Busy
parents are often confronted with the task of having to bring together a
nutritious meal in a jiffy. A typical scene confronted everyday by a working is
that she comes back to home from work at 5:45 pm and the kids are waiting for
something that’s nice to eat otherwise the scene is going to turn into mayhem.
You can put together a good meal everyday in a short time, if you plan in
advance what you need to serve and check out those recipes that are easy-to-make
and which are healthy too. Here is a look at how to plan a simple and health
meal for your children:
Look Into The Nutritional Factor
– When you plan any meal, you need to look at how much of nutrition you gain
from the meal. A nutritious meal is one that is healthy and which gives you the
right balance of carbohydrates, fat, protein, minerals and vitamins. Rule out
any fatty foods and fast foods. Include more of fresh fruits and vegetables and
lot of fiber content so that your children can gain good energy and be
healthy.
Plan Healthy Meals
– Children have the habit of liking fried foods and packed foods which don’t
give them good health. Avoid such problems by planning healthy meals for
everyday of the week. When you buy groceries, leave out foods with
preservatives, frozen foods and processed foods. The ingredients you select
must be fresh and recipes chosen should be around these foods so that you get
maximum health benefits.
Healthy
foods include fruits, vegetable, dairy foods, seafood, nuts, green etc. In
order to get the best health benefits from the freshest of ingredients, make a
list of healthy foods and their nutritional value. You can find out from this
list nutrition levels such as fat, carbohydrate, vitamins, etc that you can
gain from a single piece food item. For example, One cup of cooked Broccoli has
offers 44 calories. It is loaded with sulphoraphane, 72 mg of calcium, 78 mcg
of folic acid and Vitamin C. One cup of papaya offers 55 calories and it
is loaded with vitamin C, offer 2.5 g fiber and a small level of essential
beta-carotene and calcium. One cup of soy milk offers 81 calories, 4 g fat
and has 20 mg to 25 mg of health-promoting isoflavones.
Look
at this list to pick out a list of ingredients that you prefer to use in your meals.
Check out how nutritious they are. Then add to this list, a set of new
ingredients that offer better nutrition and cut out those that are unhealthy.
Now you have a proper list of ingredients using which you can make delicious
meals by checking out cookbooks that offer healthy meals. .
Plan Quick -
There are lots of cookbooks that offer recipes for healthy diet, low-carb diet,
low-fat diet, healthy cooking for kids and so on. Go through a couple of good
recipe books and pick out recipes that match with the list of healthy
ingredients that you have just made. Write down those recipes and make a quick
plan on which recipes you want to use for each day of the week. Include only
those recipes that enable you to make foods in 10 to 20 minutes. If you want to
include recipes that take a longer time, check if their ingredients can be
prepared on weekends so that you just have to put things together to serve a
meal during the week day.
If
you have leftovers for one day, put them into salads the next day. Such small
improvisations can go a long way in helping you prepare a nutritious meal
quickly for your children. When you buy ingredients at the grocery store, look
for seasonal foods that are fresh, so that you can bring their nutrition into
your home Always buy ingredients for a complete
meal which include entrée, veggies, whole grain meal, and fruits so on. Do
not duplicate items and device a meal plan for everyday of the week using the
recipes book and their list of nutritious seasonal ingredients.
Recipes and Meal Ideas –
When it comes to getting together recipes, you might get a bit confused. Get
inputs from your kids so that you include what they like in your meal planning.
This enables you to bring together items with nutritious ingredients so that
you serve what’s appetizing along with what is healthy prepared in a short
while for your family. You can put together snack items that your children like
with salads, sandwiches with healthy fillings, omelets, etc. Here is a look at
the name of some recipes that are children friendly:
·
Chicken Tortilla Soup
· Parmesan Fish Sticks
· Spiced Oven-Fried Potatoes
· Baked till Crunchy Chicken Tenders
· Fruit salads that are easy-to-make with lots of cream
· Oven-fried children dressed in olive oil for crunchiness
There
are lots of interesting recipes like this and you can find one for every type
of meal and make a complete meal with them. They c
an be prepared in a couple of minutes, which saves time and insist on using only healthy cooking ideas such as baking for frying etc, without compromising on the taste. Your children will absolutely love such meals and they will learn to appreciate food that is nutritious yet tasty for their appetite.
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About the author:
How Does She Do It – launched online in
October of 2010 offers a free family
meal planning ideas and online menu planner solution that helps
create highly-customizable weekly meal
plan with grocery lists in a jiffy!
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Tags
Parenting