One of the best ways to improve your health is to prepare your own meals. When I mention this to patients I get lots of questions, but the first one is always: Do you cook? The answer: Yes, I do! The next question is always: What do you cook?
Today I invite you to a week of dinners in the Goddard house. I plan to share our menus seasonally–what we eat is definitely driven by what is available.
First, some background. I have four children between the ages of 13 and 4 ½ years old, a husband and an au pair in my household. My children vary in pickiness, from adventurous to “Ewww! that smells gross!” We ascribe to the parenting philosophy of “I decide what we eat, you decide how much” and we do our best to make sure there is at least one thing on the table each person likes.
We eat dinner together about 5 nights per week. As our children have gotten older, we have started eating later–now we all eat dinner at about 6:45 p.m. including our 4 ½ year old (who may never had eaten dinner before 6:30). I am responsible for most, but not all the cooking.
Without further ado, this was the menu in the Goddard house the week of October 19, 2020:
Monday: Green salad–nearly every meal in our house starts with a large green salad with veggies for the adults. The children often get a decomposed, dressing free version of the same. I find this is a good way to get some veggies into the pickier members of the group. Whole wheat pasta with Rao’s Vodka Sauce (because it is red, not objectionable pink, and has no added sugar). We like Garofalo pasta because the whole wheat is made from 100% whole wheat flour and doesn’t taste like cardboard and it is not too hard to get in our area.
Tuesday: Green Salad. Roasted Cod (a wine free riff on this), wild rice and steamed broccoli which some of my children dip in copious amounts of olive oil.
Wednesday: Green Salad. DALS’ Tomato and White Bean Soup–the single slice of bacon adds a little something and makes the house smell amazing!
Thursday (I work late this night and we don’t eat together): Kiddos get to choose among some kid food options like chicken fingers, fish sticks or meatballs (all thanks to our local grocery delivery service and our au pair) plus grape tomatoes and baby carrots. Adults had a green salad and cheese (from our local shop) with some salami and crackers–we do this almost every Thursday, and often indulge in some wine.
Friday: Pizza night! We order in Pizza every Friday. We do have a big green salad pre-pizza.
Saturday: This week this was a date night (we are about 50/50 date night vs. movie night with the family). My husband and I ate at a trusted local restaurant–outdoors and with great Covid precautions. Kiddos had kid food and veggies.
Sunday: Green Salad. Sheet pan chicken and brussels sprouts from Melissa Clark’s Dinner. There is nothing I love more than a healthy flavorful sheet pan dinner.
I hope sharing my family’s dinner menu inspires you to cook and eat at home more.
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