Quick Meals Carolyn Classick-Kohn,MS,RD

You can spend a lot of time trying to figure out the nutrition labels on foods that you buy, making buying a "quick" meal a long term project!  If you don't have that kind of time, here are some simple rules you can use when buying pre-cooked meals:

Look at the total calories and fat content first. Remember the simple rule outlined in your diet plan: look for main dishes that contain 10 grams of fat or less per serving, and look for side dishes and other foods (like snacks) that contain 5 grams of fat or less per serving. If you stay within those guidelines most of the time, you should do pretty well on your fat intake.
 

Calorie wise, think about the percentage of calories you want to allot to the meal you're buying. Review your daily calorie level to see how the meal fits into the number of calories you should stay within. For example, if you have a diet plan of 1400 Calories, and the meal contains 450 Calories, that's roughly 1/3 of your calories for the day, and that makes pretty good sense if you eat three meals a day, and this is your main meal. If you eat a lot of snacks, the percentage of calories you allot to your meals should decrease to make up for the extra calories from "mini-meals". There is no hard and fast rule to the number of calories each meal should contain. Some people like a larger breakfast and lunch, and a smaller dinner, and for others, the opposite is true. What matters is that you stay within your caloric needs overall for the day, and that your body has the fuel it needs to function throughout the day.
 

The amount of sodium is usually quite high in pre-packaged foods, so sodium content (sodium chloride = salt) is really important to watch. For most people, I follow the guidelines for healthy eating in that the goal for sodium intake is 2000-2400 mg or less per day. Look at the sodium content in fast food and packaged meals. For some entrees, the sodium content is well over 1,000 mg just for that one meal! If you choose a meal like this, you really have to limit your salt intake in the rest of your meals (avoid canned and otherwise packaged foods), and avoid adding salt at the table. When you buy packaged meals, it doesn't really work if you try to go by the percentage of sodium that you should allot to each meal because the sodium is almost always going to be very high in these meals. Instead just look at the total sodium in that meal and try to modify the rest of your day by eating less salt in other foods to make up for it. Obviously, if you eat nothing but store-bought meals, or eat in restaurants for one or more meals per day, this will be more of a challenge. As a general rule, it is better to start with low-sodium products, and then add a little salt to taste rather than buying the high sodium product to begin with. Why is there so much sodium in packaged foods? One reason is that taste tests show that people prefer it! Have you ever eaten a high fat meal that was low in sodium? All you taste is the grease, not too appealing.

So, if you quickly look at the calories, fat, and sodium content and remember these basic goals, it will be fairly easy to choose the best meal nutritionally. But what about taste and satisfaction? That's important, too! The appeal of packaged meals is definitely a matter of personal preference, but with all the choices available now, you are bound to find something that meets your needs. You will find more meals that fit into a healthy eating plan if you shop for meals that advertise "healthy" or "lean" in the title. Lean Cuisine, Healthy Choice, and Weight Watchers are examples of packaged foods that attempt to meet healthier nutrition goals for fat and sodium content. Sometimes the reason they fit into the healthy eating goals is because the portion is quite small!

Boosting Nutrition in Your Meals
If you eat a lot of packaged meals, then you're relying on a food manufacturer to provide you with your nutritional needs. Do you think it is very likely that these food companies have your optimal nutritional goals in mind? Certainly, profit is a higher priority than nutritional quality for food companies and restaurants or we wouldn't have so many nutrition related health problems reaching epidemic proportions.

It's up to you to boost the nutritional value of these meals.
A very simple way to do this is to buy a variety of fresh or frozen fruits and vegetables and to make it a habit to always add one or two servings to packaged meals or take home food from restaurants. In addition to adding a rich source of vitamins and minerals (that may be reduced in food processing), vegetables and fruits are an important source of fiber. Dietary fiber is often very low in processed foods. You can also add a bean salad or whole grain breads or side dishes to add back the fiber missing in these meals.

Beyond Labels 
Understanding the information in food labels can be a little frustrating. The information is listed as a percentage of daily total allowances, based upon a 2000 Calorie diet. But what if you aren't on a 2,000 Calorie diet - not extremely helpful! For those of you who have different calorie needs, it's better to look at the total grams of fat, saturated fat, sodium, and any other nutrient you are concerned with. For most adults, part of the healthy eating goals is that the diet should have 30% of calories or less from fat, and no more than 10% of calories from saturated fat. Since fat contains 9 calories per gram (regardless of whether it is saturated, polyunsaturated, or monounsaturated), start with your total daily calorie needs to figure out how much fat and saturated fat you can have for the day. Multiply your total calories by .30 to get total fat calories, and by .10 to get total saturated fat calories. Divide those fat calories by 9 to get the number of grams of fat for the day.

Here are a few examples:

I hope this helps de-mystify label reading for you and helps you make smart food decisions quickly. Eating well should not have to take a lot of time and effort, but it helps to know a few short-cuts to the right information. If you want an easy diet that does all of this for you, take a look at PersonalDiets and consider becoming a member.
Here's a diet sample: