How many of us dine out each week? According to many sources, Americans eat out or consume prepared meals more than 4 times per week. Even worse, Americans spend more of their food dollars on these foods than groceries.

This is truly disturbing as we see more and more people suffering health issues related to poor diets. Dietary intake is very relevant in today’s society and addressed frequently.

Fat taxes have been applied in many states, such as New York, resulting in children’s meals at many fast food establishments being revised to reflect healthier options and the elimination of, or extra charges assessed for, up sized drinks. With these changes, some restaurants now advertise the caloric content of menu items.

Now let’s consider the big question, has this really aided in Americans making healthier and more informed options? We can only hope so! Dining at home has so many advantages. The benefits are abundant such as controlling the content of the meal including the fat and salt content, not to mention the quality of the nutrients in the meal.

Family dining time is a treasured quality event that provides a venue for actual conversation and communications. Making the most of these times and allowing them to occur more frequently in today’s high paced life is important.

Take a stand and start committing to having more family meals at home. Even better, take the pledge to dine in on December 3, 2015 using the following with the American Association of Family and Consumer Sciences . While there, check out the dining in resources available. Celebrate Family and Consumer Science Day with us and register today to help us reach our goal of 200,000 families dining in on December 3, 2015.

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