Home » Latest » Health News » Mayo Clinic Minute: 6 tips to healthy eating on a budget

Mayo Clinic Minute: 6 tips to healthy eating on a budget

11

InfoSearched 78 17 Health News

9.1

SaveSavedRemoved 3

Six ways Mayo Clinic says you can eat well without wrecking your grocery budget.

Fresh produce and lean protein carry a reputation for being expensive, which pushes a lot of shoppers toward cheaper, processed alternatives. In this Mayo Clinic Minute, registered dietitian and nutritionist Cathy Deimeke lays out practical, low-cost strategies for keeping a cart full of nutritious food without the bill spiking. The segment, reported and produced by Vivien Williams for the Mayo Clinic News Network, runs about a minute but packs in guidance that applies before you ever leave the house and long after you’ve unloaded the bags.

• Cathy Deimeke, a Mayo Clinic registered dietitian and nutritionist, outlines strategies for buying healthy food on a limited budget.
• Her core advice centers on planning meals and shopping lists in advance, choosing whole foods over processed convenience items, and buying non-perishable staples in bulk.
• Deimeke also flags frozen fruits and vegetables as nutritionally equivalent to fresh produce but far less prone to spoilage, and recommends prepping ingredients at home instead of paying a markup for pre-cut or pre-washed versions.

Plan Before You Push the Cart

Deimeke’s first fix happens before a shopper ever sets foot in the store. Mapping out a week’s worth of meals and building a shopping list around that plan cuts down on the impulse buys that quietly inflate a grocery bill. It also curbs food waste, since ingredients get bought with a specific dish in mind rather than a vague hope they’ll get used before they spoil.

Sticking to that list once you’re inside the store is the harder half of the equation, and it’s the part Deimeke emphasizes. A plan only saves money if it actually governs what lands in the cart.

Whole Foods Over Convenience Packaging

The second tip goes after the price gap between whole ingredients and their processed counterparts. Whole vegetables, fruits, and grains generally deliver more nutrients per dollar than boxed or pre-packaged alternatives, according to Deimeke’s guidance in the segment. The nutritional density is the selling point — you’re not paying extra for packaging or processing, just the food itself.

Frozen fruits and vegetables carry the same nutritional value as fresh produce, but they last far longer and don’t go to waste sitting in the crisper drawer.

That frozen-produce point is one of the more useful, counterintuitive tips in the piece. Shoppers often assume fresh is automatically healthier, but Deimeke’s guidance treats the freezer aisle as a legitimate — and often cheaper — substitute that also cuts down on spoiled produce getting tossed in the trash.

Bulk Buying and Home Prep

Non-perishable staples, whole grains, and frozen produce tend to carry lower unit prices when purchased in larger quantities or family packs, making bulk buying one of the more straightforward ways to stretch a food budget over multiple weeks. Deimeke pairs that advice with a caution against pre-cut, pre-washed, or pre-seasoned items, which carry a built-in markup for convenience. Doing that prep work at home — washing, chopping, seasoning — costs time instead of money, and for anyone trying to keep a grocery bill down, that trade is usually worth making.

The segment’s approach fits a familiar pattern in Mayo Clinic’s consumer health reporting: short, service-oriented advice aimed at habits people can change that same week. Readers looking for more of that kind of practical, food-focused guidance can find related coverage in InfoSearched’s cooking and food experiences section, alongside broader health news coverage that tracks nutrition guidance like Deimeke’s.

None of these six tips require a special app, a coupon binder, or a farmers-market membership — just a list, a freezer, and a willingness to peel your own carrots instead of paying someone else to do it.