Good nutrition is essential to staying healthy. You know this to be true, but what does “good nutrition” really mean?
Good nutrition involves eating the right foods in the right amounts. But how much food do you need to eat every day? And what are the healthy choices you should be making? Health Canada developed the Eating Well with Canada’s Food Guide to answer these very questions.
To simplify matters, Canada’s Food Guide divides food into four key groups:
- Grain products, which include various breads and cereals
- Fruits and vegetables
- Milk (dairy) products, which include cheese and yogurt
- Meat and meat alternatives, which include fish, poultry and foods that provide
equivalent nutrients, such as tofu, beans and peanut butter.
Canada’s Food Guide recommends a healthy range of daily servings from each of the four food groups. People are not expected to follow the guidelines to the letter 100% of the time. That is why nutritional balance is best measured as an average over several days.
You can view or download the Canada’s Food Guide on Health Canada. The Web site also contains a host of useful information, including instructions on how to use the guide, recipes, grocery shopping tips, information about food labels and more.