US: Parents admit to skipping vegetables two times a week on average

Just in time for hectic back-to-school schedules, Green Giant Frozen Steamers is kicking off the 'Fresh Take on What to Make' campaign in partnership with beloved celebrity chef and TV host Gina Neely. The campaign comes on the heels of new findings from the 2014 Fresh Takes with Green Giant Frozen Survey* in which more than a third (36 percent) of parents surveyed admitted to forgetting about, or even purposely cutting out, vegetables when crunched for time at the end of the day, leaving them out of meals an average of twice a week. This is despite four-out-of-five (83 percent) parents agreeing no dinner is complete without a vegetable.

Featuring exciting ways to transform tried-and-true go-to meals with just five ingredients, The 'Fresh Take on What to Make' campaign aims to provide time-crunched parents with helpful ideas and tips to reinvent dinnertime – showing that it can be as simple as just adding Green Giant Steamers to your family's favourite go-to dishes. People can find expert tips, meal ideas from Gina Neely like her Quick 'n Easy Chicken Pot Pies using Green Giant Steamers Broccoli, Carrots, Cauliflower and Cheese Sauce, and more on greengiant.com/easymeals.

Solutions for Dinnertime Challenges. When it comes to dinnertime, the majority of parents (78 percent) would rather spend less time in the kitchen and more time enjoying dinnertime with their kids, according to the 2014 Fresh Takes with Green Giant Frozen Survey. However, key findings show that parents run into many challenges at dinnertime, including:

Never having enough time to cook dinner leaves more than two-in-three (63 percent) parents falling back on the same tried-and-true, go-to meals, which most often include spaghetti (60 percent), sandwiches (39 percent) or chicken tenders (37 percent).
When genuinely trying to incorporate veggies into meals, 70 percent identify challenges, including getting kids excited about eating them (42 percent), not having vegetables on hand (32 percent) or not knowing how to prepare them (20 percent).
Learning to cook new and different meals comes with its own set of challenges. Nearly half (44 percent) of parents are worried their families won't like new recipes, 27 percent don't want to spend the time or money trying to hunt down unfamiliar ingredients and 21 percent say there are so many recipe resources available that they just don't know where to start.

"The 'Fresh Takes' survey highlights real dinnertime challenges facing parents today who are balancing a lot – work, kids' school and after-school activities, house chores and pets' needs, to name a few," said John Stockman, associate marketing director for Green Giant. "We want to help make dinnertime exciting again by showing families how to transform their go-to meals in simple ways that let the veggies shine and bring families together."

For additional information and helpful resources, please visit greengiant.com/easymeals. People can also connect with Gina Neely and Green Giant during a Twitter Chat on September 16 at 8pm ET and during a Google+ Hangout on September 23 at 8pm ET.

* The 2014 Fresh Takes with Green Giant Frozen Survey presents the findings of an online survey conducted by ORC International from August 5-8, 2014 among a sample of 986 American parents of children under the age of 18, comprising 487 men and 499 women.