Plan your next food shop

Getting ready for your first food shop while on WW? Check out Zoe's tips for planning a stress free trip. (No spur-of-the-moment decisions when you're already starving!)

Stocking up on nutritious foods is the most powerful tool when it comes to sticking to your plan. Having ingredients on hand that fill you up and help you stay within your Points® Budget makes it so much easier to make healthier choices.

Your first few food shops might feel a bit overwhelming, so we’ll send you a shopping list to help take the guesswork out of navigating the aisles. In the meantime, check out these hints and tricks to set you off on the right track...

Where you are, physically, when you eat, can impact your food decisions. Do a quick calendar check and think about where you’ll be spending the bulk of your time during the next week. For example, your needs and requirements will be very different depending on whether you’re at home or out and about.

I’d always recommend loading your trolley with ZeroPoint foods first, so you know you’ll have your go-to ingredients on hand no matter what. Regardless of which plan you’re on, having fruits and vegetables in your kitchen makes it that much easier to add them to meals, or grab them for a snack.

We all have days where we don’t have the time or energy to plan an elaborate meal or prepare a huge pile of ingredients. That’s why I love pre-prepared foods. Things like chopped vegetables, frozen fruits and pre-portioned packs of grains can really speed up the cooking process and help to eliminate waste at the same time.

Pick a new spice or herb to experiment with each time you shop, then enter it in to the WW app and see all the recipes that come up. Trying new flavours and different cuisines is half the fun of shopping and cooking. Some of my favourite spices include cinnamon and nutmeg, and I love fresh herbs like thyme and rosemary.

Some nutrient-dense foods will be higher in Points® than others, but that doesn’t mean they’re off limits. Quite the opposite, in fact. Things like nut butters, cooking oils, avocado and cheese can add flavour and substance to meals, which naturally helps you stay within your Points allowance. My go-to snack is a banana with peanut butter.