It is well known that the increasing number of orphans and vuln erabl e children in Ethiopia havernresulted in the expansion of orphanages in whi ch chil dren are provided with bas ic necessities o frnli fe including food, clothin g, shelter, schoo ling and health care fac ili ties. However, children inrnthese in stitu tions become undernouri shed due to lack of adequate resou rces and li mitations ofrnknowledge and understandin g on th eir nutri tional needs. In Ethi opia, although diffe rentrnresearches have been conducted on the nu tr it ional status of children, only few studies are donernthat assessed the adequacy of nutrients given and the nutritio nal status of chi Idren in orphanages.rnThe main objective of th is study was therefore to assess the energy adequacy of the food givenrnand the nutritional status of c hildren from selected four orp hanages in Add is Ababa. Anrnin stitution based cross sectional study with multistage random sampling was applied betweenrnJanua ry to Febru ary 2016. Structured questionnaires were used to coll ect data from the childrenrnand caretakers in the orphanages. Food samples that were given in the se lected orphanagesrnthrou ghout the week were collected and tested in the laboratory for their nutrient compositionrnand were analyzed using independent samp le t-test to determine differences between governmentrnand non government orphanages. One sample H esl was also applied 10 compare the energyrndifference between the meal given in the orphanages with the RDA. The child ren's nutritionalrnstatus was assessed anthropometrica lly usi ng a Height-for-Age, Weight-for-Age and Weight-forHernight indices. WHO Anthro plus software for Assess ing Growth of the World's Chi ldren andrnAdolescents was used. t-test for proportions was used to compare the differences in proportionsrnof children who were malnourished among government and non government orphanages. Thernda ily mean energy intake of the children was 1320 Â± 304 Kcal. The prevalence of stunting,rnunderweight and wasting among the children was 20.96 %, 17.34 % and 9.27 %. The total meanrnenergy intake among the chi ldren in non government orphanages was significantly higherrn(p 0. 05). Inrnconclu sion, thi s study fo und that malnutrition is prevalent among children in se lected orphanagesrnof Addis Ababa. To improve the nutri t ional status of the children, stakeholders should formulaternand strengthen nutrition programs and polic ies oriented towards this segment of the population.rnKey words: Malnutrition, Children, Orphanages, Add is Ababa.