How to Do More with Dinner: An Interview with Melissa Joy Dobbins

This week, I’m talking with Melissa Joy Dobbins, a registered dietitian/nutritionist who served for many years as a spokesperson for the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. She’s also the creator and host of a terrific podcast called Sound Bites. 

One of the things that Melissa and I have in common is an allergy to misleading or just plain inaccurate information about food and nutrition that circulates so freely these days.

See also: How Fake Nutrition News Hurts Us All and Reliable Sources of Nutritional Information

In her Sound Bites podcast, she brings experts in to dispel misunderstandings and myths and give listeners a more nuanced understanding of the science. She'seven created a series of resources to help other nutrition professionals communicate more clearly and effectively in the media.

In this week's podcast, I talk with Melissa about her Do M.O.R.E. with Dinner project. But this isn't really about doing more.  Most of us already feel like we couldn’t do one more thing. It’s about getting more from this daily necessity.  M.O.R.E. stands for Make Ordinary Rituals Extraordinary.

In our interview (which you can hear by clicking the audio player above), Melissa shares the personal goal that inspired this project.

The Toolkit includes links to a lot of great resources created by dietitian/nutritionists and others: recipes, meal prep and planning tools, kitchen organization tips, information on children’s nutrition, even a guide to starting your own garden.

See also: Best Meal Planning Apps

Dedicating some time to meal planning and preparation can definitely upgrade your family’s nutrition (not to mention save money and decrease food waste). But this isn’t just about nutrition. It’s also an opportunity to become closer as a family. In our conversation, Melissa talks about the practice that dramatically changed her family's dinner routine, and her relationship with her kids. 

We're told that families need to sit down together most evenings and eat a family meal....

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