Eat Better, Eat Together is a blog series by registered dietitians and parents whose stories and advice help families start or strengthen a commitment to balanced family meals and create healthy, successful families. Take the Eat Better, Eat Together Family Meal Pledge at Facebook.com/MealsMatter.org.

Planning meals and coming up with shopping lists can seem like an endless process for the primary meal preparer and food shopper. In my family, that would be me! To keep meal planning interesting and easy while providing foods my family will enjoy, I usually follow the following thinking process:

• What season is it? In summer we do more grilling and in winter we do more stews and casseroles.

• What do I have in the pantry? I always like to keep my pantry -- which includes the refrigerator and freezer full. When cooking for teenagers you never know how many kids will show up on any given evening.

With these questions in mind, I come up with a few entrees for the week and create a shopping list to accommodate the menu and fill up the pantry.

Now for the part about balanced meals. Balanced meals include one food from each food group. The new MyPlate icon is a good representation of a balanced meal because all five food groups are included. When I plan a meal I try to include "five of five." Here are a few examples of how I to do it:

• Spaghetti is a frequent menu item at our house. Spaghetti includes ground meat, vegetables (onion, mushrooms and marinara sauce) and grains (spaghetti). What food groups are missing? Milk and Fruit. We always pour milk for dinner, so add a fruit salad (maybe even as dessert) and our meal is balanced.

• Since the weather is turning cold, we are doing more stews and crock pot meals. So if the menu includes Beef Stew with meat and vegetables, then I balance the meal by serving dinner rolls (grains), sliced fruit (whatever is in season) and milk to drink.
  

• If I am serving oatmeal made with milk for breakfast, then I'd consider adding yogurt and fruit to add flavor to the oatmeal, and maybe a hard cooked egg to boost the protein (I generally do not serve vegetables for breakfast so that is an exception to my balanced meal implementation.) Another option would be to add a scrambled egg with salsa.
  

• For lunch, if deli sandwiches are on the menu, then I'd add cheese to the sandwich and a side of fruit and baby carrots.

I have found the balanced meal approach to menu planning to be simple and effective. When my kids were little and incredible "food fussies", the balanced meal worked in my favor becuase I could always count on them eating the fruit, milk and bread if the entree wasn't kid-friendly enough. Now that they are older and willing to eat almost anything, I use the balanced meal approach to add more interest and variety, for example adding more veggies into a casserole or adding fruit into a green salad.

Does every meal need to be balanced? Of course not. However, this rule of thumb for menu planning is a simple way to keep healthy and provide variety.  Check your cart while you are still in the grocery store. Do you have foods from all five food groups? 

Maureen Bligh, RD

Project Manager

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