71% of Americans believe eating at home is healthier than eating out

Nearly three in four Americans (71%) believe the food they eat at home is healthier than meals consumed out. More than nine in 10 consumers prepare at least one home-cooked dinner from scratch every week, and more than half (68%) do it almost daily. This home-equals-health belief extends to school lunches. Parents are far more satisfied with the nutritional value of the bagged lunches they prepare at home for their children (60%) vs. school cafeteria food (30%). Relatively few shoppers believe that grocery stores offer many healthy options in frozen entrees (16%), packaged foods (8%), or even ready-to-cook (10%) and prepared foods (12%). Even fewer feel this way about healthy options from fast-food (5%) and other take-out establishments (6%), Food Marketing Institute reports.