Family Meals Made Easy

In theory, meal plans sound like a great idea for busy families. Plan out your meals for the week in advance, buy all the ingredients in one trip to the grocery store, and it’s smooth sailing, right? Only I’ve never quite been able to get the hang of it. Inevitably, I end up staring into the pantry at 5pm, night after night, a few ingredients shy of whatever dish I’m trying to make. Add in 2 picky, impatient kids, 1 vegetarian, 1 low-carbotarian, and it’s a recipe for failure.

So when a woman I met at Blissdom contacted me about trying out E-Mealz, a site that lets you customize a meal plan for your family, including vegetarian, low-carb, and meals based on sales at your local grocery store, I said “Heck, yeah, sign me up!”

Here’s how it works: you pay $1.25 a week for the service, or $15 for 3 mos. (No, seriously. That’s really how little it costs. I waste 5 times that much each week buying random ingredients I never end up using. Like mushrooms. And weird cheeses.) You can choose plans for 2 or 4-6 people, for a specific store (Walmart or Kroger, for example) or any store. I did the vegetarian 7-day family meal plan for any store.

So you log on to the site and pull up the weekly menu. (See sample menus here.) You also have access to the previous week’s menu if you want. Then you print out the recipes, along with a grocery list, which lists the ingredients you need, listed by aisle. The grocery list ALONE was worth it for me. No more losing scraps of paper on which I’d scribbled “2 bell peppers, froz. spinach, eggs.”

The pros of E-Mealz: how easy it was, how you only buy what you need, and how there are so many options. The cons: how much food the plan produced. I soon realized I couldn’t keep up – with the cooking or the leftovers. On a good week, I manage to cook dinner maybe 4 to 5 times, tops. Then I peter out and it’s takeout and Trader Joe’s frozen entrees. But it’s also because we don’t eat that much food. I soon began off-loading the leftovers to my neighbor. (She didn’t complain.)

The meal plan also highlighted how picky my family is. Unfortunately, there were lots of recipes I had to rule out right off the bat because I knew they’d never fly in my house. Like Walnut Cheddar Loaf. Not happening. But I did try a few new things like Quinoa- and Vegetable-Stuffed Peppers (good, but lots of chopping) and Greek Eggplant (easy and tasty!)

The bottom line: I think E-Mealz is a great idea and the price makes it a no-brainer. It could actually save you money if you’re prone to wasting food like us. For a family that eats pretty much the same thing every night, I say give it a try. For us? Until the kids get a little less picky, I’m better off cobbling together our own meal plan based on the limited recipes my whole family likes. But I sure will miss those print-out grocery lists.

DEAL O’ THE WEEK: E-Mealz is offering 15% off for new subscribers. Sign up here and use the code BLISS at checkout. (Note: this is an affiliate link.)

RECIPE O’ THE WEEK: Believe it or not, this Linguine with Shrimp Scampi was a crowd-pleaser in our house. I left out the hot pepper flakes for the kids.

Lowest Mom on the Totem Pole

Let’s say you saw a very pregnant woman struggling to carry a bunch of heavy grocery bags. Over her shoulder she grunts, “I’m fine, I just wanted to save myself an extra trip.” Then she vacuums her entire house, skips lunch and her prenatal appointments because she doesn’t “have time,” wouldn’t dream of taking a nap even if she’s tired, and downs a double espresso so she can stay up late filling goody bags for her preschooler’s birthday party.

Be honest: you would judge this woman, wouldn’t you? I know I would. She’s putting the health of her poor, defenseless, unborn baby at risk because she can’t be bothered to take care of herself.

Only here’s the thing: except for the part about being pregnant, this (hypothetical) woman is me. And probably some of you. How many of us have powered through our days with barely enough nutrition to sustain a gnat, telling ourselves we don’t have time to eat a real meal? Or fueled our bodies primarily with junk food and caffeine because we “need it to get through the day”?

But this is not a rant about poor eating habits. It’s about – cliché alert – moms’ habit of making themselves the lowest person on the totem pole. Putting everyone else’s needs first. Putting ourselves last. Not even realizing we’re doing it.

You know how sometimes you hear the same advice over and over and one day for some reason it suddenly sinks in? That happened to me while reading “The Naked Mom.” Author Brooke Burke asks: “What if you applied even a fraction of the attention you pay to your child’s health and well-being to yourself?”

Being a fairly health-conscious person (Mini Egg and Starbucks binges notwithstanding), it’s shocking for me to consider this. I bend over backwards to make sure both my boys have some form of protein, a fruit or vegetable, and not too much sugar at every meal. Even if that means going to the grocery store for the third time that week to buy kiwi. (Which the baby calls “fiwi.” Adorable.)

I worry about them getting enough sleep, exercise, and fresh air, to the point where I will sit in a parked car to ensure they finish their nap, and force myself to kick a soccer ball in the mud when I would rather be sitting inside where it’s warm and dry.

But do I extend the same care and concern to my own health? No, I do not. I regularly skip breakfast (because I’m too busy being a short-order cook), miss spinning class (because I decide to throw in just one more load of laundry before I head to the gym), and forget to schedule my own doctors’ appointments. (Who has TIME for another appointment?!)

Burke writes, “Becoming a mother gave me a whole new respect for my body… it felt good to nurture myself in order to nurture that tiny life growing inside me. …Once you’ve left the delivery room, it’s a shame to discard the self-awareness that pregnancy provides.”

It’s true. I grew A PERSON inside my body. Two, in fact! I did prenatal yoga, forced myself to take vitamins the size of hub caps, and got plenty of rest. Don’t I deserve to treat myself better than a pack mule? (I bet even pack mules take regular water and snack breaks.)

Tell me: what do you do to take care of yourself? And when? For God’s sake, WHEN?!

Parenting Advice that Actually Works

I’ve had the idea for this post for a long time. But I only have 2 tips, and as I know from my background in magazines, you need at least 3 examples to make a trend.

Also, people are more likely to read an odd-numbered list. It’s true! Statistics show that most people will read “5 Ways to Drop the Weight” over “10 Tips for Slimming Down by Summer.” Don’t say I never taught you anything. :)

Speaking of magazines, are there certain ones that feel like homework to you? I hate to admit it, since some of my friends write for them, but there are certain parenting magazines that, even though I subscribe, I don’t enjoy actually READING because they’re full of expert advice about what I should be doing, could be doing, and definitely should NOT be doing with my kids. By the time I close the magazine I feel exhausted, guilty, and a failure as a mom and a human being. (Read “7 Ways to Celebrate Earth Day” and tell me you don’t feel the same!!)

But darned if those magazines aren’t right sometimes. I used to openly sneer at the articles about making your kids smiley-face sandwiches and cutesy snacks in the shape of animals. Those are for annoyingly perfect stay-at-home moms with too much time on their hands! I’d think sneer. I can’t be bothered to cut toast into hearts and stars. I’ve got laundry to do! Essays to critique! Paint to watch dry!

Then I had my second child, a kid so averse to vegetables that he would hunt down and pick out a stray carrot shred that I’d tried to sneak into his applesauce. While his big brother would gobble down an entire bowl of steamed broccoli, this baby would squeal like a stuck pig when you tried to fork anything green towards his face.

Then one night Miles was playing with his food. He said, “I’m a dinosaur and I’m going to eat these tiny trees!” Then he’d chomp a piece of broccoli. Riley saw this and immediately began yelling, “Tees too! Tees toos!” So we gave him some broccoli “trees” and to my astonishment, HE ATE THEM. It wasn’t a fluke, either. He’s eaten broccoli several times since. So there you have it, parenting tip #1: Let kids play with their food. Or, Presentation counts.

Tip #2 is far easier: To get kids to listen, talk about them to someone else. Here’s an example: In the mornings, I often ask my 4yo to go upstairs after breakfast and get himself dressed. “Miles, go on up and grab some clothes.” “Miles, it’s time to get dressed now.” “Miles! I asked you to please go get dressed for school!” “MILES!! If you don’t go GET DRESSED RIGHT NOW we will be LATE and you will NOT get to play with your friends at school EVER AGAIN!!”

As an experiment, I decided to see if these parenting mags knew what they were talking about. So I said to my other son, “Riley, I guess Miles doesn’t want to go to school today. I asked him to get dressed 3 times now and he’s not, so I guess he won’t get to play with his friends. And too bad he’ll miss snack time.” Guess what happened? Miles sprang into action. He immediately sprinted upstairs, threw on his clothes and was waiting at the door with his backpack within minutes. Well, how about that?

So there you have it, 2 tried-and-true, expert-approved parenting tips that actually work. Just don’t try to convince me that I should be composting with my toddler, OK?

Healthy Eating? Oprah’s Got Nothing on Us

Remember my plan to cook more creative, healthy meals this year? And what a flop the tofu nuggets were? Well, I didn’t let that faze me, people. I’m forging ahead. OK, so I’ve slacked off a little. What mere mortal mom could keep that up 7 days a week? (Or even 5.) But we’ve had some culinary hits in our house.

The zucchini bread, for instance: huge hit. As was the coconut banana bread. Even when I sneaked in wheat germ and flaxseed. But baked goods aren’t much of a challenge, are they? A far more satisfactory success was getting my 4yo to eat tilapia. I’m not kidding; he loved it. Scarfed it down. Asked for more. And last night my veggie-phobic toddler devoured some vegetable lasagna. I was so proud.

But this -- THIS made my heart swell: Miles’ friend C. came over one afternoon and asked if he could stay for dinner. Now, this kid’s poor mom has been known to make 3 separate entrees for her 3 children. So I said, “Sure! We’re having chickpea coconut curry over rice. If you’ll eat that, you can stay for dinner.”

C. looked skeptical. “What does it look like?” he asked warily.

I dished up a tiny serving and showed it to him. “That looks pretty good,” he said.

“Oh, it IS,” I assured him, hoping I wasn’t overselling it.

So I sat the kids down at the table and C. took a bite. “Mmm, I like this,” he said, sounding as surprised as I felt. “Will you tell my mom I tried something new?”

“I sure will. What a good eater you are, C!”

Not to be outdone, Miles chimed in, “I think it looks good, too, Mom.” Now, I can assure you that if it was just us, he would have a MUCH different reaction to his dinner. For once, peer pressure was working in my favor.

Meanwhile in his highchair, Riley was shouting, “CHICK-pea! CHICK-pea!” and popping them into his mouth one by one. I didn’t even care that he was picking around the tomatoes and scattering the rice all over the floor.

So what if dinner lasted only 7 minutes? So what if half an hour later the kids were begging for snacks? So what if they reject this exact same meal next week? At least it’s a start, right?

LINK O’ THE WEEK: Oprah did a show about her staff’s one-week vegan challenge. Did you see it? It was eye-opening in so many ways. There was a fast-food-addicted woman who said before this, she only pooped once a WEEK!!

Of course, the employee cafeteria was cooking up all sorts of delicious vegan meals for the staff, so that’s not much of a challenge. Come over and cook for me and I’ll eat as healthy as you want!

My favorite part was when the vegan expert took a lady shopping at Whole Foods and loaded her up with all this fancy health food -– never once mentioning that the contents of her shopping cart cost a FORTUNE! People call it “Whole Paycheck” for a reason, you know.

The Sugar Situation

Will you look at this loot? This (slightly blurry) photo shows the massive pile of candy my son collected trick-or-treating. And that doesn’t even include the haul his baby brother brought in, or the candy we had left over. (We don’t get many trick-or-treaters at our house.)

Oh, how times have changed. It seems like just yesterday he was having his first taste of sugar at his first birthday party. And I was still watering down his juice and mixing plain yogurt with strawberry jam because I thought store-bought yogurt had too much sugar. When we took him trick-or-treating his first Halloween, he didn’t even know what he was collecting because he’d never had candy before, aside from a Dum-Dum or two.

Fast-forward to my second child. One of his first words was “cookie.” He screams for ice cream, hoots for juice, and spits out fruit if it’s not sweet enough. He instantly understood the point of trick-or-treating right out of the gate.

He would toddle adorably up to each door in his Tigger costume, hold out his plastic pumpkin, then turn around and demand that we unwrap each piece of candy immediately. I had no choice but to feed him M&M’s one by one as we made our way through the neighborhood or risk screams that would frighten the pants off even the scariest Halloween ghouls and goblins.

So now we have 10 lbs. of candy in the house and because I’m such a good mom and am concerned about my children’s oral hygiene and nutrition, I will do the only conscionable thing: eat it all myself.

With the kids, it’s pretty much out of sight, out of mind. (Though I need to do a better job of “out of sight.” They spotted the candy on top of the fridge first thing this morning and started screeching for it.)

Not so for the adults in the house. My husband has stronger will power than I do. As for me, I hear those mini Butterfingers calling me from two floors away. The Starbursts tempting me with their tangy goodness. The Junior Mints with their creamy, refreshingly minty center. The crunchy Whoppers and the chewy Laffy Taffy. And Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, you’re the worst of all. I am powerless against your seductive sweetness.

BTW, my son just totally busted me as I was writing this. I thought he’d gone upstairs to bed, but he came sneaking up behind me and caught me red-handed in the plastic pumpkin. I was forced to buy his silence with a Milk Dud.

For the sake of my teeth and waistline, maybe I’d better send the candy into work with my husband. At least the kinds I like. Then again, my preschooler’s pretty smart. Even he would know if he looked at his stash and found only a half-dozen boxes of Dots and Almond Joys that something didn’t add up.

READ O’ THE WEEK: According to this article, “The average trick or treater brings home a haul of 3,500 to 7,000 calories in their bag.” Yowza! Can you guess the best and worst kinds of candy, calorie-wise?

I've Got a Bone to Pick with Jamie Oliver

So remember when I blamed my problems on Oprah? Well, now I’m pointing the finger at Jamie Oliver. Dude, why do hate chicken nuggets so much? I’m on board with your plan to healthy-up the American diet. But your constant assertion that anyone can just whip up their own fabulous meals from scratch in mere minutes is FALSE. Let me tell you a little story...

It started when I watched the British chef on the talk show circuit discussing his new show, “Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution.” Interesting premise, relevant topic, I’m in. I was feeling a little smug if you want the truth. Or perhaps sanctimonious is a better word.

See, unlike those corndog-munching, Mountain Dew-swilling West Virginians, I feed MY children vegetables. Whole-grain pasta. Organic fish sticks. Tofu, even. (So what if half of it gets thrown to the dog. The point is, I’m serving it.) I would never DREAM of giving my kids Coke or Twinkies. (But the occasional sip of Orangina and a cupcake’s OK, right?)

Yeah, well... then I realized that sweets used to be a special treat in our house. Whereas these days, my 3-year-old demands a cookie, popsicle, or piece of Easter candy after every meal. Sort of contradicts the definition of “special” treat, huh?

And although I did not let a smidge of added salt, sugar, syrup, or the like pass my firstborn’s lips until well past his first birthday, I’ve adopted a somewhat looser approach with Kid #2. Let’s just say he’s no stranger to waffles or bacon. So I guess what I’m saying is there’s room for improvement in our family diet.

But I take issue with the chicken nuggets. My 3 y.o. USED to be a good eater. He devoured avocados, hardboiled eggs, even raw bell peppers. And then things changed. Now I’m lucky if can get him to eat a scrap of protein or a raw carrot, ever. So he eats a lot of chicken nuggets. Lots and LOTS of them. And so does his 14-month-old brother. Don’t judge me. At least they’re the baked kind. Unless they’re from Chick-fil-A.

Anyway, that Jamie Oliver got under my skin. He convinced me I could -- and should -- whip up some chicken nuggets from scratch. The thing is, I’m a vegetarian. People who don’t eat chicken should certainly not attempt to cook it. But I did. And it went horribly wrong.

I bought some skinless, boneless chicken, just like Jamie said. I dredged it in egg whites and panko, just like Jamie said. I popped it in the oven and ... 12-14 minutes later it was still pink and gelatinous. I continued to bake and check it while the kids began to wail from hunger. I continued to bake and check it while I nuked them some frozen peas as an appetizer. I continued to bake and check it while I cursed out Jamie Oliver for disparaging my best quick, go-to meal and forcing me to waste Whole Foods chicken by incinerating it into oblivion.

So no, we did not dine on homemade chicken nuggets that night. Although my husband did choke some down out of pity when he came home. So, Jamie? Maybe it’s easy for YOU to whip up a healthy, tasty meal from scratch. But for us moms in the trenches? Those frozen chicken nuggets might be our last link to sanity.

RECIPE O’ THE WEEK: Now that Rachael Ray, she’s a good egg. Her recipes haven’t turned out nearly as terrible for me. Like the Sweet and Sour Thai Noodle Bowls, for instance. You can easily swap in tofu or shrimp if you’re so inclined.

Health Tips from a Complete Non-Expert

As January winds down, I keep encountering people who have resolved to live healthier this year. Exercise more, eat better, slow down, the usual. To those folks I say, good for you! But do you have to take up ALL the parking spots at the gym? Some of us have boatloads of kids and diaper bags to carry, you know!

And also? I hope I’m not standing behind you in line at Panera when you special-order your lunch and ask for everything on the side. Just GET THE SALAD!! If you really want to save calories, you shouldn’t be there in the first place.

Sorry, went off on a tangent there. What I meant to say was, I would like to share some healthy living tips with you all. I am by no means a health expert or a model of fitness -- “Why run when you can sit on the recumbent bike and read People?” is my motto -- but I have been a vegetarian for a couple of decades and I’ve never been on “The Biggest Loser.” That qualifies me in some small way, right?

Just to be clear: I am not a medical professional, just a mom who forces her kids to eat vegetables and go to the gym with her. Got it?

Take the “ex” out of “exercise.” What do you think of when you hear the word “exercise”? Extreme workouts? Sweat, pain, discomfort? Then find something you don’t hate. I can ride a bike 10x longer than I can run, for example, simply because I enjoy it more. And I do yoga because it’s relaxing and I feel taller and looser afterwards. Whereas body pump (weightlifting) classes just make me sore. It doesn’t have to be uncomfortable to count as exercise.

Sneak it in. Forget Jessica Seinfeld’s cookbook. (Unless you’re craving this.) There are MUCH easier ways to sneak healthy stuff into your kids’ food. I mix carrots into any baby food my 11 m.o. turns up his nose at. (Like green beans.) I sprinkle wheat germ on my 3-y.o.’s yogurt and call it “crunchies.” I mix flaxseed into pancakes and muffins, and have been known to add pureed spinach to spaghetti sauce.

We try to buy unsweetened everything (yogurt, oatmeal), and add our own dab of sugar, honey, or jam to it. We also buy wholegrain everything—bread, pasta, tortillas, cereal. There’s no excuse to buy white bread. EVER. If you must, use Rachael Ray’s trick of making a sandwich with the wheat bread on the bottom and the white bread on top. Sneaky, huh?

Go veggie. Vegetarian fare has come a long way since tofu and soymilk. At any Trader Joe’s, Whole Foods, and ordinary neighborhood supermarket you can find a huge variety of frozen veggie entrees. My favorite product is Morningstar Farms Grillers Recipe Crumbles. Substitute them for ground beef in tacos, chili, spaghetti sauce, and countless other recipes. The soy chicken, on the other hand? You can skip. (Except the nuggets. They’re not bad.) And remember: anything meat can do, beans can do better.


Swap out the coffee. You know those too-much-coffee jitters? I’ve started switching to green tea after one cup of coffee in the morning. If you think it tastes like boiled vegetables, try Lipton Green Tea with orange, passionfruit, and jasmine with a squirt of honey. Yum! It gives me enough of a pick-me-up to get through the day but won’t keep me awake past “The Daily Show.”

Make it a habit. You wouldn’t skip brushing your teeth for a day, would you? Or washing your face? OK, well, definitely not for 2 days straight, right? Because you’re in the habit. And you’d start to feel gross. And your friends would avoid you.

Well, it’s the same with exercise and eating healthy. Start by just showing up at the gym, or going for a walk, or eating a fruit or vegetable with each meal. Before you know it you’ll be running 10k’s and downing shots of wheat grass. Or not.

Look, I can and sometimes do eat a bag of BBQ potato chips for dinner, but I pair them with a side of carrot sticks and ranch dressing. It’s all about balance, people. Good luck with those resolutions! Save me a Stairmaster, would you?

TIP O’ THE WEEK: I never could get into V8. These Apple & Eve fruit & veggie juice boxes are MUCH tastier. I steal them from my son all the time.