Safeway Open Nature Products

Things that bug me: eating food with tons of preservatives in them, but feeling you don't have much of a choice because it's more convenient. 
This is my dilemma. I wish I had time (and motivation!) to make an awesome, healthy, delicious dinner from scratch every day of the week. Some weeks I do. But most weeks there are at least a few nights (if not all of them) where I just can't swing it. So I usually end up getting a frozen pizza or lasagna or something similar. And then I feel bad about it because usually those things are full of ingredients I can't even pronounce. And they usually don't taste anywhere near as good as their homemade versions.   So, what's a busy person supposed to do? It's a fine balance between finding something quick and easy and finding something that you can feel good about eating. This is especially relevant to our family lately as Hubby is trying to lose some weight. And since diet is an important part of that, we are striving to be a bit more natural with our food choices and trying to eliminate processed foods as much as possible. 
Enter Safeway's Open Nature products (to a heavenly chorus of ahhhhs!). A line of products that is 100% natural. That means no artificial preservatives, flavours, colours...none of that ickiness! And if items are vitamin-fortified, it's all from natural sources. It also means no added nitrates, nitrites MSG or fillers in their meats, which is awesome. And their animals are raised without antibiotics or growth hormones and are fed a vegetarian diet (which to me is a no-brainer and one of the creepiest things about the meat industry, if you ask me *shudder*). So basically, it's food that I feel good about purchasing without losing the convenience of just popping into Safeway. 

Drool...

This doesn't mean that it is "diet food". It's not low-calorie, low-sugar or low-sodium, for example. But, the choices are better. For instance, the frozen pizza is made with a multi-grain crust. Which is delicious, by the way. 
I sent Hubby to the store to pick some of the products up so we could try them, and he returned with ice cream sandwiches, frozen greek yogurt and a frozen pizza...I can see his diet was far from his mind.

 Note to self: don't send a hungry man to the grocery store.  Although, as a pregnant woman I was secretly ecstatic. 
But since then we have also tried a wide-range of their products, as they can be found in the bakery, deli, dairy, meat, frozen and pantry sections, so it's not like I have a limited choice.
In any case, I was super happy with the taste of the Open Nature products. I am usually skeptical of purchasing something that claims to be a better choice, since I have it in my mind that all those creepy chemicals they use are actually what makes things taste delicious. Which is a little silly, since when I make delicious food from scratch I don't use all those weirdo ingredients. But regardless, my fears were unfounded and everything has tasted delicious. Actually, our only complaint was we wish the pizza was bigger...it was yummo! 

I love being able to shop at a regular grocery store and feel better about my choices. I hate having to sacrifice quality for convenience, so I am so happy that I no longer have to do that.  Pretty awesome, if you ask me. 
*Please note: I recieved compensation for this post in order to facilitate an accurate review, but all words and opinions are my own (as always!)