Having to decide what to make for dinner on the fly can be tedious. Especially if you don’t really enjoy cooking. And if you have a picky eater in your family!

Consider thinking about your dinner menu like a “buffet”. Prepare two veggies/fruits, two starches & two proteins and serve family-style. (Read more about the benefits of family-style serving here).

Planning your meal using a template such as this allows you to “set it and forget it”. Deciding what’s for dinner is simply popping foods into each category. A meal could look like this: green beans (cooked & raw), orange slices, cous cous, dinner rolls, hard boiled eggs and chicken strips. Or lasagna, “deconstructed” salad, strawberries, garlic bread and sliced salami.

Neither of these menus are fancy and you may think that the foods don’t “go” with each other. But that doesn’t really matter. Let go of the stress of planning a meal that Martha Stuart would approve (unless she’s coming to dinner!) and allow the buffet-menu-template to simplify getting a meal on the table.

Dinner time got you down?

Reach out at Karen@CoastalFamilyNutrition.com or call the office at 603-674-2479. I’m happy to help.

Snack Idea: Dried apricots & almonds

Please feel free to share this with someone who may like to learn more about feeding kiddos!