Two weeks ago in my post Real Food at Walmart – Can it be done I posed the question: What if you had to buy all your food at Walmart? Pretend you didn’t have access to any local food or health food stores at all … how close could you get to a 100% “Real Food” diet under those circumstances?
This week I took a little tour of my local Walmart very early in the morning when I could have the food aisles mostly to myself 
. With my camera in hand I took a bunch of pictures of what I found that would qualify as real food. I used the question “Would Grandma recognize this as real food?” as my primary guiding question. Next, I considered whether Sally Fallon would consider it a real or compromise food. I left out anything I felt she would view as a “must avoid” item, though I’m including some items that are newfangled on her list in Nourishing Traditions
I’m hoping we can have a lively discussion this week on the items shown, and in the coming weeks I will revisit the store section by section and we can talk about each category in detail. Hopefully with everyone’s input we can further expand the choices!
Lots of pictures in this post! The captions tell the tale . I think we’ll start with what is most easily located and work our way down to the difficult to find.
What’s easy to find at Walmart
Conventionally grown produce is abundant at Walmart.
Lots of variety in the frozen food section … Abundant choices in frozen greens. Kale, collards, spinach, turnip greens, etc …
Package after package displays a simple ingredient list like this one.
Grains are pretty easy to find if you are looking for the standard issue whole wheat flours, oats and rice.
Lots of rice both brown and white varieties …
Rolled oats …
Whole Wheat and Unbleached White Flour
Beans are easy to find, though there isn’t as wide a variety as can be found elsewhere.
Lots of legumes …
Pretty good versions of kids favorites PB & J can be had.
A few peanut butter choices shown here, but there were more.
Here’s an organic choice …
A few low sugar jelly choices …
What’s not as difficult to find as you might imagine
In a word, organics! There are quite a few organic labels to be seen at Walmart, though not nearly enough. Organic produce, even in Austin where the local Walmart is to some degree competing with the organic mecca grocery stores like Whole Foods, Sprouts, HEB Central Market little can be found in the way of fresh organic produce. I was more successful finding processed products that were labeled organic.
Muir Glen is well represented on the shelves at Walmart … good prices too!
Saw quite a bit of the Newman’s Own label too …
This little section was about it for organic produce …
Amy’s soups …
Organic pre-made Spaghetti Sauces …
Somewhat difficult to find wholesome version of
Good fats seems to be the hardest thing to find in a Walmart! Since it’s the single most important improvement you can make to your diet I plan to make a very exhaustive survey of everything available.
Don’t go for this one! It’s actually hydrogenated …
A smallish section for butter …
Largish olive oil section, approach with caution … much of the olive oil on the market isn’t really olive oil at all.
Lots of meat available though it looks like virtually all of it is CAFO beef and factory farmed chicken and pork.
Bacon ends for pots of greens, lots of bacon in general …
Organ meats can be found …
Chicken livers …
Beef liver …
Found a section with some unusual cuts …
Cheek meat … pretty inexpensive.
and tripe, or small intestines …
Found some dairy items, though everything is pasteurized. Had better luck here than at the health food mecca stores finding dairy that had not been ultra-pasteurized though. Most organic dairy is ultra-pasteurized so those stores tend to stock it heavily.
Pasteurized but not ultra-pasteurized …
Pasteurized cheeses …
Ok, so now that we’ve had a tour what comes next?
Next post we’ll start with a particular food group and work our way thru the store winnowing out bad choices and working our way toward the best possible choices in the store, or available thru a special order from Walmart’s website for that particular food group. I will take note of any items for people on special diets like a gluten-free diet. In the meantime tell me what you thought of this tour … did I overlook something? Is there something you’ve found in your store that you could share? What compromises would you make?
This post is part of series … Read the rest by following these links
Introduction: Can it be Done?
Part 1: A Quick Tour of Walmart
Part 2: Fruits and Vegetables
Part 3: Fats and Oils
Part 4: Meat and Bones
Part 5: The Dairy Section
Part 6: Pantry Foods
Conclusion: The Nature of Compromise
"Sources for naturally fermented vegetables. "
Check out Fermented Vegetables on Village Green Marketplace >
This post is shared at Butter Believer’s Sunday School, The Healthy Home Economist’s Monday Mania, The Prairie Homestead’s Barn Hop, Penniless Parenting’s Hearth and Soul Blog Hop, Real Food Forager’s Fat Tuesday, Mamaldiane’s The Gathering Spot, Cooking Traditional Food’s Traditional Tuesday, Kelly the Kitchen Kop’s Real Food Wednesday, This Chick Cooks Whole Foods Wednesday, Day 2 Day Joy’s Healthy 2day Wednesdays, Real Food Freak’s Freaky Friday, Real Food Whole Health’s Fresh Bites Friday, Food Renegade’s Fight Back Friday and Too Many Jars in my Kitchen’s Fill Those jars Friday.
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Kathy lives just outside of Austin with her husband of 19 years Barry, youngest son Jake, two cats and about a dozen chickens. While not a Grandma yet, with two grown kids she remains hopeful. Kathy wants a world where everyone has fresh wholesome food and feels that cookin' like a granny woman is the surest way to get there.
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{ 48 comments… read them below or add one }
This was a great article. What I found extremely interesting was that your Wal-Mart sells CA Olive Ranch olive oil (based on your picture, I recognized the label), which is a brand I had researched and found to be real. Wow, totally impressive.
I’ve bought that brand too but I’ve never given it the refrigerator test
. So much of the supply isn’t olive oil these days that I’d want to check it. Maybe I’ll test a few when we get to the fats section.
The California Olive Ranch (i think i see it on the bottom shelf) is a pretty good brand!
Also, its been a while, but Walmart usually has wild caught fish and shellfish. The salmon is usually a very low quality like keta or pink, but it is there
Thanks Amanda! I was thinking about seafood as I was finishing up … was hoping everyone would have a few suggestions for it since I don’t eat seafood, I’m allergic
.
Great blog Kathy! I tend to get very frustrated with Walmart’s lack of organic and fresh foods. Looking forward to part 2.
Thanks Lisa!
I am from Michigan and went into Walmart last week with a friend and found cerified chemical free wheat berries. I was very excited. I am right now sprouting my first wheat berries
My girlfriend gave me some wheatberries and a sprouting screen, which I’ve sprouted some time ago and they’re sitting in the fridge. I don’t have a grain mill, so no clue what to do with them.
Joanne,
i grind my grains in a blender/food processor or if only a cup or so i use my magic bullet (grin in small! batches) – but they should be dry otherwise they are really sticky and do not grind well;
once any grain sprouted you can dry it in the oven and then freeze; no grain mill NO PROBLEM
you can also add the sprouted grain to any cereal, porridge or a handfull unmilled into bread dough.
hope this helps!
Lots of pictures are always fun. I’m taking baby steps in the whole food and traditional food venues. Where I live, I don’t have much options (though I could drive 30 minutes to a Whole Foods and I have a local health food store that has a few selections). I did just find grapeseed oil at Walmart….not sure if that is a good one or not, just surprised they have it!! Thanks for doing this!!!
I definitely need to take a trip to my Walmart again and see what they have in the way of organics. Ours is sort of a hybrid Super Walmart. The one by Costco is a true Super Walmart and may have more of the products you found. I wasn’t impressed by the produce at the closer Walmart. Other stores may be better.
Thanks for sharing this post, so many people think they can’t eat real foods because they are on a budget. I would love for you to share this at Healthy 2day Wednesdays this week (starting at 11pm EST Tuesday and every week that you have a “healthy” post!) Blessings to you this week!
Thanks for the invite! I’ll stop by …
Our Walmart (central Nebraska) is hit and miss with organic produce. Sometimes there is a bigger selection, sometimes not. It all depends on their suppliers, timing, etc.
On a good day, I can find organic broccoli, cauliflower, potatoes, onions, carrots, celery hearts, bags of apples and lemons, and hearts of romaine lettuce. On a bad day I can only get the carrots and celery hearts, lol.
Ours also has raw chicken from Harvestland, which claims to use no antibiotics, no added hormones, and raise their chickens “humanely”. It’s not organic or pastured, but it’s still a better alternative than Tyson in my opinion.
Forgot to add that ours also has Organic Valley organic cultured butter, and Dublin Cheese from Kerrygold in the “fancy cheese” section near the deli.
And, they carry fresh herbs from a local farm, which unfortunately is the only local produce they carry. But, even just the herbs is a pleasant surprise.
They’ve also started carrying some of the the Oscar Meyer “Natural” lines of meats, like uncured bacon, no preservative lunch meat, uncured hot dogs, etc. Not as good as a local source, but still a tiny step up from the normal.
I was hoping to find more of that near the deli at mine … next time I go I’ll make a closer inspection of each section and hopefully it’ll turn up then.
Our Wal-Mart also has Harvestland and I tend to use that as the least worst option. I prefer to buy my meat at the smaller chain even though it’s more expensive, but they only carry Tyson brand for their chicken.
It seems like Walmart is slowly adding more good stuff. Very slowly, but at least its progress, right? When I first started making the switch to real food I spent so much time looking for any good stuff. Now I rarely go there, just because I hate the search. (And I love supporting my local real food store.) It’s definitely more pricey, but worth it for my family’s health.
Fun series!
How can I know if Olive Oil is real? I didn’t know there was a problem. Ack! I’ve been buying Bertolli Extra Virgin at Sam’s Club. Help!
Very interesting… I shop Meijer simply because of the larger selection of naturals and organics.
Now I am using expeller pressed coconut oil.
Tell me a little more about olive oil though, some of its not real? I always buy the same kind, but recently discovered that heating it as in cooking with it, changes its molecular value and it becomes nearly toxic to the body.
Found you at The Gathering Place
Yolanda and Kendra … I’ve had an olive oil post on my list for the longest :-O … just can’t seem to get to it. For now Cheeseslave has instructions on testing olive oil to make sure it’s the real thing and Food Renegade goes into some pretty good detail on why you should be suspicious. Hope to post more detail later today …
Thank you!
Kathy – I shop at our local WM every week and I agree that you have to be choosy but healthy choices are available. I also shop at Sam’s Club and I don’t buy most of their products but only the real food items: nuts, honey, maple syrup, dried fruits, rice. None of it is top quality or organic, but I can’t see paying 10 times the price for that either. We have Earth Fare here and Fresh Market but their prices are astronomical! Sure wish Trader Joe’s would open a store here!
We grow some of our own food and have chickens for eggs and for great chicken stock. Speaking of chickens the price of their food (national brands) has gone from $9 to $16 in just 5 years. That’s for a 50 lb bag of layer mash. I can get an organic brand but it is more like $30 for a 50 lb bag and that is just nuts. Who can afford that?
Great blog post, by the way. I see you have some brands that we don’t have here in TN.
We have the same issue with chicken feed here … We have a local organic feed mill that provides organic feed to a local store for retail sale. We plan to switch from a fish-meal based layer ration to an organic scratch … the best way to do so affordably I think is to let your hens free range for bugs all day and then use the scratch to get them in the coop at night. That way they aren’t as dependent on the feed, don’t need as much and don’t need the layers ration since they find plenty of protein on their own. We had pretty good success with this in the past but the drought last year had rendered our property bug deficient
.
Inflation is a lot worse than official figures indicate … they don’t include price increases in food for example in the data used to calculate the inflation rate.
Kathy – did you read this? It’s from a link on Cheeseslave’s blog post – the first comment has a link to it. Here’s the link http://www.oliveoilsource.com/page/freezing-olive-oil
“Myth: Hardening Proves Extra Virgin Status.
There is a rumor that true extra virgin olive oil, placed in a small quantity in a glass bowl and refrigerated for a while, would become crystalline. A chemically refined olive oil with some virgin oil added to it, however, would form a block when frozen.
At the Olive Oil Source, we doubt that this is a valid observation. While refined or pomace oils will usually be stripped of their waxes, thus making them more likely to form a block, and while it is more common for a refined oil to be winterized to be used in a cheap dressing, many excellent extra virgin oils do not form “crystals”. We have watched the production process of many premium oils, from the olive to the bottle, which form a solid block when frozen. Unfortunately, detecting fraud is more difficult than just freezing the oil.
Myth: The Fact that Olive Oil Hardens in the Refrigerator Means That It Is Saturated.
Olive oil is not a saturated fat. All fats will harden if they get cold enough, whether they are saturated or not. As we saw above, olive oil often hardens, but not because it is saturated. It has not been refined as seed oils have been, to remove waxes. The presence of waxes does not make the olive oil saturated or unhealthy, it just means it is a natural product.
As a general rule, the more saturated the fat, the more likely it will be hard at room temperature. Beef and pork lard, margarine, butter, and the saturated tropical fats in cookies, packaged foods, and snack foods are all solid at room temperature. This improves their shelf life, makes packaging easier, and improves “mouth feel” but is not necessarily good for your health.”
Yeah, the way this is written is confusing.
This wikipedia article mentions both the refrigerator and ignition tests as an easy way to test at home, though they mention both tests do not absolutely prove purity.
Basically the fridge test is checking the monounsaturate fat level of the oil. Monounsaturated fats thicken at a higher temp than polyunsaturates do. So if the oil is adulterated with polyunsaturates it will remain free flowing.
Mark at Mark’s Daily Apple sums it up very nicely:
So logically:
A) Any olive oil that thickens in the fridge is *likely* to be extra virgin olive oil, though not necessarily. Some canola oils can pass this test too.
B) But if it doesn’t thicken it isn’t extra virgin olive oil.
So reject any brands that don’t thicken. As for the ones that do thicken, as always your best protection is not to rely solely on the test, but to get to know the producer and develop a thorough smell/taste/feel knowledge of what real quality extra virgin olive oil is like.
For the purposes of this series though we are shopping a Walmart and can’t know our producer and maybe big box store olive oil is all we’ve ever had to compare with. If this as our premise, the fridge test is our best friend. You can try the burn test too. Personally I’ve tested a few olive oils so far in the fridge and have yet to find a brand that passes. ‘Till I do we don’t eat olive oil … I plan to keep trying
.
For those who’d like more technical detail this post explains some of the complexity pretty well.
Also, this PDF report from University of California has an interesting chart inside listing the results of their tests of olive oil brands. Some of the brand findings may surprise you!
now my head hurts
can we just get a simple list of what is junk so we can avoid wasting money? i had seen one some where… need to find it again….
That’d be great but I think any list would be either overly general or incomplete
Sorry Gudrun, earlier I thought you were talking about all the groceries, not just olive oil. I posted a link a few comments below that might interest you.
Great topic! Using your premise of “what if Walmart was the only place you had to by Real food”. I think when we explore this question, it’s also important to compare prices. If Walmart really IS your only grocery outlet, that’s one thing, but I’ve found that the local health food stores and grocers in Milwaukee, where I live, only charge but a few cents more than WalMart.
So, when one considers how horribly they treat their workers….how inefficient many of their stores are run (long lines, anyone?), and their questionable business practices (read the book The Walmart Effect for details) it’s just not worth it to me to shop there for Real food just to save a few cents.
I do, however, find it encouraging that they actually appear to be listening to consumer demand for healthier food choices!
Walmart isn’t always the least expensive option … in fact once you meet up with local producers you’ll find that for some items at least local producers can charge less since they are cutting out the middleman, which in this case is Walmart
.
Yes, by all means if you can avoid Walmart do so. You may be pleasantly surprised to find your grocery bill gets smaller! My concern with this series though is for those who for whatever reason need to shop there, or at any other large chain grocery store, for a variety of personal reasons. Many feel shut out from real food by their personal situation. I hope this series encourages those who feel shut out by a perceived lack of access to become “real food ninjas” seeking whatever real food options are available to them right now where they are at in life. Once you get on that road it’s a simple step to add a new source, then a new local source, and hopefully before you know it you have local sources for a large part of your groceries.
… yes – but is is virtually ALL CONVENTIONAL, BIG CORPORATE, NON LOCAL, and FULL OF GMO’S–
this is “real food”??
NOT!
Yes, but
the big mecca health food groceries like Whole Food’s or Trader Joe’s are also mostly BIG CORPORATE and NON – LOCAL. Granted, they have a lot more organic items than Walmart and do make some effort to stock local produce. My strategy here is to completely avoid buying anything at Walmart that is likely to be GMO, and accept some compromise on the other conventionally grown foods, which is the vast majority.
Like Jessica states below, we all have to start somewhere. Real food is a continuum, not a black and white this is and this isn’t kinda thing. Yes, at Walmart we are smack dab in the middle of the gray area most of the time. And yes, there are many foods here that should be avoided at all costs. What I hope we can do with this series is help people navigate thru the gray area into finding food that is more and more clearly healthful.
I agree Kathy!
Also, you can not go into a health food store and expect everything in it to be healthy, you have to search and read labels there as well. Yes, the majority is not considered “real food” but there are some products that are okay to eat on occasion and thousand of those products that are labeled as healthy have way too many ingredients and SOY, it is a must to read labels! I agree the best thing to eat for convienence foods is fruits and nuts and veggies but I don’t condem anyone for eating packaged foods because there are times when you just might have to. I am not at that point yet, still eat a few, so I completely understand. What frustrates me a little is a product I find and really like it but it’s in a can . Why can’t these companies make that last step and go to glass jars, ya know!
Yep, I have the very same issues walking thru a Whole Foods as I do Walmart! I hope to do a short little series on that as well … should be entertaining
I think this post is a great idea, especially for people who already shop WM and are new to real food. You have to start somewhere! Our WM has Spectrum brand expeller pressed organic coconut oil (in a glass jar). That is where I bought my first coconut oil, which scared Hubby since it costs more than veg oil, but now I’ve got him converted! (Their Spectrum price recently went up a dollar so it’s not any cheaper than other stores anymore.)
My family learned about real food back in April of this year, and while I hate shopping WM and supporting them in any way, we really didn’t know any better when it came to food and shopped there anyway. Now 5 months later, I prefer Natural Grocers and Sprouts and we buy very little at WM.
That’s great about the coconut oil! I was planning to do a little hunt for it next time I go … I think the hubby issue and cost is important to lots of people, and is likely to be a strong reason why people continue to shop at Walmart for awhile while making the conversion to real food. Sometimes we need to go slow in making changes so everyone can adjust and there aren’t sudden ramp up’s in cost to deal with. I think your family made the conversion in record time!
I have noticed that Walmart is catching on and supplying better ingredients to cater to those who want these quality foods. I think it’s wonderful for people who only have Walmart as an option. I gripe about Walmart on many levels, but they are way better than a regular grocery store because they can get these products on their shelves with their volume buying across all their stores. Great series Kathy!
What a great photo tour. Too often folks don’t know where to look for better food choices. Thanks for sharing on Hearth & Soul Hop.
Awesome post!!! I’ve been trying to do the nourishing traditions type cooking for awhile now. I have a smallish budget. Lots of good info here- thank you!!!
i think i saw this (and another one… i thought i bookmarked… well i will keep looking)
Toxic rapeseed and other low-grade oils with additives are being passed off as olive oil
Is this what you’re looking for? It has brand names in it. UC Davis Olive Oil Report [PDF]
nope
but if i run into the list again i will make sure to post it 
My local Walmart carries a large egg variety, they have Cage-free and Free-range in white or brown.
still need to know what they feed the hens! organic feed is not cheap and i doubt the egg box tells you – but you can find out where the eggs come from and write to the “egg suppliers”
i had amazing responses re the meat Giant food sells here (amazing in terms that they told me, not so amazing what i found out!)
Cage-free doesn’t always mean they are free to roam. It could simply mean they have an outside pen for thousand of chickens that 20 chickens would be to cramped in. Weed’em and Reep on facebook (possibly spelt wrong) has a good post on chickens. Also, I worry about the eggs that say fed all vegetarian diet on the carton because that probably means there is soy in the feed. I personally have a few farms fairly close that state they don’t feed soy and are cage-free free-range but of’course they are $5 and $6 a dz.
Kim, yes, i noticed i forgot the cage free part after i posted
checking on facebook it is Weed ‘Em&Reap and i found the link
http://www.weedemandreap.com/2013/03/understanding-cage-free-free-range.html
need to go to Walmart again one of these days, have not been there in years
shopping local if i have to / doing computer orders (until they tax them)
bless you all
My walmart (and sams club) both stock kerrygold brand butter and cheese which, while not raw (they are indeed pasteurized), are grassfed. The butter is wonderful.
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