As my long time readers know, I got into cooking homemade real food for my family about 2.5 years ago. At that time I had a 2.5 year old and a full time corporate job that required frequent travel. I was motivated to give up FAKE food for good and to make homemade read food. However, one thing I didn’t have a lot of was time. I focused on making real food a habit for me and for our family. I did this in a way that was do-able. I want this for you as well. It is my passion to help my readers realize how easy and quick making real food can be because if I can do it – so can you!

How I Kept My Sanity

Over the years, I have come up with quite a few tricks to keep myself sane. I wrote a ebook about them, The Real Food Survival Guide for Busy Moms, which came out last August. I was recently interviewed about my real food journey and my ebook for a NEW Free Online Virtual Conference, New Year New You. In this post, I will summarize some of my favorite and very achievable tips here to get you thinking, however, I encourage you to tune in to my interview on Day 3 (Wednesday, January 15th!) of the conference for FREE to hear more about my story and my tips! Sign up now so you can add this to your calendar!

6 AchievableTips to Cooking Real Food in 2014

1. Focus on cooking a full dinner 2-3 times per week. This is achievable. I once tried to cook 5 full meals a week and I could not do it! This schedule is do-able for busy moms and dads!

2. Have a regular ‘breakfast for dinner’ every week. It does not take long to scramble some eggs and toast some sourdough bread (or grain free bread!). Plus this is a fun way to get the kids to help because even a three year old can help whisk some eggs!

3. Always cook double what you need. I am not talking about making double and having ‘leftovers’. For example, when I roast a chicken, I never roast just one chicken. I roast two chickens. I then put the second whole chicken in the freezer for another night. I don’t take the meat off or anything – I literally freeze the entire chicken. I can then reheat this frozen chicken in the oven another night when I am short on time and no one is the wiser! I can quickly roast some veggies in the oven at the same time the chicken is re-heating and make a salad and voila – dinner is served!

4. Do that amount of planning that makes you feel comfortable. I am not a master meal planner. I sometimes look in the fridge 30 minutes before dinner and pull something together. But if it helps you, outsource your meal planning. There are many meal planning services out there today that are incredibly inexpensive and worth the investment. These can easily be handed off to a husband or other helper to do the shopping and/or cooking without much effort from the busy mom!

5. Focus time and attention to making your ‘new convenience foods’. These are foods you do not have to make every day or even every week. But they need to be made on a regular basis to keep your real food pantry stocked. They are a must to keep on hand because making these foods will save you time in the long run – a lot of time. So bite the bullet and start making them. Find out what my list of new convenience foods are in my interview for the New Year New You Summit!

6. Take a basic knife skills and cooking techniques cooking class. It is vitally important to learn the basics. This is a great idea for a night out and you will learn a ton to help you move faster in the kitchen and be able to cook pretty much any recipe with ease. I also wrote an ebook on cooking techniques for this reason – it is called The Homemade Mommy Handbook and is full of basic techniques for newbie home cooks.

Want to hear more of my tips + hear from 30 other amazing speakers?

Listen to the FREE online virtual conference, New Year New You, happening LIVE January 13-17, 2014!

This FREE online conference features 5 days of interviews from 31 amazing speakers from the Real Food world.

New Year New You is all about inspiring all of you to make the changes you need to be healthy in 2014. I am inspired just having been a part of this! I am truly in awe of this amazing lineup:

• Dr. Kate Rheaume-Bleue – Author of Vitamin K2 and the Calcium Paradox
• Lynne Farrow – Author of The Iodine Crisis
• Chris Kresser – Author of Your Personal Paleo Code
• Joel Salatin – Author of Folks, This Ain’t Normal
• Robb Wolf – NY Times Bestselling Author of The Paleo Solution
• Dr. Cate Shanahan – Author of Deep Nutrition
• Matt Stone of 180 Degree Health
• Carol Tuttle of Dressing Your Truth
• Josh Tickell – Award-winning director of Fuel

These interviews will help you get organized, get fit, get positive and happy, and get out of debt among many other topics! And it’s FREE!

Sign up now for this FREE event!

How this online conference works

Starting January 13th and running through January 17th, on each day during this free online conference, 6 – 7 presentations will be posted on the New Year, New You Summit website.

The presentations will be available for FREE. But they will only stream for 24 hours (from midnight to midnight Pacific time).

At the end of each 24-hour period, that day’s presentations will come down and 5 new presentations will be posted. This will continue each day until the conference ends at midnight Pacific on January 17th.

Too BUSY to Listen during the live streaming Jan 13-17th? Don’t worry – you can download the whole conference!

I have never been able to listen the day of the interviews due to my job. I always purchase the download package so that I can listen whenever I have the time. Each interview is about an hour long so I listen while in the car or even while folding laundry!

Pre-order the Summit Download Package — and you will save 50%!

The Summit Download Package price will normally cost $99 — but right now you can pre-order for only $49.

The New Year New Year Summit Download Package includes:
Over 30 hours of audio interviews
Over 30 hours of video slideshows
ALL THIS FOR ONLY $49!

VGN Premium Members save 65% — get the Download Package for Premium for only $35!

NOTE: The price of the Download Package goes up to $79 the week of the Summit (Jan 13-17) and then goes up to $99 when the Summit ends so order now before you forget and you end up paying full price!