That's Fit

Apples, bananas, grapes, and oranges ... all good and healthy choices, but after a while they can start to feel a little boring. Mixing it up and trying a more unusual fruit not only adds interest -- it likely adds a nutritional boost as well. Different color categories of fruits and vegetables provide different nutrients. For example, red fruits and vegetables tend to be high in lycopene.

If you want to try a new taste, give some of these unusual fruits a try:

• Baby kiwi
• Prickly pear
• Cherimoya
  
• Kiwano melon
• Kumquat
• Tamarillo
• Lychee
• Feijoa
• Passion fruit
• Dragonfruit
• Pomegranate

So you're the type of person who fills your grocery cart with healthy foods -- fruits and veggies of every shape and color, whole grains, low-fat dairy, and lean protein. Your healthy choices are enough to make the check-out person feel guilty about the candy bar stashed beneath her register. But are you sure you're getting the most vitamins and minerals out of the foods that you buy?

Shape has a list of 9 common kitchen mistakes even healthy eaters make:

• Overloading on produce. It's best to buy fresh fruits and veggies within just a few days of using them. If you stock up on too many they'll lose precious nutrients as they sit on your counter waiting to be eaten. Or, worse yet, they'll end up going to waste altogether.
  
• Exposing foods to light. Opt for milk in cardboard boxes and don't store foods in glass canisters or see-through storage containers. Many foods are susceptible to a process called photooxidation in which light breaks down the nutrients.
  

For weeks, my family drooled over the four, perfect, green Granny Smith apples in the fruit bowl.

"Don't touch them," I admonished, "I'm going to make apple burgers with them."

Now, my family had other apples to eat, so don't go feeling sorry for them. But they really wanted those tart, crisp apples in the fruit bowl.

Three weeks later, those apples ended up out under the pine tree -- squirrel food. I'd waited too long and they were brown and mushy on the bottom. I felt bad then that I didn't let them get eaten when they had the chance.

Do you waste produce? According this article, we all do. Food waste takes up a large chunk of landfill real estate and creates methane gas that leads to global warming.

Fruits and veggies are good for you, so it's tempting to buy a lot. But produce is highly perishable, so reduce waste by only buying what you need. Diet-Blog has a few tips for buying and preserving all the fruits and vegetables you can eat, without the waste.

Even if I wanted to buy 100% organic, I wouldn't be able to...at least not from my local grocery store. Though they have an increasing variety of offerings, it's a toss-up every week what will be available. So, I try to buy organic when I can and try to scrub really hard when I can't. And I wait patiently for our CSA to start up in June.

Reducing exposure to pesticides is a concern people often have. If you're like me -- part of a family living on a budget -- then it can be tricky trying to figure out what to splurge on. Canadian Living has a few suggestions to help you manage your food dollar while reducing your risk at the same time. For instance, you can:

• Buy the fruits and vegetables you eat most often from the organic section.
• Eat a variety of produce.
• Grow your own or join a CSA.
• Peel before you eat -- though you'll lose a lot of nutrition that way and it isn't always effective.

The US government recommendation for fruits and veggies used to be eat 5-9 a day. The recommendations now are a bit more vague; if you visit mypyramid.gov you can create a custom plan that works for you. Other sites, such as fruitsandveggiesmorematters.org just recommend eating "more." While I personally prefer the more specific recommendations, I have worked with some dietitians that prefer the more general encouragement to just eat more because so many Americans are so, so far from the older 5-9 guideline.

It's not as hard as you might think to eat lots of fruits and veggies every day. The trick is to start eating them fresh -- just munching on them in the whole or sliced form -- and also looking for ways to incorporate them in all of your meals. Check out the gallery for some easy ideas on healthier eating.

Current dietary guidelines recommend five to nine servings of fruits and vegetables every day, and some groups are starting to say we should be eating up to 12 servings. Though a serving is usually only 1/2 cup of veggies or a small piece of fruit, it can take some planning to squeeze that many portions into your day, especially if you're new to healthy eating.

Ediets has several suggestions for working fruits and vegetables into your diet. Some of my favorites include:

• Throw a fistful of berries on top of your cereal in the morning. In the winter, I buy mine frozen and don't even bother to thaw them. The berries are so sweet that they soften quickly in milk.
• Get creative with smoothie recipes. Not only are smoothies a great way to add to your fruit intake, you can often sneak in spinach and other veggies without your taste buds even noticing.
• If you allow yourself snacks, make sure they always include a fruit or veggie. (Red bell peppers and hummus are a favorite at my house.)
• Plan ahead and try to eat two servings of fruit or veggie at every meal.

Fruits and vegetables are rich in fiber and antioxidants, both crucial for your good health. Can you squeeze in an extra serving today?

I love to sit down to a colorful meal. Bright green beans, brilliant orange sweet potatoes, a salad mixed with yellow peppers, edemame, and bright red tomatoes -- a colorful plate glows with good nutrition. By eating a variety of colors -- yellow, green, orange, red, purple, and white -- you'll not only ensure that you're getting enough antioxidants, but that you're getting a good variety of nutrients as well.

Prevention has a handful of colorful recipes for your next meal, and if you're interested in what each color of fruit or vegetable can do for you, check out the gallery below.

Everyday I carry around just a little bit of guilt for robbing my body of all those fruits and vegetables people tell me I should be eating. How does anyone find the time to meet all those dietary recommendations anyway?

Subsequently, I pat myself on the back whenever I remember to drink a little juice -- as that should count against my daily requirement, right?

Apparently not. There's research that does support labeling juice as a healthy beverage (healthier than soda or beer at least), but it still can't provide all the benefits you get from eating good 'ol fashioned solid fruits and veggies. While juice is certainly a good source for nutrients like vitamin C and beta-carotene, they don't contain the anti-oxidants found in skins and peels -- which work to reduce the risk of heart disease, cancer, and some age-related conditions.

So buy a banana, grab some carrots for a snack, eat a few grapes with lunch, put some lettuce on that burger -- you get the idea. Finding creative ways to get those recommended daily servings will be better for you in the long run, and juice just won't cut it.

Are you a fan of eating fruits and vegetables? Sure, preparing fruits and vegetables can be a little more cumbersome than popping something in the microwave, but the extra few minutes (or maybe 10) to prepare a healthy dose of fruits and vegetables is easily worth it. The thing is, 10 minutes is quite a bit to ask in this age of extreme business.

The CDC said yesterday that fewer than a third of American adults eat the amount of fruits and vegetables the government recommends. This is not particularly surprising, but it is alarming to see it in print. The goal of the U.S. government is to see 75% of Americans to eating two servings of fruits and seeing 50% of American adults consume three servings of vegetables each day by 2010.

If this current trend -- which has remained steady for about a decade -- continues, that goal won't be met. What do you do to get your suggested fruit and vegetable servings eaten every day?

I like my diet colored with all the brightness of a fruit orchard -- do you? The reasons we always hear "eat more fruits and vegetables" is because the amount of vitamins and minerals in those foods are generally plentiful and almost all fruits and vegetables are fat free. It's hard to argue with that!

A tip from eDiets here is to avoid pre-packaged foods that state "fruit flavored." I agree here -- it may seem convenient at first, but going to the produce aisle for fresh fruits and veggies is the best course of action always.

So, what is your favorite low-calorie fruit? Try this list on for size: steamed broccoli, steamed zucchini and yellow squash, fresh-cut pineapple and strawberries and those easy-to-pop grapes.

Are fruit and vegetable growers taking care of the land they grow our food on in a sustainable and renewable way? Hardly -- most fruits and vegetables are grown in "factories" far removed from the "garden-like" marketing messages many processed food manufacturers apply to their advertising images.

So, it comes as little surprise that the actual vitamin and mineral content found in fruits and vegetables located in most standard grocery stores are deplete of large amounts of vitamins and minerals compared to fruits and vegetables farmed from sustainable and unpoisoned soil from 100 years ago. But, hey, that's just my opinion from in-depth research. Eating organic helps quite a bit of this situation.

The best solution? If you can, plant a small garden where you can grow your own vegetables and possibly some fruits as well. Unless the climate does not permit it, this is a great idea for many people, although very impractical for most without yards to work with. But then, there are farmer co-ops and local farmer markets that can do this for you.