this perspective in mind has helped me keep food costs down, limit food waste and make some really
delicious meals!”—Johanna Bishop
“When I think about this year’s National Nutrition Month theme, Go Further with Food, I think about being mindful with food in all aspects of our lives. Whether it’s being mindful of portion sizes, being aware of decreasing our food waste, or appreciating how healthful foods fuel our bodies—I think everyday we have a chance to think a little bit deeper about our food and the impacts food has on ourselves and our world.” — Mackenzie Burgess
“Going Further with Food celebrates the universal power of food. This message can mean a variety of things – from improving access to healthy foods, to fighting for improved sustainability measures, to cooking with ingredients out of one’s comfort zone. The fact that this message’s meaning is unique to every individual celebrates the ubiquity of food and how central and celebratory it is in all of our lives.” — Grace Morgan
“Going Further with Food is about embracing the role of food as fuel, choosing to nourish your body with vitalizing nutrients so you have the energy to adventure, move, and celebrate what your body can do. Going Further with Food is also about approaching each week of eating with the intention to grow in some way whether it’s trying a new recipe, or experimenting with a new ingredient or re-purposing leftovers to extend the life of a meal.” — Kalyn Garcia
For delicious recipes, nutrition tips, and to find cooking and nutrition classes, go to the Kendall Reagan Nutrition Center website. More great info is also available at the College of Health and Human Sciences Pinterest board.
