Healthy Food Choices: Pasta

Pastas are a healthy food and loaded with carbohydrates. Learn some tips for picking your own pasta in this video.

Take Action

Look for whole wheat pasta
Pastas are a great complex carbohydrate
Try using a tomato based sauce

About this Author

Alice Merritt is currently the Campus Dietitian at the University of North Carolina at Wilmington. She has a masters degree from University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in public health with a concentration on nutrition. Alice has worked as a registered dietician for four years, and believes that helping people reach their nutritional goals will lead to a long and healthy life.

ALICE MERRITT: Now I'm going to talk to you about pasta. With all the low-carb craze, a lot of people have gotten afraid and don't want to eat vey much pasta. But pasta can actually be a very healthy choice. When you're looking at pastas, you want to look for whole wheat pastas or pastas that are higher in fiber. Pastas are also great complex carbohydrate and can give you lots of vitamins and minerals. Other things you want to look for when you're having pasta is you want to make sure that you use some kind of tomato-based sauce. A lot of the cream-based sauces are the ones that add a lot of calories and fat to our pasta dishes. Some important things to remember about pasta is, 1, you want to make sure you always look for whole grain or whole wheat pasta. Now, fiber is a good place to look for to make sure you get enough of that. Also, use tomato sauces and tomato-based sauces on your pasta. If you increase your vegetables, you automatically decrease the calorie density of your dish. And if you're wanting to add meats, try to add leaner meats such as grilled chicken, ground turkey. Try to avoid frying foods and adding that into your pasta. All of these things are healthy tips about pasta.

Healthy Food Choices: Pasta Video

Take Action

About this Author

Member Comments