Many parents wish they could give their kids a hot breakfast, but often feel like they don’t have enough time due to the fast paced lives most of us lead these days, so our kids reach for a cereal bar or a bowl of sugary cereal, or even go without. But with a little planning ahead and using ingredients you probably already have on hand, you can create these hot breakfasts that you and your children can eat on the way to school and work.

Prep. Time-10 minutes or less:

Egg Roll Ups

Scrambled eggs take only a few minutes to make, like 5 or less, making for a quick and healthy way to start the day because they are packed with protein. Roll scrambled eggs into a flour tortilla or a slice of bread. Add other ingredients on hand for flavor and nutrition, like shredded cheese, chopped onion, chopped green pepper, diced ham, crumbled sausage or sliced jalapenos while cooking.

Quick and Easy Breakfast Sandwiches

You can use either microwavable bacon, or pre-cooked bacon that you’ve saved. While the bacon is heating in the microwave, toast two halves of an English muffin. Then place two slices of bacon and a slice of cheese between the muffin halves. Wrap in a paper towel and go. This breakfast sandwich is easy to handle and delicious! You can do the same thing with a sausage patty if you so desire.

Pancake Roll Ups

Use pre-made pancakes, frozen or refrigerated. After re-heating, spread your favorite ingredients like peanut butter, your favorite jelly, honey or butter. Roll up and go. You can also use a sausage link or a slice of bacon if you have some already cooked in the fridge or freezer that will only take a few seconds to reheat.

Not So Typical Bagel

There are many ways you can turn an ordinary bagel into a hot breakfast on the go. Instead of just spreading cream cheese or butter on your bagel, top it with a slice of warm ham, pre-made sausage or bacon. You can also scramble some eggs with cheese if you prefer for a nice, warm and tasty on-the-go breakfast.

Breakfast doesn’t have to be skipped or cold incorporating the ideas above. With a little planning and imagination, you can start your family off with a hot breakfast that is faster and healthier than going through the drive through.

Save Time And Money By Planning Your Meals

Breakfast is probably the meal that is skipped the most because people are either in a hurry and don’t have time, they don’t feel like eating or don’t have an appetite early in the morning. However, as studies have shown, breakfast is the most important meal of the day. Eating breakfast gets your metabolism going, supplies your energy for the day and stabilizes your blood sugar levels.

To help with the issue of not enough time to make breakfast and to give you some added motivation to encourage you to eat breakfast, here are some great tasting breakfast ideas that you can make ahead and freeze. Then all you have to do is grab them, heat up quickly in the microwave, and go!

Quiche Cups

Quiche cups are easy, quick and healthy to make. You can use a wide variety of ingredients and they heat up in as fast as 30 seconds in the microwave. Plus they are easy to eat on the go.

Simply whip up some eggs in a bowl (you can use egg substitutes if you desire). Then add any of the following ingredients you wish.

• Shredded cheese (cheddar, mozzarella, Colby)
• Chopped onion
• Chopped, cooked spinach
• Mushrooms
• Diced ham
• Crumbled sausage
• Bacon, chopped
• Chopped green peppers

You can use any combination of vegetables, meats and cheeses to suit your taste buds.

Mix well, and then pour the egg mixture into a muffin pan lined with small cupcake holders. Bake on 350F for 20 minutes. Let cool. Place two to four cups in quart size freezer baggies and freeze. When re-heating, place in microwave for 30 seconds to one minute. Grab and go!

Peanut Butter and Jelly Pancake Roll Ups

Another idea for a quick, easy-to-reheat, on-the-go breakfast is to make extra pancakes on Saturday morning. Freeze the extra pancakes in a large freezer bag. When you need a quick, hot breakfast, grab a couple, place on a paper towel or paper plate, then microwave for 30 seconds to a minute. Spread with peanut butter and jelly, roll up and go.

Sausage Biscuits

When you are making Sunday morning breakfast, be sure to make some extra sausage patties for these delicious, on-the-go sausage biscuit sandwiches.

Prepare a can of refrigerated biscuit dough (usually makes about 8 biscuits) according to package directions. Place a cooked sausage patty between two biscuits and freeze in a quart size freezer bag.

To microwave, remove from freezer bag, wrap in a paper towel and microwave for 1 minute to 1.5 minutes. You can add a slice of cheese if you prefer before heating. Grab and go.

Breakfast Burritos

Growing up in the Southwest, I usually like to throw a Mexican or Spanish twist to lots of the foods my family eats. Here’s a favorite that can be made ahead, frozen and reheated.

Combine scrambled eggs with your favorite ingredients, like: chopped onion, chopped green pepper, diced ham, crumbled sausage, mushrooms, olives, diced tomato, sliced jalapenos and shredded cheese. Place on flour tortilla and sprinkle with hot sauce. Roll up and secure with toothpick if necessary. Place in freezer bag and freeze. When reheating, place burrito in a paper towel and microwave for 30 seconds to one minute. Grab and go!

With a little planning and thinking ahead, breakfast doesn’t have to be a cold bowl of cereal, or non-existent!

Learn How To Plan Your Meals

Homemade chicken soup is great any time of the year.

1 (3 pound) whole chicken
4 carrots, halved
4 stalks celery, halved
1 large onion, halved
water to cover
salt and pepper to taste
1 teaspoon chicken bouillon granules (optional)

Put the chicken, carrots, celery and onion in a large soup pot and cover with cold water. Heat and then simmer, uncovered until the meat falls off of the bones (ocasionally, skim the foam off). Take everything out of the pot. Strain the broth. Pick the meat off of the bones and chop the carrots, celery and onion. Season the broth with salt, pepper and chicken bouillon to taste, if desired. Return chicken, carrots, celery and onion to the pot, stir together, and serve

Chicken Baguette Salad

Ingredients:
(Serves 2)
1 large chicken breast, cut into bite-sizes pieces
Half a baguette, cut into bite-size pieces
1 large tomato, cut into bite-size pieces
Olive oil
Handful of arugula or other lettuce leaves
½ packet feta cheese, cut into cubes
Salt and pepper to taste

Method:
Preheat the oven to 375F.

Put the chicken pieces, baguette and tomato pieces in a roasting dish and drizzle with a good amount of olive oil. Season with salt and pepper and bake in the oven for about 15 minutes or until the chicken pieces are no longer pink.

Divide the lettuce leaves on two dinner plates and place the warm chicken and tomato salad on top. Sprinkle with feta cheese and enjoy!

This warm chicken salad makes a very tasty and light lunch.

There are a number of quick and easy ways to prepare healthy snacks which you can do given that you have such a tight schedule. And even if you it appears that you have an uncompromising schedule, it would be best to slip in a few minutes each day to consider your health.

Now if you’re an adult you take responsibility for your own state of health, but if you’re kids are snacking as well, then the more you should be responsible for their health relies on your hands as well. In order for your kids to eat healthier snacks, what you should try to do first off is prepare something interesting.

Keep your kids and your self interested. If you find a banana ordinary, serve it with peanut butter or jelly. Make sure to keep colorful foods like apples, orange, and carrots part of your snack time. Search for healthy dips or fillings for sandwiches and even for rice cakes, carrot and celery sticks. Be inventive and look for other combinations that can spice up your healthy snack time.

Those packed of potato chips can be quite unhealthy so why not go with tortilla chips and a homemade salsa. By just combining tomato, and chili you can create a pretty awesome salsa. This beats the processed, too salty chips you buy off the supermarket shelf.

Fruit smoothies are pretty good snacks as well. You will have to prepare the fruits in advance. Place the fruits inside your freezer. When you crave for a snack, get a frozen banana, for example, and pour in milk and just blend. You can produce a really creamy drink.

If you want something heavy to match your smoothie, then why not prepare several pieces of ham, cream cheese and bell pepper slices. What you do is spread the cream cheese, this should be the fat free one, on top of the ham. Put a bell pepper slice on it and roll the ham. Or if you’re not a ham person, try baby carrots with hummus. Actually, you can dip other vegetables in your hummus as well. Cherry tomatoes and sliced red bell peppers are quite good when dipped into hummus.

A fresh salad is also a refreshing and very healthy snack. All you need is some romaine lettuce, slices of carrots, tomatoes, cucumbers, a little bit of salt and pepper to taste or better yet just use vinaigrette. You might want to prepare the vegetables in advance if you want to have your salad faster. There are salad ready vegetable packs available in your neighborhood supermarket but can be quite pricy. It would be better if you prepare the vegetables yourself.

Now the key in this healthy snack routine is to keep your health snack near your reach at all times. When you begin to feel the urge to snack, you take your snack pack and start munching. This way you will not have the urge to buy that chocolate bar or a bag of chips from the vending machine. With the quick and easy ways of preparing healthy snacks, I don’t see why you have to resort to the unhealthy ones.

Don’t worry too much on the chicken parts you are using. Believe me when I say that you won’t run out of recipes for each chicken part. All you need are the right ingredients and you can have a delicious meal in no time. You can combine these simple recipes with some useful cooking techniques which will make the whole process even easier and the resulting dish much tastier.

For example, when baking or grilling chicken, it would be best to leave the skin on first to make the meat tastier. You can remove the skin afterwards when you serve or eat it. Most of the fat of the chicken is stored in the skin. You can have a low fat chicken dish just by removing the skin. When you do prepare chicken dishes, I would suggest sticking with baking, broiling, and grilling. As much as possible, avoid frying the chicken. There are a lot more delicious and healthier ways to prepare and cook chicken aside from frying so let’s do that.

Let’s see, you can cook a tasty chicken dish with cream of mushroom soup. What you do is place sliced and skinned chicken on a pot and mix a can of cream of mushroom soup. Add another can of mushrooms but make sure the water has been drained. Add water and onion soup mix into it. You can cook this in low fire until the chicken is tender. Add salt to taste. And that’s it. Although, this recipe may take longer since you will have to cook the chicken in low fire to get that taste but the recipe is easy and the preparation is simple.

If you’re craving for pasta, you can add chicken into it to have a fuller meal. What you do is cut boneless and skinless chicken breasts into bite-sized pieces and sauté it together with garlic, green pepper, some onions and mushrooms. Make sure the chicken is cooked already when you add the vegetables. In a few minutes the vegetables should be done as well. At this point mix in your tomato or spaghetti sauce. You can cook your pasta while you’re doing this so by the time you’re done with the chicken, the pasta is firm and ready to be served. Sauce your pasta and top with grated cheese or parmesan cheese.

If you like a different approach, mix olive oil to your pasta instead of spaghetti sauce. That sounds interesting. When you combine pasta and chicken it seems that you can’t go wrong. Both dishes are very easy to prepare individually and combining the two is just simply mixing the dishes.

You see, by having some quick and easy chicken dishes in mind, you can save your family and yourself a lot of time in preparing your meals. Start reading and looking for those quick recipes.

To those experienced in the kitchen, this kind of meal is easy to make. But to the novices might still find pasta a little daunting or troublesome. One thing that you should watch out when cooking pasta is the noodles. You need to test every now and then to see if the noodles are done. The pasta cooks pretty quickly and leaving it too long can result to soggy noodles.

Avoid placing the pasta when the water is not yet boiling. This will help prevent the pasta from becoming all mushy, soft and sticky. Also, keep the water at a boil at all times. You can help make the pasta firmer if you add salt into the boiling water. Note that you should not cover the pot when you already placed the pasta. When the pasta is done, take it off the boiling water. The pasta will continue to cook if you leave it there. With that, one half of your pasta meal is done. The other half would be the sauce.

The good thing about pasta is having several choices for sauces. Actually, at some point you will be stomped on what kind of sauce to make due to the varieties. If you’re a pasta person then having a couple of sauces stored in your refrigerator would be the best ways to go. If you have pesto, you can use that to sauce your pasta. Add additional garlic, some mushrooms or even Italian sausages and topped with cheese and you can have a good meal.

Bottled or canned sun-dried tomatoes can go well with pasta. I always try to have some sun-dried tomatoes ready since you can just pour it over your pasta and voila! A tomato based pasta without the traditional tomato sauce and pastes. Top with grated cheese and partnered with bread and you can have a fulfilling meal in no time.

If you want a cream-based sauce, just prepare some sliced olives, cream, oregano and grated cheese. Mix the cream, olives and oregano together with your pasta and finish off with grated cheese on top. A simple cream-based pasta but can be quite joyous to the palette.

Olive oil is also a staple sauce for pasta and can be quite easy to use as well. You can mix olive oil with canned seafood or slices of meat or sausages to create a sauce for your pasta. You can add basil for flavor and don’t forget the grated cheese. If you want to experiment, try adding spicy flavored meat or canned seafood. Spicy pasta may not be for everyone but still a good dish in my account.

A pasta meal in a flash is really just that. In a span of 15 to 20 minutes you would have already prepared a good, hearty meal of pasta in either tomato, cream or olive-based sauce. It is a quick meal that I personally won’t get tire off.

Many times busy parents resort to hot dogs and macaroni and cheese, frozen pizza or frequent trips to a fast-food restaurant. That’s not healthy for you or the kids – not to mention its pretty rough on the family grocery budget.

Kitchen time savers

There are things you can do to cut down on time spent in the kitchen. Pick one day a week and prepare several freezer friendly meals. You can even go the extra mile and package them in individual serving size containers. Doing so will provide your family with a larger variety of entrée choices, on any given day.

Do you have friends that are intrigued with the idea of a one-day a week cooking spree or a meal planning service? Get together with 2 or 3 of them. Each of you decides on 2 main dishes you want to prepare. Buy enough ingredients to make the entrees for each family.

You need to plan ahead

One simple thing that you can do is keep an ample supply of fresh fruits, salad ingredients, soups and fresh sandwich fixings, on hand. Quick meals such as this are nutritious and don’t require a great deal of preparation time.

If you take on the task of meal planning and want to get in the habit of consistently putting together weekly menus yourself, you may be surprised at how much time it involves. Did you know that the typical family meal planner spends roughly 3 hours per week combing through cookbooks, choosing recipes and compiling a grocery list? That translates into 156 hours, per year. Yikes!

A menu service can help

You can say goodbye to last minute thrown together meals and eliminate the stress of dinner planning for your family by subscribing to a meal planning service. This type of service is very affordable, usually costing only a few cents per day. Menus are often designed to be family friendly and easily adaptable.

When you purchase a subscription to a service such as this, your membership will typically feature a weekly menu emailed right to your inbox. This includes seven main dish recipes, side dish suggestions and dessert ideas. As an added benefit, you receive a detailed shopping list, categorized by aisle, which makes your trip to the grocery store that much easier. Simply cross off items already in your pantry, add any other products you may be in need of and you’re off!

If you enjoy planning your own menu, you may want to consider a dinner planning service, in addition to your own choices. Why? It will still save you time, in the long run. Use the membership menu as a base. Then, search for recipes that will deliciously compliment that weekly plan.

Remember, nothing is more important than family time. Don’t let dinner planning get you down. Consider the suggestions we’ve made and you’ll spend less time
slaving over hot stove and more time with the people you love.

For a free weekly trial of a family friendly menu planning service, visit DineWithoutWhine.com

Get organized with weekly meal planning. Here are a few reasons why planning your family’s meals is a good idea.

The Benefits Of Family Meal Planning

Are you ready to save some time, feed your family healthier meals and save some money along the way? These are just some of the benefits of family meal planning. Let’s look at all of them in a little more detail.

Eat Healthier
Planning your family meals will cut down on your trips to your favorite fast food restaurant and the amount of pizza you have delivered to your door. Food you prepare at home tends to be much healthier than hamburgers with fries, fried chicken or pizza. When you plan your meals include some lean protein like chicken breast, as well as some salads and vegetables. Your entire family will benefit from the healthier meals.

Save Time
How much time are you spending now running to the grocery store a few times a week. I used to run to the store at least 3 times a week to buy something to fix for dinner. Planning your meals out for a week at a time and then putting together a grocery list with everything you need to cook those meals will cut your trips to the store down to one a week. This alone will save you a few hours each week. Plus you won’t be standing in front of your fridge and pantry every night trying to come up with something you can fix with what you have at hand.

Save Money
All that eating out and having food delivered can quickly add up. By preparing more meals at home you will save quite a few dollars each week. In addition, you will save on your monthly grocery bill; since you will be making a list of everything you need for the week and won’t end up buying extras that just go to waste. I used to throw out food almost every week before I started meal planning.

Less Stress
You know the routine. It’s 6 pm, everyone in the family is starving and you have no idea what’s for dinner. Trying to come up with something to cook from what you have in the kitchen while your kids are tired, hungry and screaming isn’t one of the most fun family activities. You will be much more relaxed about dinner, when you know exactly what you are going to cook ahead of time and known you have everything you need in the house.

Quality Time Together
Meal Planning also encourages everyone to gather around the dinner table each day. Who could resist the delicious smells coming out of the kitchen? Dinnertime has always been a great time for families to gather and share news and experiences of the day. Parents and children can pay each other undivided attention. Cook some dinner, set the table and don’t forget to turn off the TV. Make dinner a daily family tradition again.

I encourage you to give meal planning a try. I am sure you and your family will see the benefits within less than a week.

Don’t have the time or patience to plan your family meals? Let us do it for you!

Christine Steendahl Is The Founder Of Dine Without Whine – A Family Friendly Weekly Menu Planner. Eliminate Your Dinner Hour Stress And Re-Discover The Pleasure Of The Dinner Hour! For A Free Sample Menu Visit Weekly Meal Planning – Free Sample

Description: Menu Planning Central is a monthly membership in which you receive a full month’s worth of meal ideas, recipes and shopping lists for not just one, but 3 different menus: Family friendly Menus, Healthy Menus, and Vegetarian Menus. You also receive monthly bonuses that include extra recipes, menus, eBooks and more. You get information from the columnists there that include an expert on etiquette, family meals and even a nutritionist.

Review: Menu Planning Central is awesome. As a mom, in a family of all boys, you can imagine how hec tic life can be and planning a week’s worth of meals is downright exhausting. That’s just the planning; we won’t even talk about the shopping required every week.

When I plan the week’s meals, I have to take into consideration that my boys and husband all three are pretty set in their ways when it comes to food. They like what they like and I have to be careful when adding something new to the mix. To top it off we haven’t always eaten the healthiest, but I’ve realized how damaging that is and want to make a change and start preparing better meals for my family. Of course, most of the time they aren’t happy about it, so I have to find a way to combine the foods they love with the foods they need.

When I found menu planning central, I couldn’t have been happier. Not only does it save me time planning and shopping for our meals, but also I can now shop for a whole month’s worth instead of one week at a time. I don’t wear myself out deciding what we’re going to eat or shopping for it. That’s why I only shop for a week at a time, because it’s exhausting and really hard to get out of the routine of eating the same things over and over because I just don’t have time to look for new meals and recipes every week. Now, I don’t have to!

I signed up in hopes of getting a month’s worth of meal plans and guess what? Instead I got 12 weeks (3 months) worth that I can mix and match if I want. So, I can give them the meals they like and throw in a few healthier meals that I love! The combination possibilities are endless! And the best part, I can print them all out and when we try them if there’s one they love I’ll save it and make it again later. If they hate it I’ll make note of it on the menu plan so I’ll be sure not to make it again. I could go forever without making the same meal twice with all the possible combinations.

Saves Time

Planning your meals ahead of time will save you a lot of time. When you visit your grocery store, take a list with you that shows everything you need for your weekly meals. This way there will be no return visits to the grocery store for something you forgot, and you won’t waste any time deciding what you are going to have for dinner that night. Forgetting a key ingredient or having to fight in long lines at the grocery store can be very frustrating, but meal planning can completely eliminate that.

Saves Money

Who doesn’t like to save money? And if you can reduce the amount you spend on grocery bills, you can save it up for something really fun – like a special night out or a family vacation. Meal planning saves anyone a significant amount of money, since meal planning is much cheaper than eating fast food. Also, since you will be bringing a shopping list with you to the grocery store, there will be no more impulse buys and wasted food. We’ve all fallen victim to foods that we suddenly have a craving for when we are shopping only to get home and realize that we need other ingredients to turn it into a meal. And having a shopping list will make it easier for you to clip coupons, since you know what you will be purchasing each week. This means even more savings to you and your family.

Meal planning allows you to create a calendar of what you will have for dinner each night. If you create a menu one month at a time, you can ensure that you aren’t having chicken nuggets five nights a week. Have an overall calendar of meals will allow you to shop for foods when they are on sale and buy in bulk whenever possible.

Health

Planning out what you are going to cook for dinner will make it possible to ensure you are cooking a healthy meal every day of the week. While eating out is convenient in our ever busy world, eating fast food or at restaurants is not nearly as healthy as cooking it at home. This is largely due to the fact that you don’t have control over what goes in those meals. By preparing your own meals, you can choose healthy options, like baked chicken, and add any of your favorites for a side like a fresh green salad or steamed vegetables. Most boxed or frozen dinners contain a great amount of fat and sodium, but cooking the meal from scratch can eliminate them. You control the flavor and the fat. You can take steps to reduce the amount of fat by adding seasoning and spices to perk up the flavor.

Prevent Obesity

The rise of fast food chains in the world means that more people are becoming overweight and obese. Obesity can bring on many health issues, including heart or breathing problems. It is important to prevent a child from becoming overweight and teach them the importance of balanced meals. Cooking homemade healthy meals can do this. When you plan out what you are going to make, you can be certain that it will be healthy for the entire family. It allows you to have a better handle on the nutritional content of your meals. You can also tailor it to each family member’s needs. If there is someone who needs to watch their fat consumption, you can cook grill or broil instead of fry. If there is someone that is trying to get more servings of vegetables in their diet, you can help by offering two veggies for side dishes.

Spending More Time With Your Family

Because planning out your meals gives you more time during the day, you can spend it doing something that really matters. Spending time with family should be the first thing on anyone’s priority list, and being able to spend more time with them is a wonderful perk to meal planning. You can use this time to either play with your children outside, or maybe talk with your spouse about their day at work. With the time saved with meal planning, the family can enjoy a walk together after dinner, play yard games such as croquet or bocce ball, or compete in a board game night. No matter how you use the time, it is special and necessary to keep a family running. And when you kids are grown up and look back on their childhood, those will be the times they remember most fondly. Just think about all the home cooked meals that you look back on warmly. No one cooks it like mom does.

Teaching Essential Skills

By including children in the meal planning process, they can learn many skills that will carry with them into adulthood. They can help to plan the meals, and learn about the different nutrition groups. Learning how to assemble a balanced meal is a great skill to have. Measuring different ingredients in the meals teaches children about fractions. Younger kids can just play with the different kitchen utensils, which allows them to explore and learn about the huge world they have yet to explore and learn about. Spouses can get in on the fun, making it possible to bond with one another by cooking a meal for each other. Meals where each person can individually tailor food to their liking, such as making your own pizzas or a taco bar, allow a great opportunity for the whole family to cook and learn together.

Reduces Stress

Our world is hectic. We are being pulled in several different directions each day. Because we live in a fast paced world, it is important to do everything possible to reduce your stress load. We have enough stress with our every day lives without mealtime stressing us out. Planning meals can reduce your stress since you won’t have to worry about everything that goes into making a meal for your family. As long as you bring your list to the store and buy everything on the list, you will be all set. You can choose to either visit the store each week or twice a month, rather than a million times like before. The increased time you have will allow you to relax more often, and even feel great when interacting with your children. If you are enrolled in a food delivery service, having a handy list makes online shopping a breeze. Have it with you when you log in to order food and you won’t have to worry about a thing.

As you can see, there are many benefits to meal planning. From the ever crucial facts of saving money and eating healthier, to reducing stress and spending more time with your family. Meal planning only takes a little extra effort. And once you get the hang of it, it’ll become second nature and make you life so much easier. You’ll be wondering why you hadn’t started meal planning earlier. And will all the time and money you save you can spend on something that really matters – your family!