Ready-meal consumption: associations with weight status and cooking skills

Objective:The ready-meal market has grown considerably in recent years. Atthe same time, a degradation of traditional cooking skills has been observed.Ready meals are often rich in energy, fat and sugar and lack vegetables; however,studies investigating associations between ready-meal consumption, overweightand cooking skills are lacking. The present study examines whether demographicfactors, overweight, beliefs about the nutritional value and taste of ready mealsand cooking skills are associated with ready-meal consumption.Design:Cross-sectional survey.Setting:Ready-meal consumption, weight status, cooking skills, beliefs aboutthe taste and nutritional value of ready meals and demographic variables wereassessed with self-administered questionnaires. Data were analysed with one-wayANOVA and multiple regression analysis.Subjects:A total of 1017 adults from the German-speaking part of Switzerland.Results:Men reported being more positive about ready meals and havingfewer cooking skills compared with women. Overweight adults (BMI.25 kg/m2)were more positive about nutrients and vitamins in ready meals compared withnormal-weight adults. Ready-meal consumption was associated with cooking skills(b520?192), age (b520?228), overweight (b50?129), nutritional value (b520?131), taste (b520?126), working status (b50?096) and gender (b50?084).Conclusions:Cooking skills were identified as a strong predictor of ready-mealconsumption. The importance of cooking skills as a barrier to healthy eatingshould be explored, as it is plausible that cooking skills will further decrease in thefuture. Next, the study provided evidence for an association between ready-mealconsumption and overweight. Further research should examine the importance ofready meals for the overweight epidemic.