Nutrition Rating System Helps Busy Families Enjoy Healthy Meals at Home
Guiding Stars, the world’s first store-wide nutrition navigation system today announces a partnership with Make Thyme for Dinner to help make it fast and easy for busy families to enjoy healthy meals at home.
Each month, a portion of Make Thyme for Dinner’s 16 offered recipes will earn one, two or three stars according to their nutritional value, as indicated on the website and in-shop signage. Guiding Stars Licensing Co. will rate Make Thyme for Dinner’s ‘cook at home’ recipes, helping busy consumers choose meals that offer the most nutrition for the calories. Make Thyme for Dinner is a Maine-based company that allows customers to assemble a month’s worth of delicious, home cooked meals in less than two hours. Make Thyme for Dinner provides all the recipes and prepared, fresh ingredients to it easy for busy families to put a healthy dinner on the table.
“In this tough economy, many families are choosing to save money and cook meals at home, but not everyone has the time to assemble a nutritious homemade dinner,” said Misty Smalley, client services manager at Guiding Stars Licensing Company. “We are thrilled to partner with an innovative program like Make Thyme for Dinner and help take the nutritional guesswork and time consuming prep work out of home cooking.”
Guiding Stars utilizes a proprietary algorithm that is grounded in evidence-based science and the most current guidelines and recommendations of leading national and international health organizations, such as the FDA and USDA. The system credits all edible foods based on the presence of vitamins, minerals, dietary fiber and whole grains, and debits for the presence of trans fat, saturated fats, cholesterol, added sugars and added sodium. Food items are then awarded zero, one, two or three stars – one star means good nutritional value; two stars, better nutritional value; and three stars, the best nutritional value.
“Adding Guiding Stars nutrition ratings to our menu provides our patrons with another easy-to-use tool to help simplify home-cooking,” said Paula Pelczar, owner of Make Thyme for Dinner. “Guiding Stars helps busy families to quickly identify the most nutritious options, making the meals they serve at home even healthier.”
The Guiding Stars system was the first of its kind when implemented in select grocery stores in September 2006 in response to consumer demand for a simple, easy-to-understand tool for making good nutritional choices as they shop. The Guiding Stars program is now on shelf tags and signage in grocery stores throughout the Northeast, Southeast, Mid-Atlantic and Florida, and has also recently launched the first nutrition navigation system in a public school in MSAD 75 in Topsham, Maine, and Bates College in Lewiston, Maine in April.
About Guiding Stars Licensing Co.
Since 2006, Guiding Stars has been leading the way in helping consumers make nutritious choices by pioneering the first-ever storewide nutrition navigation system. The Guiding Stars program is a simple, easy-to-understand tool for making good nutritional choices and is designed to make a positive and lasting impact on public health. Guiding Stars Licensing Co., based in Scarborough, Maine, creates opportunities for supermarkets, manufacturers, food service providers and other organizations to license the program and make nutritious shopping simple throughout the United States. Guiding Stars is currently in more than 1,400 supermarkets up and down the East Coast including 1,177 Food Lion Stores in the Southeast and Mid-Atlantic, 167 Hannaford locations in the Northeast and 108 Sweetbay stores in central and western Florida. The program is supported by a 15-person team with significant licensing, marketing, food retail, IT and customer service experience.
About Make Thyme for Dinner
Make Thyme for Dinner is an independent meal assembly business in South Portland, Maine. With the goal of helping busy families get back to the kitchen table with real, home-cooked food, Make Thyme for Dinner strives to make putting together several weeks worth of meals quick, easy and fun. We do the shopping, chopping and prep work so customers can create healthy and affordable meals with fresh, natural ingredients. For the customers who are too busy to come in and assemble, we can do it for them for a fast pick up of their frozen meals ready to thaw and cook as needed. Open since October, 2006, Make Thyme for Dinner continues to improve the quality and breadth of services, such as the addition of Guiding Stars, offering a gluten free night, a special seniors menu, a “grab-and-go” refrigerator and freezer with pre-assembled meals ready to cook, and catering. Visit Make Thyme For Dinner to preview the 16 monthly recipes and sign up for a meal assembly session or Thyme Out pick-up.