Cooking is a big part of being an adult, and it becomes all the more important when you have children to cook for too. So, how are your cooking habits?

Before, your cooking habits only affected you. Now, they affect your entire family, especially your kids. So, you want to ensure that you’re following good habits that keep your family as healthy as possible. With that in mind, it helps to know of any bad habits that might do the opposite. You could be guilty of a few bad habits without realizing it, so here are a few things you should stop doing in the kitchen:

Cooking with unsafe cookware

Yes, the equipment you use has a direct bearing on your family’s health. Most notably, the materials that your pots and pans are made out of. Now, you can see the safest cookware at mamavation.com, and the general consensus is that stainless steel is a fantastic option. However, it’s also revealed that you should avoid things like lead, nickel, chromium, and aluminum cookware. If your pots and pans are made out of these materials, you might accidentally be ‘poisoning’ your family. That’s said in a light way, it’s more a case of you unknowingly adding substances to their meals via the cookware. So, to avoid this, switch to safer and non-toxic options. 

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Applying too much salt

A good percentage of us are guilty of over-salting meals. The main problem comes when you have pre-cooked things that you add to meals. For example, you add a bottle of pre-made bolognese sauce to a pan, then salt it. The sauce itself has already been salted, so you’re adding extra for no reason. Or, it’s when you add lots of different things to a dish. For example, you cook chicken, salt it, then add it to a stew or sauce that you have also salted. Stockpots are another thing to be wary of – they contain salt, so you don’t need to add more if you’ve put a stockpot in the dish! Over-salting food is bad for you as it can lead to all sorts of health complications down the line. So, go easy on it when cooking for the family!

Portion sizes

Lastly, the portion sizes of your meals can impact your family’s health in one of two ways. If you make huge portions, your family will start putting on weight. If the portions are too small, there’s a risk that your family is being underfed! So, you have to find the sweet spot and deliver portions that fill your family up without being too large. You can find resources online that explain the ideal portion sizes for children and adults. Or, they actually make plates with portion sizes as part of the design. 

Do you see how easy it is to follow these cooking habits? There’s no doubt a lot of you are guilty of them, but you shouldn’t feel bad about it! Life as a parent is all about learning new things and correcting previous mistakes. Now, you know not to follow these bad habits, so you can switch things up and keep your family healthy.