Eat

No mom wants to become a short order chef, especially when the complaining eater isn’t a kid, but a husband.

If you relate, you are not alone.

Very often it is one partner who wants to get healthier, while another likes meat and potatoes; or one partner who has a food allergy, while one can eat anything; or one partner hates vegetables while the other is a vegetarian.

When two adults have very different food cravings or food upbringings, and kids are involved, it makes mealtime even more complicated; and it makes it much harder to raise kids who will eat everything.

Here are some ways to shift mealtime, so you can agree on what to eat.

I eased my shopping cart along the meat counter in a national chain grocery store to buy a whole chicken. Roast poultry for dinner seemed like a simple enough proposition. But like so many of us making food-purchasing decisions these days, I was stopped in my tracks by the range of choices.

Should I buy free-range or pasture-raised? Is organic better? Or is the best choice a brand like Foster Farms' Simply Raised (whatever that means, exactly)?

Confused by all of the labels and marketing claims, I gave up. My family ate a meatless stir-fry for dinner that night.

Society views weight gain as the enemy yet waging a war on your weight guarantees more weight gain. Your body senses the stress you feel and turns on cortisol to keep you fit for this war. What if your body used weight gain to get your attention? Weight gain clues you to something being out of alignment. Luckily, getting back into alignment can be fast when you follow these 5 steps for eating foods that nourish your body and soul while satisfying your taste buds.

Sometimes, husbands need a little motivation. Back when you were dating, he’d move the mountains and the sea for you just to get your attention. Now, he’s sitting on the sofa in his underwear not batting an eye when you ask for help taking out the trash. While you can't make your husband do anything, you can get his attention and set an example of your efforts—and put him in a good mood at the same time.

The weather’s not the only thing that heats up in summer. So do our bodies, which makes this season a great time to transition to a healthier diet. If we aren’t careful, foods we eat during the summer can affect our bodies and digestion through Thanksgiving and beyond.

That’s why it’s important that couples adopt a summer diet consisting of foods that are sweet, bitter, cold and oily—such as salads, steamed vegetables, fruits and coconut oil.

What if the common restaurant kid’s menu was never invented? What if parents ordered right off the adult menu, asking for a side plate to share "grown-up foods" with their kids from the moment they were learning to chew? What would happen?

* Kids would be exposed to a wide variety of textures, aromas and tastes. Research shows that exposure to new foods is the first step to raising healthy eaters. A study appearing in the Frontiers in Pediatrics suggests:

American life is full of references to cherries, from George Washington chopping down a tree of them (Why did he do that?) to the popular song "Life Is Just a Bowl of Cherries" sung by Ethel Merman in 1931. But the actual fruit itself, beloved by most, is a sweet, juicy reminder of the changing season.

Here in California, our local cherry season lasts just a bit longer, while the Pacific Northwest and Midwestern harvests are still weeks away, guaranteeing that the cherished cherry will be in good supply until the end of July.