Cooking is considered a chore by most people. Restaurant visits, take-outs and frozen TV dinners are much more in keeping with our busy lifestyles.
The downside to all this is that you have little control over the nutritional quality of food prepared by others. Unless you do it yourself from scratch, including grocery shopping and everything else before sitting down at the dinner table, there is no guarantee that you eat really well.
By eating ‘really well’ I mean getting all the nutrients the body needs to fully function and stay healthy. Learning how to make meals that measure up to that standard is not rocket science, but it requires a bit of knowledge in nutrition science and also in sound cooking techniques.
Even among those who still can be talked to about home cooking, convenience is a top priority. Time-consuming trips to the grocery store or farmers market are for many people out of the question, and so are hours spent on following complex recipes.
Luckily, there is plenty of help. Entire industries have emerged to make things easier for those who are unable or unwilling to toil in their kitchens the way generations before them had to. More than a hundred companies, including Walmart, are now offering so-called “meal kits” that contain exactly measured ingredients for breakfast, lunch and dinner, all delivered to your doorstep.
Subscribers to meal kits providers like Blue Apron, Hello Fresh, or Plated can receive weekly mailings of almost any kind of food as well as cooking tutorials and utensils that promise to turn a clueless novice into an avid hobby chef.
So far this fledging industry is showing great promise. Technomic, a food-industry consulting firm, predicts a $3 to $5 billion annual growth over the next decade or so. The comparatively high prices per meal, however, which can rival high-end grocery outlets or even medium-priced restaurants, limit the target audience to the well-to-do.
From a nutritional perspective, many of these meal-in-a-box options are certainly preferable to fast food, pizza, and other typical take-outs. But they are not necessarily superior in quality to fresh produce, meats, fish and other staples from your local supermarket (let alone farmers market). The difference is that preparing the latter may seem a little more cumbersome. But in reality, they really aren’t.
I myself have always been a believer in simple cooking techniques. I like my food as unaltered as possible, preferring uncomplicated techniques like steaming fresh vegetables or poaching fish to baking, frying, or whatever else more creative people than I can come up with.
I also try to follow my own motto, “eating lighter is eating smarter.” So I usually leave out sauces, dressings and other condiments that may add a bit of flavor but many more unnecessary calories and substances I don’t know anything about. This, by the way, I would also recommend to users of meal kits and other partially or wholly prepared products.
And there is one more element that should not be underestimated: Even the making of the simplest dish gives me great pleasure when it is to be shared with people I love. Enjoying a glass of wine while stirring a pot or assembling delicious treats before gathering at the table – you can’t get that from unpacking a box, no matter how well appointed it may be.
So, yes, I think it is worthwhile making the extra effort to learn a few cooking tricks, not just to eat more healthily, but for all the other benefits that come with it, including what it can do for your soul. Bon appétit!
Timi Gustafson R.D. is a registered dietitian, newspaper columnist, blogger and author of the book “The Healthy Diner – How to Eat Right and Still Have Fun”®. For more articles on nutrition, health and lifestyle, visit her blog, “Food and Health with Timi Gustafson R.D.” (www.timigustafson.com). You can follow Timi on Twitter, on Facebook and Google+.
