LeAnne R. Ruzzamenti, MA
LeAnne Ruzzamenti
About me:
A marketing communications professional, LeAnne is passionate about a healthy lifestyle and hopes to instill that passion in others. She holds a master’s degree in communication studies, is a mother to toddler twins and includes red wine, dark chocolate and feta cheese among her favorite foods.
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Our twins are two years old and we’ve had plenty of dinners sitting around the table with family and friends, but these have mostly taken place on weekends and holidays. On weeknights, the twins are usually fed around 5 p.m. by their nanny, and my husband and I sit down several hours later. In embracing the feeding philosophies of
Ellyn Satter, I knew I had to take on what feels like the overwhelming stress of getting a family dinner on the table each night.
Satter recommends giving children set snack (mini meals) and meal times to regulate their eating and manage their hunger. So the first step in moving to the family dinner meant introducing a snack around 3:30 p.m. so that the toddlers could wait until 6 p.m. for their next meal. Their nanny reported a good-sized snack: whole wheat crackers, hummus, kiwi, banana and milk.
Chicken souvlaki was on the menu for the evening. I had marinated the chicken overnight, so my husband was grilling it by the time I arrived home. After greeting the children, I asked them to help me set the table. My daughter happily agreed. I handed her their plastic plates and asked her to put them on the table. She surprised me by carrying them outside to the patio table. What a great idea! We should eat outside, it was a beautiful evening!
I pulled together all the fixings and the already washed and peeled fruit and set the rest of the table. My son seemed to sense a great event, because he eagerly sat at the table poking his fork onto his empty plate watching his dad cook the chicken.
For our “first” dinner, we had some great successes. My son sat at the table for about 10 minutes before the lure of his bubble mower took him away. I excused him while helping my daughter fish out the remaining kalamata olives from their jar. She saw me serve them on to my plate and asked for some. I cut one in half and expected her not to like it (I had given her a taste of them before upon her request and she hadn’t cared for them). She asked for more. Nine in total, and I think she would have kept going if it was a bottomless jar. According to Satter, one of the benefits of family meals is to move children along to eating “grown-up food.” This felt like great success (even though the olives made up her whole meal)! Plus, getting everything ready and having everyone sit down at the same time didn’t feel as overwhelming as I had feared.
Help a rookie out – what are some of your quick, kid-friendly recipes suitable for busy weeknights?
LeAnne R. Ruzzamenti
Director of Marketing Communications