Mumsnet users discuss family mealtime rituals with Uncle Ben's & Dolmio

[AaronMumsnet]

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While some evenings are for a hastily prepared and eaten meal as you taxi your child around to football/ballet/karate, others are for taking the time to share the chopping and stirring, then sit down and enjoy dinner as a family. Family dinners come in all shapes and sizes and can be noisy and often messy affairs - but they’re the perfect opportunity to create family mealtime rituals and spend quality time together.

Uncle Ben’s and Dolmio believe in the power of dinnertime to bring people together:

‘We all know that one of life’s pleasures is to share a meal with family and friends where you can take time to connect with the ones that you love, but in the midweek mayhem it’s not always possible to take time to cook and eat together. We want to hear your stories, what mealtimes in your house are really like, tips and tricks to overcome barriers to a great mid-week dinnertime and the rewards that eating together can bring.’

Did you make your daughter’s first boyfriend sweat over a flaming hot chilli con carne? Is it while your kids help you in the kitchen they have suddenly chosen to open up to you about their feelings, school day, worries or dreams, or did this time together produce a mini Nigella, now boasting cooking skills and flare far beyond what you’ve taught them. Does the dinner table give rise to stage-worthy performances, perhaps an impression of their teacher so legendary that it still leaves you in stitches, even now? Or do you still brag about the famous spaghetti bolognese in which you successfully hid a grand total of four portions of veggies and hit your family’s nutrient quota for the day?

Whatever your meal time wins, and rituals might be, share them below to be entered in to a prize draw to win a £300 voucher of your choice (from a list).

Thanks, and good luck!

MNHQ

Standard Insight T&Cs Apply

I’ve always wanted us to eat together as a family all the time but it never works as DS is starving straight after school and has a hot dinner for lunch at school so just wants sandwiches and DH doesn’t get home from work until 7.30. I get hungry in between, some generally sort our own food out. I wish it was different.

The main thing here is that screens are banned at the table so we all have to talk to each other. When I remember we ask everyone about their day, which usually leads to arguments about who gets to go first...

Ritual? Feed them, water them and then bed....

I'm all about having basic, go-to recipes that the whole family enjoy. Freshly cooked from scratch on a Sunday, a spaghetti bolognese is always a family favourite!

I always make our family sit at the table for mealtimes. Even though we often eat different meals, we eat at the same time and in the same place.
It often takes a lot of juggling to get everyone's meals ready at the same time but I love being able to ask about their day and find out what's going on in their lives. It's too easy to spend time staring at screens and ignoring each other nowadays so mealtimes are the perfect times to reconnect with each other.

We all eat together, as long as I'm not at work. I'm a nurse so there are times when I'm not home for dinner but when I am we all eat at the same time, including the baby.

We try and eat together at the table at least a couple of times a week

We sit down as a family every night, without fail.
When I was a kid, we mostly all ended up in front of the tv eating dinner off our laps and some years the 'dining' table got used for dining on Christmas day only!
I much prefer sitting down as a family round a table, not only does it promote better manners and provide a space for us all to chat away from any distractions, it also allows us to focus on our food instead of mindlessly shoveling...

Trying to teach our 15 month old table manners & not eating in front of the TV is our ritual! He loves my homemade beef Ragu and Turkey meatballs which are both SW recipes, so that’s a win!

We used to all eat together when the children were younger, but now theyre at high school and Uni, and my hubby has a new job, I find theyre often coming and going at different times, so while we all eat the same meal, its usually at different times, unless we make a effort to sort a date out to eat together.

Kids lay the table. Butter the bread & mind their manners.

Unless we are going out, or it is 90 degrees outside, we always have a roast! We take it in turns to choose the meat, and there are no gadgets allowed at the table. We always cook too many greens, and make little bubble and squeak cakes for the next day to have with cold meat!

We always eat together when we can.

When having soup it's necessary to ask whether soup is a food or a drink?

we like to sit at the table to eat and the kids help with the clean up :)

There was the Christmas Dinner ritual where Great Granny always declared how much she "Loved a bit of stuffing!" with a scary wink! It horrified our DC once they were old enough to realise what she was on about!

we try to make as many meals that they can get involved with. homemade pizzas, fajitas and burritos, usually the DIY kind of food. Great fun together being creative.

Our ritual is that no matter what is on the TV, or how fascinating a game on the Wii is, or how important the catching up on Instagram, everyone turns off all electronic devices and sits down at the dinner table. The table, I might add, is old and rickety but well-loved due to much use and many a lovely family meal/heated argument. Meals are often rushed due to mum's imminent taxiing to various clubs but we all enjoy that bit of time together- its increasingly important now my daughters are almost teens and seem to spend the rest of their lives in thier rooms!

We have always sat as a family since little one started weaning. We did Baby led weaning and has been so amazing with ours enjoying meal times (most of the time!!)

We have set nights for cooking Chinese food, fish and curry. Chinese night seems to be the favourite

We always eat dinner together at the table and make sure all phones/tvs are off. Its only 30 mins but its nice to truly listen to everyone and hear about their day without any distractions.

Busy week days made for meals out the freezer or slow cooker meals but Friday was always 'have a friend night' for my kids with treat type food and it was my home made chips that I was renowned for and were loved! Saturday night was our takeaway night and Sunday I kept to the traditional roast and sitting down as a family and catching up on the weeks events.

Spend ages preparing it and then woof it’s gone.

We have quick meals during the week after a long day at work, but at weekends we take pleasure in having more interesting meals. Unless we are having a BBQ then Sunday’s are our favourite day for a lovely homemade curry. Yum.

We always try and cook from scratch and make preparing a good way to be together and catch up with our day.