Family Meals: Fast Food Done Right
Lanie DeMars, Adventure 212 Bistro Manager
As much as I love summer vacations; basking in the sun, swimming in the river, and wakeboarding with my friends…it’s hard to compete with back to school for fun times of the year. The leaves are starting to change color, the evening air gets a little crisper, and the promise of what the school year will bring is so exhilarating! (Not to mention that you even get to go shopping for new school clothes!) From mom’s and dad’s perspective, the start of school correlates to less time in the evening for cooking and eating together as a family. Kids have football practice, swimming class and dance lessons (sometimes all in the same night!) and with all the running around, car seats often pinch hit for the kitchen table. But we all know that in order to keep our families healthy, we should limit our consumption of fast foods….right?
What if I gave you some tricks and ideas for “fast” foods you can make at home—so YOU control the fat, sodium and portions? It doesn’t take a ton of time, just a little bit of planning. Here are some step-by-step ideas to make the planning go smoothly.
- Figure out what you’ll be making for dinner the day before—so you can make sure you have ingredients on hand. Then, start it in the morning before you leave for work. We all know that by 5:30 pm, if you haven’t started dinner yet, you’re most likely going to end up at a drive-thru window, forking over good cash for yucky food. If you’re really on your game, you can plan the whole week’s dinners on the weekend, so we can just do one big grocery shopping trip and save time there.
- If you know your family will be running around in the evenings and will need to eat on the go, invest in a nice re-usable container for each family member. Color code them if you like (your kids might get into that), and make sure they’re clean and ready to go when you’re prepping for the next day’s meal. Don’t forget utensils and napkins, and something to pack a glass of milk for your kids. Pack them all in a large re-usable bag (like a grocery sack), so it’s easy to pack in and take out of the car with you.
- When you’re planning your menu, remember the food pyramid. My pediatrician told me to shoot for the plate to be 2/3 vegetables and fruit, the rest protein and complex carbs (brown rice, whole grain pasta, etc).
- Think about these cooking methods for fast and easy weeknight suppers… Crockpot. Casseroles. Stews. Chili. (Anything you can make ahead and just warm up quickly on your way out the door.)
- Have a little cooler of snacks in the car for when kids are hungry (or “staaaaaaaaaaarving” as my kids are prone to say) and dinner is more than 15 minutes away. Cheese sticks, apples, whole grain crackers, nuts or trail mix and re-usable water bottles are good choices.
Need some ideas for quick (and packable) dinners?
- Chicken a la King, full of peas and carrots (made in the crockpot) over a biscuit, served with melon chunks and strawberries.
- Asian beef with mandarin oranges, lots of peppers and vegetables with rice (crockpot), watermelon wedges for dessert.
- Shepard’s Pie (made with ground turkey, corn, green beans, leftover mashed potatoes and a bit of cheese), served with apple slices.
- Sloppy Joes (crockpot– try it with ground turkey) on whole grain buns with a tossed salad and carrot sticks **Note: Okay, perhaps not in the car with this one, but it can be eaten quickly before you need to leave the house, or as a mini-picnic before the big game.
- Chicken and wild rice casserole (bake it the night before if you know you’ll be in a big hurry!) with raw green beans and tomato slices.
For more great and quick dinner ideas, check out a couple of my favorite websites…
http://family.go.com/food
www.familycrockpotrecipes.com
http://www.momswhothink.com/recipes/recipes.html
