To ask if anyone else prefer eating their evening meal on a tray?

[FredSoftly]

I have friends who insist that every meal is eaten en famille at the table so everyone can "talk about their day." Then they complain that it's often tense or their teens are moody and uncommunicative.

When I suggest tea on a tray, they gasp in horror!

We often do this in front of the TV and it can make for a nice relaxed evening. We also manage to chat a lot without facing each other across the kitchen table on a nightly basis.

Am I common?

@TakeTheCuntOutOfScunthorpe

It's easier using a tray than just having a plate on your lap. Preferably one of those trays with a bean bag underneath.

We only use the table when the meal requires or deserves it. Some things are too messy to risk a tray with, other things are too classy. But eating every meal at a table smacks of unwoke, right-wing white privilege.

🤣🤣🤣 what silliness 🙄

I let my young kids eat in the living room a few times a week on the nest of tables, usually it's at the table though.

Roussette
Can't wait .

AND I would find you common as muck

Gosh, yes. Because eating dinner at a table makes you soooo much better, doesn't it?

We are a customarily old school upright tradition family therefore table manners etiquette de rigueur. All seated together in one sitting with sometimes background music but no television to enjoy each other's company and catch up etc. However we are also flexible not set in our ways as sometimes on trend too and if appropriate have ventured to airline style home buffet tray catering for certain events such as following live sports or adventure camping etc. Eating a meal on your own tray is a touch too school/university or hospital style but fine on coach class airborne! Each to their own as I don't disagree with this choice concept as works perfectly well for garden barbecue picnic or poolside settings etc.

@ResIpsaLoquiturInterAlia

We are a customarily old school upright tradition family therefore table manners etiquette de rigueur. All seated together in one sitting with sometimes background music but no television to enjoy each other's company and catch up etc. However we are also flexible not set in our ways as sometimes on trend too and if appropriate have ventured to airline style home buffet tray catering for certain events such as following live sports or adventure camping etc. Eating a meal on your own tray is a touch too school/university or hospital style but fine on coach class airborne! Each to their own as I don't disagree with this choice concept as works perfectly well for garden barbecue picnic or poolside settings etc.

😂😂😂

The classy solution is to do what my parents have done, and have a TV next to the kitchen table. That way you can watch Dad's Army while eating a proper meal with side plates, teapot etc.

Haha! We tend to eat in different rooms in our house - completely unsociable! My husband and I eat different meals, at different times while sitting at our desks watching stuff on the computer/reading Mumsnet. The kids have their food often in the lounge or sometimes up the kitchen table if it's something they're liable to spill everywhere.

We only all eat together up the kitchen table on special occasions because there are hardly any meals we all eat. It's nice when we do it but god, I wouldn't want to do it all the time. Like someone else said, a lot of the time I don't want to talk when eating, my kids talk to me constantly throughout the day. I want to escape everyone!

We tend to in the week and just had lunch on sofa but have only one adult ds at home who does his own thing.

@TheYearOfSmallThings

The classy solution is to do what my parents have done, and have a TV next to the kitchen table. That way you can watch Dad's Army while eating a proper meal with side plates, teapot etc.

We used to have that, basically eat like TV families, all on 3 sides of the table, and the TV at the other end. The TV is still there. It was basically good to catch up with news. But, tbh, the chat (mostly inane conversations) was almost always between us the kids and less with the parents.

In the 10+ years I've been an independent adult in my own home I have never eaten on a tray, there has always either been a table in the kitchen or the table has been nearer to the kitchen than the sofa so would literally be more of a pain to take it to the sofa than it would to eat properly at a table. For the last 5 or so years we've owned our own homes and had children I've never allowed meals in the living rooms mainly due to the thought of mess! All eating happens in the kitchen/diner except snacks.

Much, much prefer to eat at a table whether it's just me by myself or the whole family. Honestly don't know why eating at a sofa is seen as easier when it's more awkward to eat, further to carry it (in our case) and more likely to make a mess on sofas and carpets than on tiles and wooden kitchen table. That's before you even start to consider "family time" etc.

"But eating every meal at a table smacks of unwoke, right-wing white privilege."

People who don't have enough food have a respect for it and in some areas of the world, that requires prayer before eating. Usually done around a table. Coupled with many people still not having regular, affordable electricity, a table/special floor mat etc is probably more used outside of traditionally white societies, because there is no television. A table doubles up as a place to play cards, put a sewing machine, do written work and save any sofas for best. None of that fits in with white privilege. The poorest people often had just a table and chairs.

But eating every meal at a table smacks of unwoke, right-wing white privilege.

In my house we're white and fairly privileged, it's true. But I also think we're a bit 'woke', and we're certainly not right-wing.

I know and have known loads of working-class people, of all colours, who eat/grew up eating every meal at a table.

We do tend to eat dinner at the table, but then repair to the living room for telly and chocolate. Sometimes if there's something special on telly (like Strictly) we eat in front of the box. Or if we've got a takeaway.

I didn't realise pre mumsnet that people did this by choice. I had naiively assumed it was due to student digs/shared housing etc.

I miss eating at the table. It was something I always did with DC, except for odd occasions like a pizza and movie night. But now it’s just me eating my evening meal alone it feels a bit sad sitting at the table! So now I eat in front of the tv for that reason alone, not because I prefer it.

I make a right mess if I eat anywhere other than at a table!

Even if I'm on my own and DH is away, I still eat at the table. I like the ritual of it.
Mat, knife and fork, salt and pepper wine glass

@FredSoftly I don't think you're common, but maybe a bit old fashioned. Eating dinner in front of the tv was definitely something I did growing up, but that was because we only had one TV, it was in the sitting room, and if we missed the evening news or prime time shows there was no way to catch up. We also spent a much higher proportion of our time watching TV, including lots of repeats. These days, we can watch TV whenever we want, wherever we want, and tend to watch much less of it because there are other alternatives. We have all our meals at the table - breakfast, lunch, dinner - sometimes we talk and sometimes we don't but it's still the most convenient place to sit and eat.

@TakeTheCuntOutOfScunthorpe

It's easier using a tray than just having a plate on your lap. Preferably one of those trays with a bean bag underneath.

We only use the table when the meal requires or deserves it. Some things are too messy to risk a tray with, other things are too classy. But eating every meal at a table smacks of unwoke, right-wing white privilege.

I grew up eating most evening meals at the kitchen table. I'll let my Asian mom know she's a white supremacist 🤣🤣🤣🤣

Worth adding that our table is in the kitchen, in contrast to being in the 'dining room' in the house I grew up in. We don't have one of those.

@TakeTheCuntOutOfScunthorpe

It's easier using a tray than just having a plate on your lap. Preferably one of those trays with a bean bag underneath.

We only use the table when the meal requires or deserves it. Some things are too messy to risk a tray with, other things are too classy. But eating every meal at a table smacks of unwoke, right-wing white privilege.

And the nuttiest / most disproportionate post of the day award goes to 🥁🥁🥁@TakeTheCuntOutOfScunthorpe 🍾🍾🍾

😂

@TakeTheCuntOutOfScunthorpe

It's easier using a tray than just having a plate on your lap. Preferably one of those trays with a bean bag underneath.

We only use the table when the meal requires or deserves it. Some things are too messy to risk a tray with, other things are too classy. But eating every meal at a table smacks of unwoke, right-wing white privilege.

Strong words for suggesting that it's nice to sit down to dinner together if you get chance.

I grew up in a house which was too small for a table, spent the first 26 years eating from my lap (except at school). Since I moved into my own place I have eaten every meal at my table, with white linen napkins too, once I could afford them.

We've always eaten at the table. We both did as kids, and we do now. It seems more comfortable and less messy to me. We are working class but I must be a bit posh as the thought of sitting having Christmas dinner on a tray makes me shudder. Take away pizza is the only time we ever sit on sofa round coffee table in front of telly. I don't religiously switch telly off when we are eating at the table. If it's early and Pointless is on we often leave it on, so it's not a TV snobbery thing.

I grew up eating most evening meals at the kitchen table. I'll let my Asian mom know she's a white supremacist
🤣🤣🤣🤣

Well someone needs to tell her, it's probably best coming from you 😆

I grew up eating most evening meals at the kitchen table. I'll let my Asian mom know she's a white supremacist 🤣🤣🤣🤣

Make sure she’s sitting down (at a table) first.