the family table

When I was growing up, sitting down to a family meal each night was the rule rather than the exception.  My mom cooked dinner almost every night and we would all sit down when my dad got home from work.  We talked about school and friends and other various topics and we couldn't leave the table until everyone was done.  When the meal was finished, we each had to do some chore to help with the cleaning.

(If you were lucky, you got to take out the trash.  If you were unlucky, you were stuck doing the dishes.  Luckily if you complained that "nobody ever helped you," my dad would help until the chore was done.)

My childhood evenings were filled with classic meals like spaghetti with garlic bread and chicken with rice.  We ate things like meatloaf, shepherd's pie, and soup.  On Saturday mornings my dad fixed pancakes (although not in a fancy dress shirt like in this picture).  No one was forced to eat anything but there was always something on your plate that you liked.  Family dinners were a happy time that we all looked forward to yet took for granted at the same time.

For the first few years of our marriage, Dave and I were both either working or studying full time.  At home, we were tired and worn out and cooking a meal just didn't sound fun.  Most nights were spent rummaging for ready to eat food and sitting on the couch bathed in the glow of a TV screen, surrounded by the din of commercials rather than family conversation.  I always planned on having family dinners.  It just made more sense to wait until we had children and I was at home to prepare our food instead of out in the workforce tired like everyone else.

And then we had Katelyn and Dave started working and life went so fast so soon.  He never gets home until seven and by the time we get up the stairs and into the house it just made more sense to put Kate in bed and eat something from the fridge, or worse a fast food restaurant.

Lately, I've been watching a show on BYU TV called The Food Nanny.  At first I started watching it because I will watch any cooking show.  I continued to watch it because I couldn't take my eyes off the show's hokey gimmicky antics and the annoying timbre of her voice was like passing a train wreck.  I just couldn't take my ears off of it.

Eventually though she grew on me.  I realized that past that obscenely chipper Utah accent and frosted hair was a woman who actually felt strongly about family dinners and genuinely cared for the families she was helping.  Episode after episode, she tries to help various haggard parents at their wits end about family meals.

(Only a cooking show produced in Utah would prepare recipes designed for eight to nine servings, by the way.  It is so Utah.  She helps families of multiple blonde children with last names like Christensen and Young.)

So I made the commitment to cook at least five family dinners a week.  On Fridays, we have a date night and go out to eat and Saturdays would be spent eating leftovers from the week before or in the absence of leftovers, breakfast food.

At first, it was difficult.  That first Monday evening as I drove to pick Dave up from the bus stop, I briefly considered driving through Wendy's for some side salads and chicken nuggets.  Instead, we went home and I threw frozen chicken and broccoli into the oven.

Gradually though it got easier.  I planned ahead and wrote down the menu on my calendar each week.  I found that by briefly thinking through what we would eat the next day before I went to bed, I saved myself time and effort the next afternoon.

I learned that I actually enjoy the half hour it took me to put dinner together in the evenings.  Dave sits with Kate in the living room and I get to prepare our meal serenaded by the sounds of squealing laughter and books being read.  It has given Dave and Kate a chance to spend time together before she goes to bed for the night.

We sit down together and have a prayer before we eat.  Katelyn has learned to fold her little arms that are so chubby she can't even fold them completely.  Dave tells me about his day, I recount our adventures at home, and Katelyn laughs as we try to keep her from dumping her plate on the floor.

Family dinner has become my favorite part of the day.

Family dinners have become a part of our nightly routine that I look forward to.  The social, emotional, and financial benefits of eating together as a family are countless but what I think is overlooked is the health benefit.

I have found that I'm eating less throughout the night.  First of all, I'm eating a healthy balanced meal with ingredients that I have chosen and prepared instead of a processed or fast food meal with a high starch and sugar content.  I know what I am feeding my family because I purchased the food and put it together myself.

But perhaps more importantly, by making our family dinner an event instead of an evening of grazing, I am telling my brain that I have eaten.  I prepare the food, I sit down and enjoy eating and conversation, and at the end, I help clean up and put Katelyn to bed.  The entire process takes well over an hour.  By the time we sit down for the night, it is almost nine o'clock and my brain has processed that fact that I enjoyed a meal, am full, and am pretty much done eating for the day.

I hadn't realized it but by eating small amounts of even healthy food over a long period of time in the evening, I wasn't allowing my brain to comprehend the fact that I had eaten.  Enjoying a healthy meal with my family causes me to stop and focus on the food I am eating.  When I am done I know it.

So I guess I should have been less annoyed by the Food Nanny and more grateful.  She saved family dinners at our house.