Cooking for Kids by Ronni Litz Julien, MS, RD/LDN

• Creating That Healthy Family
• The Toddler Years: Those Veggies Really Aren't "Yucky"
• From Toddlers to School-Age: Eating Breakfast for Better Grades
• Packing Those Healthy (Not Traded!) School Lunches
• I’m Starving: That Required After-School Snack
• On to Sports Practice: What Will Give Them That Burst of Energy?
• Hassle-Free Dinnertimes
• How to Get Them to Try Something New
• More Dairy: A Must for Optimum Growth
• How to Get Them to Eat Those "Yucky" Vegetables
• How to Get Them to Eat More Protein
• I Want Dessert!
• Planning That Healthful Holiday
• Planning a Healthy Party
• Nutrition Parenting Resources
• Growth Charts

Buy This Book »

My brother and I walked around as teenagers saying, “Mom, meatloaf again?” It felt like every third day, we were having meatloaf for dinner. Today, having been a mom for 17 years, I have never made that dish. Just can’t bring myself to make it, or eat it. In fact, my Mom did make other things — but for some reason, those unpleasant meatloaf memories have stuck with me a very long time. I am sure we all have positive and negative meal remembrances while growing up. It’s just part of growing up!

Every parent has their repertoire of foods that they make for their family — and use the same familiar recipes most of their children’s growing-up years. But now with The Everything ® Cooking for Kids Cookbook, there is a whole new non-meatloaf world out there. Everyday life is so different than in past generations — there is more running around, fewer family mealtimes together, more extracurricular early evening activities, more fast food, and less breakfast time. There doesn’t seem to be a reason why it needs to be this way, or what the benefit is; however, that is today’s world, and you have to make the best of it.

The Everything ® Cooking for Kids Cookbook is a great handbook to help you teach your children healthful eating habits while running to the soccer game or making a birthday party. Additionally, this book offers an enormous collection of fantastic recipes and hints that will never bring on mediocre meatloaf memories! There will always be something fun and unique to choose from, for holidays, for birthdays, for desserts, for innovative vegetable ideas, for after-school snacks, and the list goes on and on. From the time you have picky toddler eaters, to the time where your teenager wants to make her own gourmet birthday cake, it can all be found within these pages.

Being a nutritionist and registered dietitian for the past 23 years, I would be remiss if I didn’t remind you, as parents, that we are in the midst of the worst childhood obesity epidemic in history. Children have never been unhealthier than they are today, and they are not anticipated to have the same life expectancy that our present generation has — due to their poor eating habits, the abundant unhealthy choices available to them, and their preference for sitting at the computer, rather than playing baseball or tennis. Pediatricians have never diagnosed more childhood diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and breathing issues from children being so overweight — not to mention the devastating feelings that weight issues create for children’s self-esteem. There is a better way, and The Everything ® Cooking for Kids Cookbook can certainly be the go-to guide when trying to feed your children, and their friends, in a healthier manner. There are fun and unhealthy recipes to be made, but the goal of the book is to become comfortable with preparing healthier foods, having that occasional “treat,” and still enjoying them all immensely.

Finally, feel free to contact my own children and see how they have fared over the years, living with their mom, the nutritionist! They are none the worse for it — there are always food challenges, but we have created healthy children, who have learned the true meaning of moderation, self-control, and the proper place for food in our incredible world. Best of luck as you embark on your nutrition parenting journey!