One of the main concerns parents share with me, when it comes to providing good nutrition to their family, is the issue of food preparation. Young parents tell me they have difficulties deciding what to buy, how to prepare it and how to balance work and cooking duties.

We all have busy lives, electronic devices and the whole array of technology we all use daily is not helping. If anything, it adds to the consumption of time, allowing still less time to plan meals.

With these concerns in mind I’ve created a one-week sample menu that can be followed step-by-step, taking away a lot of the guess-work and decision-making. You can find this menu plan on my web site and it includes a grocery list and even a financial profile to help you understand the cost of eating healthy.

But before you start, allow me to explain a few items.

The week’s menu should be started on a Sunday. Why? For decades I have been managing the same challenges you have by doing my grocery shopping on Sunday and spending a couple of hours of my Sunday afternoon preparing some of the more time consuming dishes, in order to get ahead of the week.

If you start the menu on any other day, you are going to see references to dishes prepared the day before and the whole menu becomes less helpful.

Check out the grocery list first. It provides you with what you need to get from the store for the whole week. You won’t have to go grocery shopping again for 7 days.

I created the menu for a family of four members, two adults and two children. If the children are toddlers, the menu may last more than one week, since you are going to end up with leftovers on most of the days.

I don’t mention the amount of food to be served per person. For the children, the amount they eat depends on their age. But I do include some general ideas about serving size in the introduction and information. You really need to read it all in order to understand the principal behind the idea.

The menu includes breakfast, afternoon snack (mainly for the children) and dinner. This is because most children eat lunch at school and parents eat at work. Those staying at home can use leftovers from dinner to prepare lunch. This plan works during school days, when most kids require a snack when they come home from school. If you are following this menu in the summer I would suggest skipping the afternoon snack if kids (and adults) get up later that usual.

I hope this menu is a helpful for your busy life. I also hope it can give you the tools to understand how to prepare a balanced meal at home.

I invite you to try it out and to give me feedback about the menu itself, as well as the layout of the web content and your understanding of the concept.

You can find the Dr. K’s Prescription menu, shopping list, and recipes at www.drkatalenas.com.

About Dr. Marta Katalenas M.D.

Dr. Marta Katalenas is a Board Certified Pediatrician and owns the Pediatric Center of Round Rock located in Round Rock, Texas. Dr. Katalenas is a professional speaker and is available to speak on childhood obesity and healthy eating topics. She is also the author of the upcoming book "From Scratch", a guide to healthy cooking and eating for busy families.

This entry was posted on Monday, June 7, 2010 at 3:13 pm and is filed under Healthy Eating. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.