TIME SAVER: “Time for Dinner will provide you with recipes for five simple, healthy meals, including side dishes each week. Meal plans are created to be efficient and eliminate waste. We also include an organized shopping list, cost estimates to help keep you on budget, a list of pantry items you will need, and guides to meal preparation.” Trish Ryan, founder and owner of Time for Dinner, enjoys shopping for healthful meals.

What’s for dinner? Finally — that age-old question has been answered. Time for Dinner, the new on-line subscription food service has solved the problem!

It provides weekly menus, recipes, and a shopping list to relieve the family cook of the need to do all the time-consuming planning.

“There are two things we can all agree upon as parents — we are busier than ever, and we wish we had more time with our families. Dinner time is one time each day when we can slow down and connect with our families. Our goal, at Time for Dinner, is to make dinner happen. We have made the dinner process easier, so you can enjoy sitting down together as a family.”

Trish Ryan, founder and owner of Time for Dinner is determined to help families enjoy a relaxed, healthy meal, and spend this important time together.

Face-to-Face

Mother of three (ages 16, 13, and 9), she had always focused on family dinners, she reports. “I believed that the most precious time of the day was when everyone came home and sat down to eat dinner. It became our safe haven; electronics were turned off, and our kids really looked forward to it. It’s time to be together and have face-to-face conversation.

“As we became accustomed to eating together, every Sunday night, I’d sit down with my cookbooks, and plan the meals for the week ahead,” she continues. “When you have a plan, everything is much easier.”

As time passed, Ms. Ryan sought a way to share her family’s experience with others. She came up with the idea of an on-line subscription food service, and last August, Time for Dinner was launched.

“With our easy meal-planning service, we’ll save you (1) from staring at a pantry full of food with no idea what to cook; (2) trying to make a favorite family meal, but realizing that you don’t have an essential ingredient; and (3) ordering yet another take-out meal for the second or third time in a week.

What Ms. Ryan offers is five menus a week, a complete, detailed shopping list of ingredients with cost estimates, and cooking instructions.

“Our plan features five meals: three meat (chicken, beef or pork), one fish/seafood, and one vegetarian each week. We also offer ingredient substitutions to make each meal gluten-free. Eventually, we plan to have three separate full menus each week: classic, vegetarian, and gluten-free.

Kid-Friendly

“The dinner serves four people,” she continues, “and I also provide information on how long it takes to prepare the food. With our on-the-go shopping list, you’ll be in and out of the store in 20 minutes, spend less than $100, and be ready for the week ahead.

“And we don’t just grab random recipes and call it a meal plan. We mix and match the list of ingredients to create balanced dinners that play off each other. Also, the recipes are child-friendly, and get our family stamp of approval before they are added to our weekly menus.”

Customers who sign up for the subscription service have the choice of a 3-month plan for $18 or a yearly plan for $60.

Sample meals for a recent week included spice-rubbed tilapia with stuffed zucchini; black bean and sweet potato tortados; Jamaican pork tenderloin and zucchini rice; flank steak with roasted vegetable orzo salad; and red curry chicken stir fry.

Ms. Ryan points out that some parts of each meal can be prepared at the beginning of the week, unless otherwise noted, to save time on meal nights. She also includes specific information on preparation time and actual cooking time.

Customers are not only from Princeton and the area, but from as far afield as Florida, Alabama, and California, reports Ms. Ryan, and they are very enthusiastic. Positive comments keep coming, as word-of-mouth grows.

Recipe Repertoire

“We keep getting more people all the time, and they especially love the variety and all the different possibilities. For example, you’ll have chicken again on the menu, but it will be prepared differently. Typically, most people have 10 to 12 meals in their recipe repertoire. There are no repeats in my house! Sometimes, if the kids really like something, they will ask to have it again.”

Ms. Ryan is finding her new adventure to be a real pleasure. As she says, “When you do something you love, you don’t mind the work. And I love sharing this with people. It is a real time saver, and can help everyone to be more relaxed at dinner.

“Even when your are busy, one thing you can do is cook your own food. It is so much healthier. When everything is planned ahead, it takes less time than you think. And imagine the end result! It is so essential — to feed your family a healthy dinner and all sit at the table together and enjoy it. I look forward to helping more families to do this all over the country.”

Customers can sign up on the Time for Dinner website, where they can also access the menus. Information is also available on Facebook, and Ms. Ryan provides a frequent blog featuring cooking experiences and tips, and  the pleasure of eating together as a family. Website: www.timefordinner
planning.com.