Health Store | Evergreen Health and Wellness

There is an alternative for every piece of junk food you have ever eaten.Health food stores stock plenty of nutrient-dense options that can be incorporated in your diet in the place of the high calorie snack foods pressed on us by the media. . We all snack; however, the way to eliminate cravings is to snack wisely in order to stay full throughout the day. There are countless snacks on the market that makes it tough to wean yourself off potato chips or chocolate-coated nuts. Read below and see how healthy eating doesn't have to equate to boring, tasteless food.

If you are desperate to have chips, then consider this: two and a half large packets per week on top of your normal diet equates to one kilogram gained. Yes, that's kilogram. All it takes is 3,500 calories to add this unnecessary weight. So choose chips that are baked and not fried and save on the carbs, plus the fat. Light or even fat-free chips taste exactly like their normal counterparts. But it is not only the fat you should look out for, more often than not manufacturers will replace fat with excess sodium and other health-risk items. Scan the back of the box and make sure of what you buy.

Or replace your snack items with fruit. Go green and use bananas, apples, plums and pears to curb the sugar cravings that cause you to dip into the double-choc ice cream. But buyers beware! Certain green fruits, such avocado (yes, it's a fruit) contains a high amount of fat. Opt for the crispier vegetables such as celery, dipped in low-fat mayonnaise, a green salad of spinach, nuts and beetroot and many other yummy food items.

You cannot lose when it comes to healthy food items. Use online health stores to select the tastiest products and beat the bulge, one carrot at a time.

'Health food' and 'wellness' have become buzzwords of late and with the focus of the nutrition world solely on the obesity pandemic that has the larger part of the populace in its sweaty grip, it makes sense that there is bound to be some interesting developments in the industry. We list a few of the most apparent changes that have been noted:

1. Mother knows best: Clever product developers have noted a sharp rise in the demand for natural/organic infant health foods. Condition-based marketing and parental concern plays a large role in this, as does the alarming 'unhealthy food + children = future unhealthy adults' equation.

Out of 10 000 mother surveyed in the UK, a whopping 73% stated their primary concerns when buying infant food to be nutritional value and convenience. This poses the food production industry with an interesting challenge - fresh, healthy foods that are easy to prepare and easy to cart about.

2. Man up: It seems the metro-male trend is spilling over to the health food industry as well. Whereas the average male consumer was previously focused primarily on the all-mighty prostate cancer threat when it came to preventative health foods.

Now the limelight has widened to include conditions like cholesterol, intestinal health and even (god forbid!) the signs of aging. This leaves a lot of leeway for producers to experiment with products marketed solely at the male market.

3. The Green Debate: Packaging is going green of necessity but the question remains, which option is actually the most environmentally friendly? At a recent Pack Expo in Chicago, for instance, a representative from one of the top baby food companies touted their newly launched plastic packaging as an environmentally friendly alternative to the glass jars that were previously used.

How did the representative back up this claim? Simple: plastic packaging is lighter; therefore investing in plastic packaging takes more gas-guzzling, fume-spewing transportation trucks off the road. PLUS it takes more BTUs to melt sand into glass. Plastic manufacturing, on the other hand, requires petroleum. Which is the lesser of the two evils? Hang on to your hats; the argument is still raging.

And there you have it, three of the top trends that are influencing the health food sector in 2009.