On December 3, Family & Consumer Sciences Day is being celebrated with a “Dine In” theme. Since 2014, more than 300,000 people have publicly committed to dining in on the annual Family & Consumer Sciences Day http://www.aafcs.org/fcsday/home). This day also celebrates the birthday of Ellen Swallow Richards, the founder of what is now the American Association of Family and Consumer Sciences (AAFCS), formerly called the American Home Economics Association. The website above lists over 30 different valued sponsors or partners in this initiative. The promotion is an international event.

People are being encouraged to make a commitment to preparing and eating healthy meals with their family or others in their community. This is a fitting tribute to Ellen Richards, as she so believed in people working together and valuing family and community. You might consider this a good day to get some home prepared and preserved foods out of your freezer or pantry and share them together in a setting of community eating, whether with our own family or a group you invite to eat home prepared foods together. Maybe your community garden groups would like to share a meal of local foods and talk about community and health!

For other ideas, you can monitor the entries communities are sharing at http://www.aafcs.org/fcsday/home, or on Twitter and Facebook. Resources, such as an original recipe from the Beekman Boys cookbook and recipes certified by the American Heart Association can be found here: http://www.aafcs.org/fcsday/fcs-day-resources/dining-in-resources and http://www.aafcs.org/fcsday/fcs-day-resources/fcs-day-web-resources. Links to food preparation videos from The Art Institutes as well as Texas A&M University, food-related resources to use with children, and many other resources are also provided links. And of course, even if you do not want to can them, you can find interesting recipes at the National Center for Home Food Preservation for some relishes, fruit dishes, and salsas for your sides! (http://nchfp.uga.edu)

You can read a little more about Ellen Swallow Richards here, http://connect.aafcs.org/about/about-us, as well as in many other sources. Ellen Richards, a chemist, was the first female graduate and professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Smith College conferred an honorary degree of Doctor of Science on her. She was an activist for nutrition, foods education, child protection, public health, women’s rights, and the application of scientific principles to everyday living for the family. Her activism, vision and professional experiences led to formalization of the home economics profession and founding of the American Home Economics Association. Here is one short biography: https://libraries.mit.edu/archives/exhibits/esr/esr-biography.html. I have done a lot of archival research and reading myself about Ellen Richards’ life and professional contributions, especially regarding public health and safe food and water. It is nothing but inspiring, especially when you read a lot of her correspondence with other foods and nutrition professional leaders in the late 1800s.

(References are the links provided above throughout the text.)