KitchenMom

I use convencience foods a lot more than I'd like to. I love good food. I love to cook. I don't especially love the taste of convience foods. So why do I do it? Simple - lack of time. I work a pretty demanding job and I have two young children - 2 and 4. By the time I pick them up from daycare and get home, there is often an hour or less to get dinner together. I can either disappear into the kitchen or spend that hour with my kids, who are clamoring for my attention. Sometimes the older one helps in the kitchen (he loves to cook), but the little one is still to small to be anything but a major distraction. I try not to use convenience food more than I have to. I don't use those things that are just as easy to make from scratch, but I do use pre-shredded cheese, bagged salads, pre-made sauces and sometimes salad dressing (though I really hate these and it is so easy to throw together a good vinaigrette). I feed my kids frozen fish sticks and chicken nuggets, though I buy the healthiest ones I can find, w/no trans-fats, etc. I occasionally make mac and cheese from a box, buy pre-grilled chicken strips from Trader Joe's, pre-made soup, etc. Believe me, if I had time, I would do a lot more myself, and make much more interesting meals than I usually manage to pull together. I look forward to the day my kids are a little older and this will all be easier. Oh-lest you ask why I don't do more prep the night before or something like that - my kids aren't great sleepers, and usually by the time they are in bed I'm so exhausted it's all I can do to sit at the computer for a little while before falling into bed.

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Hi Hillary (and all). I've also recently joined e-G after lurking for well over a year. I'm also a suburban mom (yikes! how did that happen?) w/a 2 and 4.5 year old. I love eating and all things food, though I don't get out nearly as often as I'd like these days (I'm in the middle of renovating my kitchen so I can at least do some real cooking at home). I often wonder - how did I get these picky little eaters? I swore I would raise kids who would be foodies, and thought that people w/picky kids must have done something to cause it. Enter my 2 y.o. who lives on a diet of squishy white bread, string cheese, and plain hamburger and becomes an absolute troll in restaurants. We have become one of those loud, obnoxious families I always cringed at. Anyway, to your questions, we have a couple of regular breakfast stops in your general vicinity. I can't say they have anything exciting, but they do have good, basic breakfast stuff and are very kid-friendly. First is the Trolley Car Diner on Germantown Ave. at the Chestnut Hill/Mt. Airy border. Basic diner food, ice cream stand in an old trolley outside that is fun to walk around if trains are popular in your family. Second is the Country Club Restaurant on Cottman in the Northeast. Very big, broad selection of traditional breakfast and jewish deli stuff. Sorry, but that's the best I can do. Now, if anyone knows of anything decent in the restaurant challenged wasteland of Elkins Park/Jenkintown area, I'd love to hear it.