In many households, 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. can feel like the busiest, most hectic part of the day. You arrive home after what can be a stressful commute from work; the kids have homework and need to get ready for bed; the house is a mess; you’re tired from pulling an eight-hour shift (or more)… How do you fit in making the time to cook a healthy, family-friendly meal without driving yourself crazy?

Firstly, don’t be quick to come home with fast food just to save yourself some sanity. A recent study from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health found that home cooking is a main ingredient in a healthier diet.

“When people cook most of their meals at home, they consume fewer carbohydrates, less sugar and less fat than those who cook less or not at all — even if they are not trying to lose weight,” says Julia A. Wolfson, MPP, a CLF-Lerner Fellow at the Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future and lead author of the study.

The findings also suggest that those who frequently cooked at home — six-to-seven nights a week — also consumed fewer calories on the occasions when they ate out.

Making dinner happen after work on a consistent basis can feel like a challenge. Even just figuring out what to cook can be hard, let along doing it quickly and with results the whole family will enjoy. But believe it or not, a healthy dinner is achievable… and you can even do it in less than 30 minutes with simple, fresh ingredients.

Start off by committing to ONE WEEK of home-cooked meals. To get you started off right, we’ve compiled a list of 7 recipes for healthy dinners you can make in 30 minutes or less.