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Archive for the ‘Meal Planning’ Category

Today I was researching childhood obesity because I am interested in why it is increasing so rapidly. I think it has been on my mind lately because out of the 10 children under the age of 14 on my street, 3 are overweight. Out of the age 14 and over population (including adults), of which there are 30, 10 are significantly overweight/obese. When you see it around you I guess you start to wonder, what gives?!

So I randomly came across a YouTube video of a presentation called Current Issues in Pediatric Obesity Part 1 - which was absolutely fascinating and I am telling you is worth watching every minute of the hour-long video.  It isn’t just about childhood obesity because, as the presenter states, the reasons for obesity are the same in both adults and children.  In it you’ll learn that:

• Soda needs to be limited to one drink per week
• Fast food needs to be limited to 1 or fewer meals per week
• Exercise is the absolute best way to decrease insulin resistance
• Exercise only helps the insulin issue for 24 hours so you have to do it daily

When I watched it I couldn’t help but thinking about how our local elementary school and my child’s daycare have both, in the past year, held fundraisers for the schools at McDonald’s! I was appalled at this from the first but I found out that not many other parents were at all phased.

(I am getting to a point here…) So then I watched the second presentation - Current Issues In Childhood Obesity Part 2 - and thought I’d share the nutritionist’s snack advice for kids as we could all use some new ideas for kids snacks, right? She also has a lot of other practical diet guidelines on there as well if you are looking for more detail.

Healthy Kid’s Snacks

• Carrots and hummus
• Celery and peanut butter
• Apple slices and cheese slices
• Trail mix (nuts and fruit only)

The last take-home message I got from the two videos is that if you or your child wants to lose weight it is very beneficial to do it with a doctor’s counsel as opposed to trying to do it on your own.

Something I have done for years now is to keep a favorite snack and recipe list tucked into my recipe folder. Whenever I find a particularly wonderful recipe or snack idea I jot it down on the ever-expanding list. Then, when I am at a loss for what to plan for the week I can just get this out and pick a few.

I got the idea from a roommate back in my days as a summer intern in college. She was second generation Chinese and boy could she cook. She mostly cooked Chinese dishes, all of which were super-tasty, but could also wow us all with her American cuisine as well. One time she even went out picked wild rasberries to top off a pie that she had basically just whipped together from what ingredients were on hand. That’s some major skill for a 20 year old and all the rest of us were definitely appreciative.

Anyway, she kept a recipe box with 3×5 cards. Everytime she made up a new recipe that she liked, she’d write down the ingredients and a few notes about how to cook it and file it away. She explained that if she didn’t then she would forget what she had done.

My system is not nearly as fancy. A lined sheet of paper torn out of a spiral notebook from about 5 years ago that is labeled “Food Ideas.” There’s 4 different colors of pen ink on there and a few scribbles from the kids.

Here are some of the things that are on my list:

• Jiffy apple-cin muffin mix - make the coffee cake
• Lasagna with shredded carrots in filling
• Cinnamon sugar toast
• Sauted veggies with basil and goat cheese
• Focaccia bread w/ roasted garlic and sundried tomato on top, goat cheese on side
• Re-fried bean and cheese burritos
• Fruit salad with yogurt, honey, and chopped walnuts on top
• Krusteaz pancakes
• Scrambled eggs w/ ham and cheese mixed in
• White cheddar popcorn cakes w/ peanut butter on top
• Blackberry Chicken (recipe in New Basics cookbook)
• Green bean casserole
• Fresh broccoli steamed w/ a little cheddar on top
• Bagels w/ strawberry cream cheese
• Chile from “Pasta, Grains,…” Cookbook
• Phad Thai - Box, quick fix
• Sandwiches: pesto, tomato, goat cheese, and prosciutto
• Smoothies - fruit, yogurt, oj, etc.
• Cous cous

I wrote those exactly as they appear on my list. What’s on your list?!

The 3 year-old blues: no, I am not talking about sad 3 year olds, I am talking about sad parent’s of 3 year olds! For any of you out there raising someone this age - hats off to you because this is tough! Let me just give you the run down of my morning.

6:20am - “I want cereal” “I want a peanut butter and jelly” “I want a different kind of cereal” “Peel this banana”

6:30am-8am - I let both kids watch TV for, gasp!, 1.5 hours! Call the parenting police! My usual guideline is 1 hour a day, tops, for both kids, but this morning I must’ve sensed that it would be a tough day so I let them watch PBS Kids for a bit longer than usual. That was probably the quietist most peaceful moment of the day.

8am - 12pm - Sheer h*ll. He wanted food constantly, then he couldn’t get along with his big sister. Then both kids got their corn chips taken away when they couldn’t stop complaining about who got more. Then he pulled her hair, REALLY hard. He got sent to his room. Then he wouldn’t stay in his room. Then there was the tortilla incident, oh yeah, but that was after the Throwing Stuffed Animals at Mommy incident. The tortilla pieces were left in his room (where they aren’t supposed to be in the first place) so he was told to pick them up. Oh boy did that unleash some fury. Let’s just say that about 1 hour later he finally picked up the tortilla pieces, which were now torn completely into shreds, making them very hard for him to throw away.

I don’t normally recommend drinking as a way to solve one’s parenting problems, but let’s just say that the normally disgusting-sounding Bourbon, which was all the alcohol we had in the house, was sounding REALLY good at about 11am!

The Alcohol Alternative - Cupcakes!

Once big sis was off to kindergarten for the afternoon, I figured the only thing that was going to get me and little bro through the next few hours was to bake something. So I came up with cupcakes. After some complaining about how he does NOT like cupcakes, I got him started. He cracked the egg and put the cupcake liners in the cupcake pan. Then he worked the Kitchen Aid like a pro and helped put the butter in the microwave. 30 minutes later we had some cupcakes and he decided that yes, indeed, he DOES like cupcakes! Well imagine that. So do I.

Nothing can cure a bad day like some cooking. This whole experience just shows how important it is for those of us who have little kids around to keep cooking supplies on hand at all times!

Do you ever sit down to make a grocery list and realize your mind is as blank as the piece of paper in your hand? Maybe you’ve made all the family favorites recently and just aren’t into making them again this week. Or maybe nothing sounds good. When this happens to me, I have several tricks up my sleeve, and one of them I will share with you here. I guess that doesn’t make it a secret anymore!

The Secret

What I do is simply go to the website of one of those make your own frozen entrees places, look at their menu for the month, and take note of any dishes that sound good. Then I either attempt to make something similar without an actual recipe or I find a recipe online that is similar to the one on the website. There it is. My secret weapon. So when your mind draws a blank try out this tactic and you’ll probably wind up with more than a week’s worth of meal ideas!