News Flash: I am a BUSY mama. I have 4 kids with 2 of them 2 & under. Two of them go to school all day and come home with homework and projects. The kids play soccer, t-ball, basketball, take music lessons, and have dance class. We are your typical fast-paced, on-the-go family! We aren't home-bodies. I have babies home all day with me. I don't have time to cook up gourmet meals and engineer intricate dishes (my kids wouldn't eat anyway).
Until 2 years ago, my kids were eating frozen corn dogs,
chicken nuggets, box mac n' cheese, pizza, and fast food
for dinner every night. They went through a box of fruit snacks in a couple days
and a large container of animal crackers in a week.
They were raised on processed junk food. Why? I was a working mother who didn't know where to start with healthy eating. Plus, after a long day, I didn't want to argue or fight with my kids to get them to take a bite of their dinner.
So, I started by subscribing to a meal planning service, eMeals. The meals were family friendly, had a wide variety of foods, and kept us on a tight grocery budget. But, as I started learning more about "clean eating/real food" and the benefits of cutting out processed foods, my eMeals plans weren't working for me anymore. I had to change the recipes so much that I might as well just use my own recipes instead of the meal plans they had for me. Then, I thought it was awesome when they came out with a "clean eating" meal plan! The best of both worlds! Well, I won't knock eMeals because if it wasn't for that meal planning service, I honestly would not be where I am today. I am comfortable in the kitchen. Recipes with more than 5 ingredients don't freak me out. And I learned how to put meals together: meat/starch/veggie. BUT, the clean eating meal plan by eMeals is quite gourmet. The recipes are a little more complicated, use more exotic ingredients, and are more time consuming to make (and clean up). The dishes featured on last week's meal plan include:
Herb Roasted Salmon with Caramelized Leeks and Red Lentils
Mushroom Tart with Spinach and Pear Salad
Farro Salad with Fennel, Kale, Feta, Tomatoes
Shaved Asparagus Pasta with Goat Cheese and Lemon Zest with Roasted Tomato Salad
Quinoa Risotto with Roasted Red Pepper Sauce and Kale Salad
OK don't get me wrong, those dishes sound AMAZING!!! And if it were just me and my husband, I would whip these up and enjoy the heck out of them. BUT I have 4 kids, who are finicky about their food. Albeit, they eat more variety now than they did when they were eating junk food all the time, but they would not touch most of these dishes! I don't believe that you should be a "short-order" cook and just make your kids what you know they like all the time. They should have variety of foods and try new things! But, I want family friendly simple dishes that my kids will eat. Is that too much to ask?
I have been struggling with this for a couple months. So, I finally decided it's time to cancel my eMeals membership, which I have had for about 2 years, and either make my own meal plans or find a new meal planning service. I did sign up for a 2 week trial of Deliciously Organic's Real Food Fast meal plan. I'm going to try it out and see what I think. I also have a HUGE database of family approved meals I can fall back on if this doesn't meet our needs.
SO, how do you cook healthy for your family when you are SUPER busy like us? How do you make time to clean, take kids to school and extracurricular activities, do homework, exercise, do laundry, change diapers, and make the effort to make healthy unprocessed meals and snacks? This has been a process for our family and is the basis of Fit N Busy Mama. The reason I started all of this. So thank you for sticking with me on this journey and I look forward to helping others who were just like me! Thanks for reading!
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