Home-delivered meals: food quality, nutrient content, and characteristics of recipients

Meals provided by a home-delivered meal program with the same supplier were evaluated for 5 consecutive days in each of 6 years. In the evaluations, meals were compared with federal guidelines for meal pattern, serving size, and temperature of hot food, and the quality was evaluated. Meal pattern and serving size guidelines were not always met by the meals. Problems included no delivery of milk with the meals and variations in serving sizes for meat or alternate, fruit, vegetable, and dessert. Temperatures of hot foods were often much lower than the 140 degrees or 150 degrees F specified in food safety guidelines. Food quality varied. Protein, iron, phosphorus, vitamin A, and niacin were consistently greater than 33% of the RDA; energy, thiamin, riboflavin, and vitamin C were less than 33% of the RDA some years, and calcium was consistently less than 33% of the RDA. Estimated total daily nutrient intakes of 27 recipients followed the same pattern as the nutrient content of the meals. For many recipients, estimated nutrient intakes from food other than the home-delivered meal was less than 33% of the RDA. Food preferences were fairly well satisfied. Recall of nutrition-related vocabulary was poor. In this study, home-delivered meals were found to make important contributions to the nutrition needs of the recipients.