Have you heard the term Perimeter Shopping? It means shopping around the border or outer edges of the supermarket. This is generally where you find the fruit and vegetables, dairy, meat, eggs, seafood. These items are easily recognisable as food, they are in their natural form and no labels are required to explain them.

The general idea is to stay away from the centre isles of the supermarket, because that is where you find all the highly processed foods with little nutritional value and lots of additives. We all know these things are addictive, mess up our metabolism, rob us of energy, and are making us fat.

Many of the things in the middle aisles are not easily recognisable as food – they are in packages, boxes, bottles and tins. We need to read the labels to know exactly what is in them. Warning: you won’t like what you read. Watch out for the terms “low fat”, “low sugar” and “added calcium”. These are trade-offs. Low fat items are often loaded with sugar or salt to make up for the reduction in fat. Low salt is often loaded with sugar and fat. When they splash the phrase, “added calcium” on the front, that’s often a signal that the product is loaded with all three.

There are some items located in the perimeter that are not good buys: pre-marinated meats (have you looked at their ingredients list?), flavoured milks and sugar-added yoghurts, packets and bottles of sauces and flavourings to which you “just add meat” for an instant meal, and salad dressings. For good health you want to eat natural food in preference to these sorts of processed items.

You pay for the convenience of pre-prepared and packaged foods in two ways – they cost more money to buy and they cost you your health. We know we need high quality fuel to get the best performance from a racing car. Similarly our body will only be in peak condition when we feed it the highest quality food.

Your health is your real wealth. It is worth investing in. You deserve the best.