Most Americans don't get enough calcium, perhaps because coffee and carbonated beverages have taken the place of milk in many diets. If you get less than 1,000 mg of calcium daily, weakened bones, teeth and muscles may plague you in the future. Including calcium-rich food sources in your diet on a regular basis can solve your calcium problem while addressing other nutrient needs, within limited calorie counts. This so-called nutrient density improves your nutritional profile and helps you maintain your weight.
Enriched Breakfast Cereal
Breakfast cereal manufacturers add calcium to some cereal products to achieve high calcium content per serving, or 20 percent of daily calcium values and up. Read the FDA package labels to identify calcium sources such in cereal bars, cream of wheat, cold cereals.
Dairy
Plain fat-free yogurt delivers the most calcium of all yogurt varieties, because other ingredients such as sugar and fruit detract from the mineral content by weight. The USDA Nutrient Database places plain nonfat yogurt highest in calcium content among dairy products, with 452 mg per 8-oz. serving. All varieties of milk and many cheeses, including Swiss, cheddar and provolone, are high in calcium. Milks provide about 300 mg per 8 oz. and cheeses provide about 200 mg per 1 oz. Soy and rice drinks may be enriched to provide calcium amounts similar to those in milk.
Canned Fish
Among fish, those canned with the soft, edible bones deliver the most calcium to your diet. Get a big boost toward your total daily value by eating canned sardines, 325 mg, and canned pink salmon, 181 mg. Make sure the variety you buy specifies that it contains the bones; most other fish have moderate to low calcium content.
Cooked Spinach
Cooking green vegetables increases their calcium concentrations. For instance, 1 cup of cooked spinach contains as much as 291 mg of calcium, while 1 cup of raw spinach has only 30 mg of calcium. This same trick works for cooked collards, 357 mg, turnip greens, 249 mg, and beet greens, 164 mg of calcium per 1-cup serving.
Legumes
Cooked dry beans and peas are healthy food sources of calcium. The USDA notes that 1 cup of cooked soybeans provides 261 mg, 1 cup of black-eyed peas contains 211 mg, and 1 cup of canned white beans offers 191 mg.
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