Food Buying Guide

The USDA Food Buying Guide has been expanded and updated. The new guide replaces the 1984 edition and is more comprehensive. There is also a new look, with an updated design. The guide is packed with helpful information and contains meal pattern charts.

The guide will answer the following types of questions.

Will the meal meet the appropriate requirements of the various Child Nutrition Programs?
How many servings will you get from a specific quantity of food?
What quantity of the raw product will provide the amount of ready-to-cook food called for in a recipe?
How much food will you need to buy?

Food Buying Guide

Food Buying Guide Calculator

Note: Some documents on this page are made available in the Adobe Acrobat PDF format. Acrobat allows the user to view and print the documents exactly as they look in hard copy. First-time users of this format will have to perform a one-time only installation of the free Adobe Acrobat Reader Software before they will be able to read or print a document. This format is used extensively both on the Web and on this site.

For additional information, E-Mail: nutrition@cde.state.co.us