How to make meals for the family
A healthy diet for the family is incredibly important for a number of reasons. Children’s attitude towards food is cultivated from an early age, so a healthy, varied and balanced diet is essential in helping your children to both enjoy food and eat the right foods.
When cooking for a family, food preparation is key. The first step to efficient food prep is making time – whether you set aside an hour or two on a Sunday afternoon before the week ahead or prefer to use it to unwind on a Friday night, the quicker it becomes a routine the more likely you are to make time for it. Another great tip is finding ingredient overlaps - choosing a versatile food that you can make several quick and convenient dishes from, for example, fish fingers, keeps the whole family satisfied, and as you can cook the amount you want, you can avoid and reduce food waste.
When looking for meal inspiration that is practical as well as versatile, healthy and tasty, Birds Eye are here to help. So, read on to discover ways to incorporate Birds Eye’s range of frozen fish into your dinner repertoire. You can also find a variety of delicious meal ideas within our recipe section.
Recipes for all the family
Frozen fish is the perfect versatile food to inspire your meals. Both fresh and frozen fish can add a lot to healthy family meals, as frozen fish is just as good nutritionally as fresh. The variety and practicality of frozen fish can allow for a greater variety of fish dishes, especially when time is tight. Our Omega 3 Fish Fingers are the definition of Real Food, Simply Made. The combination of 100% fish fillet and our delicious light and crispy golden breadcrumbs make for a nutritious and delicious dinner to guarantee clean plates and plentiful conversations round your dinner table.
Here is our selection of healthy fish finger meal ideas:
• Crispy Fish Finger Pie
Birds Eye Fish Fingers, mash and peas is a classic family-friendly meal, but transforming it into an inviting looking pie is just one of those super easy ideas. The perfect hearty winter meal, this pie combines fish fingers, potatoes, peas and cheese for a tasty and simple mid-week family fix.
• Fish Finger Tacos
Fish finger meals don’t have to be traditional: here is our Mexican twist on the humble fish finger sandwich. Why not spice up your teatime with this fish finger taco? Simply add fish fingers to the tacos, and add some spice with some fresh salsa and yoghurt. This is an especially great way to spice up family meal times as displaying the ingredients on the table and allowing your children to build their own tacos adds a fun, creative vibe to dinner.
• Fish Finger Baked Potatoes
Bored of the usual baked potato fillings? Try this creative recipe. This tasty twist on a classic is a perfect quick and filling dinner or lunch recipe, and you can add whichever toppings or seasoning you please.
Why are family meals so important?
So, now you have a few meal ideas for the family, read on to learn why family meals are important and how you can start eating more nutritious meals together.
Feeding your family a nutritious and balanced meal is a big responsibility, which is why we work hard at Birds Eye to innovate healthier meal choices so you can provide your family with a variety of nutritious foods. With a list of delicious recipes available, you can encourage your family to enjoy mealtimes together and promote a healthy diet for everyone round the table.
However, health and nutrition aren’t the only things that make family meals important. In our busy modern lives, when we’re constantly glued to our phones and tablets, sitting down around the dining table can be the only time we get to talk and bond with each other. As well as establishing a routine and stability, family meal times can be a great way to get closer and can create a whole load of other rituals we don’t even realise – conversational habits, manners and gratitude to name a few.
Don’t forget, the quality of family meals is just as important as quantity. Mealtimes have been noted as one of the most common times children communicate with parents, so if possible, try and keep your children’s attention in the room by turning off the TV and ensuring mobile phones aren’t at the table.
Healthy family meals also help to promote nutritional awareness in kids. From children being able to figure out what they do and don’t like, to striking the right balance between healthy and indulgent, a lot can (and should) be discovered at the dinner table. Children’s nutritional awareness with their family should help them to make their own healthy decisions when having, for example, school lunches. When children learn about the variety of food groups and the importance of them at school, going over this with food in the home environment reinforces this knowledge in an informal and ‘fun’ way.
So, how hard can it be? Birds Eye’s wide range of fish finger recipes can be tailored to suit any age, taste or time of day – even breakfast, such as our Fish Fingers & Spinach Scrambled Egg Toasted Sandwich. We innovate to help consumers make healthier meal choices and our Forever Food Together Campaign aims to achieve 3 things: to maximise food resources so that you have nutritious food to eat forever; to innovate to help you make healthier meal choices; and to ensure that our food is Responsibly Sourced and Prepared. You can begin to introduce these environmental and nutritional efforts into your household with Birds Eye foods: Real Food, Simply Made.