Day 3 – Why you shouldn’t feed ashamed when you serve your kids hot dogs for dinner

Did I tell you I was away this weekend? Visiting my parents for their wedding anniversary, so my husband was solo parenting. As a result, our fridge is full of “unhealthy” foods. I don’t want to waste these foods, so they will be appearing on our dinner table all week. It feels like I need to give a disclaimer when I serve hot dogs – but do I? Would I judge you for serving hot dogs for dinner?

Hot dogs for dinner?

Here’s the thing – I wouldn’t judge you for serving hot dogs for dinner. And this is why:

• Hot dogs are delicious
• Most kids love hot dogs
• Hot dogs are affordable
• A pack of hot dogs becomes a quick and easy meal in under 10 minutes
• Serving hot dogs is likely STILL more nutritious than going through a drive-through on nights when you don’t feel like cooking/you feel like eating hot dogs/time is tight/money is tight/you haven’t gone grocery shopping… the list is endless!

So why do I feel ashamed posting photos of my family eating hot dogs on the internet?

Because despite my best efforts to avoid grouping foods into “healthy” and “unhealthy” and keeping an all foods fit approach, this isn’t really how most nutrition messages are framed and I think that in doing this, we can feel a fair bit of shame about what we eat and what we serve our kids.

But, is all this shame actually helping?

I don’t think so. In fact, I think it harms us. Of course we want kids and adults to have an understanding that different foods are important parts of healthy diets. And I truly believe that eating patterns such as a Mediterranean Diet are associated with better health outcomes. But I think that in order for us and our kids to be healthy and have healthy relationships with food – we need to create space for REAL life and we need to give ourselves permission to do this without shame.

So here goes – what the dinner table looked like

We had leftover hot dogs, marinated grilled chicken thighs, broccoli salad, roasted potatoes and vanilla yogurt.

Here’s what Child 1 Ate

Hot dogs – obviously were a hit. The yogurt is always a favourite in our house too. He also ate some of the chicken and potatoes. No broccoli salad.

Here’s what Child 2 ate

Hot dogs (with ketchup), yogurt, a small amount of potatoes and chicken. Also – he had left over popcorn from his lunch (we love stove-top popped popcorn for lunches in our family) and he ate some of this too.

So what?

The family of a working mom/dietitian eats hot dogs for dinner. My kids love it. We all enjoyed the meal and my kids ate what felt right to them. And I am going to work on feeling less shame when “unhealthy” foods makes it way to our table and into my blog. Thanks for reading!