Utah County Shopping List

Since I started my hunt for real food, the most stressful thing has been actually FINDING the real food at the best prices in the places I shop. I like how Christine Avanti puts it in her book Skinny Chicks Eat Real Food; "In a way, we've come full circle. Our earliest ancestors had to gather, forage and even experiment to find nutrients in their uncertain environment, and that's similar to the adventure you're embarking on."

So for your reference (if your in the Utah County area) as well as my own, here's my list of foods, where to get them, links, and possibly costs.

Bread: 100% Whole Wheat Bread from Prairie Grains Bread Co. 5 ingredient bread with 10% Stoneground Whole Wheat including Raisin Juice Concentrate as the sweeter-which leads to only 2g of sugar per piece! Made in SLC, UT. Macey's for about $3.69, possibly WalMart. Click here for nutritional information.

My second choice would be Aspen Mills Honey Whole Wheat Bread, which is made in Ogden, UT. You can find this at Costco or Sunflower Market. This has 100% Stoneground Whole Wheat Flour with a total of 5 ingredients. The only thing I didn't like about this bread is there was 6g of sugar per piece because of the honey. While I was okay with some sugar of course, 12 g of sugar for a sandwich felt like too much for me-especially for something that I really don't care if it's sweet or not. I'd rather have a cupcake.

A third option, in case you need another, is the Honey Whole Wheat from Great Harvest. This bread also has only 5 ingredients with 100% whole wheat. The awesome thing about this bread is they grind the wheat every morning in the bakery so it's completely fresh the day you pick it up. The others may as well, but it also takes time to get to the store and then time for you to buy it. The downside is it has 7g of sugar per piece.

Eggs: Oakdell Organic Eggs (farmed in Lewiston, UT). These are "cage free" and organic. I called the farm and they explained that there is an outdoor patio with wood chips over cement that they can go out to all day. They are fed organic soy and corn feed (non-GMO) and are not given antibiotics. Click here for more information. I get these at Macey's for $3.99/dz or Costco for $6.99/2dz.

I would like free range, organic eggs, but I haven't found any in a supermarket yet-so I'll keep searching. There is Roberts Ranch & Gardens in Spanish Fork that sells a dozen for $3.00. It's a little out of the way, but could be worth it.

Chicken: I'm not entirely happy with my chicken findings yet. I'll keep searching. For now, I found the frozen chicken from Perdue sold at Costco. It is USDA Process certified-??. They only feed the chickens a vegetarian diet and they're cage free, but in a chicken house-so not outdoors. They of course eat soy and corn (I don't believe it's organic or GMO free). They say that they DO use antibiotics, but only under the instruction of a veterinarian and it's not every day use. I guess it's better than others. I'm not sure about steroids or other additives. I'll keep looking for sure.

I also like the chicken at Sunflower Market. The butcher said it's 'all natural' and 'antibiotic free'. The antibiotic free claim isn't on the label, so I'm not too sure. I want to do some more research on it.

Tortillas: This has been a hard category for me. Almost every "whole wheat" tortilla I've looked at has at least 40 ingredients. So I've had to use the 80/20 rule on this a little. The best tortilla I've found so far is at Macey's. Maya's Tortillas from Papa Pita has about 12-19 ingredients (I never know if I should include the ingredients in the parenthesis.) They claim 100% whole wheat, and the first ingredient is Whole Wheat Flour, however the fiber includes Oat. This also has canola oil which is a GMO. There's zero grams of sugar, however added sugar IS in the ingredient list, but pretty far down. I've chosen this purely because it has mainly whole wheat and the ingredient list is much much shorter than the rest. It is also made in West Jordan, UT-so it's local. Click here for nutritional information.

I'll continue to update this post as I have more information-which will be a lifelong process!