Benefits of Family Meals

When was the last time you and your family sat down to a good dinner? Recently there has been a shift in society’s view of eating family meals.

 Families today have busy schedules. Kids are involved in extracurricular activities, and many mothers are more active in the workplace. Although most families would say that family meals are valuable, they often allow other things to become a priority, devaluing the act of eating family meals together. Making time for family meals is beneficial to the entire family.

One way to make sure your family sits down for family meals is to ask your children to help with dinner preparation and make it a fun experience. Some fun programs you can explore are Cooking Up Fun (http://www.cookingupfun.cornell.edu/), Cook It Up, and Cooking with Kids (http://cookingwithkids.net/).

All of these can give you some good ideas about how to bond with your children as you prepare family meals. These programs highlight the importance of family meals and the benefits of creating the meal as a family

Download the full UF Extension publication at: http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/pdffiles/FY/FY136200.pdf

Planning Healthy Family Meals

How many times a week do you hear, “What's for dinner?” After a long, sometimes demanding day, this can be a stressful question for busy moms and dads. Try to overcome the temptation of picking up fried chicken on the way home or ordering pizza; these options are unhealthy and can be expensive. Instead, start planning your meals ahead of time. Planning meals helps you save time, money, and energy. Also, planning meals helps you prepare healthy meals at home. For example, when you write out your meals, it is easier to see if your family is eating a variety of food choices, nutrient-dense foods, and the right amounts of foods for good nutrition.

Planning healthy meals is important and should be based on the Dietary Guidelines for Americans and MyPyramid Food Guide recommendations. The following tips from Isabel Valentín-Oquendo, senior dietician, College of Medicine-OBGYN/WIC program, and Claudia Peñuela, EFNEP nutrition assistant, Department of Family Youth and Community Sciences Department at the University of Florida are helpful:

• Select more nutrient-dense foods for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. They give you the nutrients you need with relatively fewer calories than other choices in the same food group. Examples include fat free milk instead of whole milk and fruit instead of fruit pastry.

• Try to add whole grains to each meal to achieve the daily recommendations.

• Try to eat fruits, and dark green and orange vegetables, with at least one meal per day.

• Choose one cup of milk or an equivalent from the milk group, like yogurt, at each meal. Choose fat-free or low-fat versions.

• Use meat alternatives, such as dried beans and peas, as often as possible.

• Combine meat or chicken with beans to increase fiber in your diet.

• Reduce or replace recipes items that are high in saturated fat, trans fat, cholesterol, sodium, and sugars.

• Serve salads with your lunch or your dinner.

• Substitute fruit salads for a dessert, or add a fruit to each meal.

Be sure to choose foods that are colorful, flavorful, and that have different textures and shapes. This makes the meal more interesting

Pleasant Family Meals

If you’re frustrated because your family members are headed in different directions at meal times, you’re not alone. In fact, recent research published by the American Medical Association said that less than half of children 9 – 14 years old reported having dinner with family members every day and almost 20% said they never had dinner with family members.


Most families find it increasingly difficult to sit down together over a meal. Demanding work schedules, band or softball practice and evening study dates can take up so much of everyone’s time.

But eating together plays big dividends for both parents and their children. According to Dr. Linda Bobroff at the University of Florida, shared family meals not only contribute to a healthful diet, they give children a sense of belonging, which is so critical in our world today.

There are several ways parents can ensure that the mealtimes are pleasant and relaxing. First, make a family agreement that mealtimes are for pleasant conversation. Hold discussions about difficult topics such as a child’s poor grade or marital problems for another time. Second, get rid of distractions. Turn off the television and cell phones, and let the answering machine take telephone messages during the meal.

Encourage discussion by asking each family member what he or she liked best during the day. Give each person, even the youngest, a chance to contribute to the conversation with everyone paying attention.

What a nice change from the fast food line and what a great time to spend together as a family!