We work hard to make sure every recipe we print is healthy.
Here's what we do:
- Our food writers work with qualified nutritionists when developing the recipes to provide maximum health benefits
- All recipes are analysed to make sure they fit our nutrition guidelines, and if they don't we keep working until they do
- We look for readily available, affordable ingredients
- We test recipes twice to make sure they work and taste great!
- We use specific nutrition criteria for all recipes, and those which don't meet our criteria won't be printed.
Healthy Food Guide recipes have nutritional classifications. This is what they mean.
HFG recipe badges
 |
Low fat This recipe has less than 10g fat per serve for mains and less than 4.5g fat per serve for desserts. |
 |
Low kJ This recipe has less than 1700kJ per serve for mains and less than 1000kJ per serve for desserts/snacks. |
 |
Low sodium This recipe has less than 500mg sodium per serve for mains (not applied to desserts or baking). |
 |
High calcium This recipe has 250mg calcium or more per serve. |
 |
High fibre This recipe has 6g fibre or more per serve. |
 |
High iron This recipe has 4.5mg iron or more per serve. |
 |
Dairy-free This recipe has no ingredients which are known to commonly contain dairy products.** BUT always check the particular ingredients you are using. |
 |
Vegetarian |
 |
Gluten-free This recipe has no ingredients which are known to commonly contain gluten.** BUT always check the particular ingredients you are using. For example, malt made from barley (which contains gluten) is used extensively in manufacturing as a natural colouring, flavouring and sweetening agent. |
 |
Diabetes-friendly This recipe is diabetes-friendly. It has 50g or less carbohydrate, 4g or more fibre, 6g or less saturated fat, and 600mg or less sodium per serve (applied to mains, soups and substantial sides).* |
 |
Money-saver This recipe costs $3.50 or less per serve.**** |
 |
Veges Shows the number of vegetable serves per person (1-5).*** |
*This is a broad guideline for people with type 2 diabetes. People with type 1 diabetes should follow individualised advice from their doctor or dietitian. Please check the amount of carbohydrate is right for you. For recipes which meet the criteria for saturated fat and sodium but not fibre, you may be able to add fibre with vegetables and whole grains to make a diabetes-friendly serve.
**Always check the particular ingredients you are using.
***For potatoes, kumara, legumes and avocado, a maximum of 1 vegetable serve is counted.
**** Recipe costs are based on supermarket prices at time of publication. Prices may vary between outlets and regions.
We reserve the right to review and revise our recipe badges and their qualifying criteria from time to time.
Measurements
We use standard New Zealand metric measurements:
1 cup = 250ml
1 tablespoon = 15ml
1 dessertspoon = 10ml
1 teaspoon = 5ml
Unless otherwise noted, we use standard no. 6 eggs.
Oven temperatures are in degrees celsius (°C).
Click here for a guide to the approximate recommended dietary intakes (RDI) for the average adult.