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

[AaronMumsnet]

This activity is closed

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

BBQ on a Friday is we can and the weather permits. Fun to have salad, other BBQ bits, meat/veggie stuff to choose from and to eat outside. We had friends over for the children yesterday so even more fun. They all loved it! So love the gas BBQ.

We don't eat together much in the week just because of differing work schedules. However we do have a friday night meal time where each week one of us will choose something that they would like to eat. For example last night it was my sons choice and he wanted home made burgers and corn on the cob so thats what we had :)

We have family meal on a Saturday morning. We get up and I make eggs, or porridge or whatever, and we all sit around and have breakfast, then go and hang out. Our kids are little, so we go and play with them, do music practise and relax. My husband works on Sundays, so then that evening we do the same and have a family meal. We eat at about 5.30 and chat and laugh. It is my favourite moment of the week.

No rituals here as such but when we were little my sister and I used to say "can I leave the table alone please?" Which I think I'd rather cute :)

Nowadays it's just me and one dc so we don't always sit at the table especially at lunch as we like carpet picnics, but when we are at the table it's dc job to lay it.

I have a big table in my kitchen, the kids sit on one side doing homework/crafts whilst I cook.

The only ritual we have is a big family sunday breakfast where we all sit down for a big breakfast (which isn't the usual cereal) and chat and eat pain au chocolat, baguette and brioche. Now I've written that, i realise it's pretty french sounding! More continental than usual. I would start a fry up tradition but I can't cope with 5 fry ups.

We sit down to dinner every night and we wait for daddy to get home too. It's such a social thing and really important to me as growing up we had dinner in front of the tv and I used to long for the dinners at my grandmas where would all sit and chat round the table!

We also try every month for the kids 4,6 and 8 to cook a meal too.

Sunday's we go to the in laws for dinner
most weeks without fail where MIL cooks a lovely roast or dinner with all the extras and we sit down with everyone and catch up! It's one of the highlights of our week!

We love talking about our days when we sit down to eat together. The 3yo usually asks everyone about their day in her chosen order.
However the children's favourite dinner is anything outside. A picnic, a BBQ or even just taking their snacks outside. BBQ meals are fun, noisy and the kids seem more willing to try different things. I'll often chop up a mixed bowl of fruit & send them outside with it, they will happily picnic on it for ages!

Hubby makes dinner while I put baby to bed then we spend quality time chatting in the kitchen until dinner is done.

Meals can be topsy turvy in our house. With my husband working late, or everyone having something different to eat.....
Family go-to meal is spaghetti bolognese - absolute favourite and allergen free, so everyone can enjoy it. I add fine diced carrot, peas and sweetcorn, along with spring onions to my mince, with mixed herbs, then use an organic sauce, as it's allergen free and delicious. I do use a top quality, organic if I can get it, mince, as you can really taste the difference

We are all very busy but manage to eat together several times a week.
We do manage a Sunday roast most weeks- I always have to do extra yorkies so that the DDs can have them with jam later. If I forget (or get gravy on them) they do moan!

We eat together and my daughter always expects chocolate at the end of a meal 😂

We also sit around the table and my toddler helps set the table whilst the baby throws everything she can reach on the floor.

When I was a child, we always said grace before meals, but it was always the same one and it was short, gabbled and to be honest fairly meaningless to me. But I do like the idea of thanking the person who’s cooked the food, the person who bought it, the person who grew it, the animal whose eggs/milk/meat you’re eating, as well as God if you’re into that.

I taught my daughter how to make brownies last year, using a recipe that my mother had taught me. It is very simple. When the time came to taste them, I let my dd try the first one, she pulled a face and said, "they taste different to normal ones". Disappointed, I asked her how they were different and she said, "they taste like chocolate, mummy you should just make these every day!"

With two autistic boys and a daughter with dairy allergy ...our house is chaos at mealtimes. The only dinner everyone eats is a roast. One boy just eats the carrots, the other just the meat and potatoes and my daughter Hoover's it all up!

The best food is stolen off mommy's plate (says my toddler)

We try and eat together as often as possible. The only real ritual tends to be the 2 year old refusing to eat unless Mummy feeds him...

Weekday mealtimes have become easier since I accepted that sometimes a sandwich will suffice. Prior to that I could find myself cooking at three separate times.
Saturday is our 'ritual' night - I cook whilst listening to 80s music on the radio then we all eat something nice at the table, before gathering round the tv for Britain's Got Talent/ Xfactor or whatever is on. The kids love it, it gets us all together, and I love the family time.

Due to work patterns and after school activities, there's only 2 nights in the week we can eat as a family, so I ring fence those for the dcs favourite meals. DH generally asks them what was the best bit of their day, gets them chatting about school day.

We enjoy having dinner together each night and playing games. Days when we know we won't have time to cook we try and pop something in the slow cooker at breakfast time

We try to eat together as much as possible but it's not always easy. At the weekends we manage it more times than not which is lovely- I enjoy sitting round the table, eating & chatting together. I make a point of asking each DC what they have done that day and me & DH tell them something about our day. I think it's important to talk and meal times is a good time to do it.

Favourite meals include bangers & mash, a Sunday roast and anything with chips!!

A ritual we have is choosing what food we'll have over the next week. We all get to choose at least one evening meal and we debate others as we write the shopping list. The kids usually argue as one wants something the other doesn't want.

Rituals at mealtimes, funny never thought about it, but it is more routine , we all try and sit down together, I always Serve the children first, they have sometimes finished and ask to leave before I sit down. We always sit in the same chairs and normally have some music playing. We talk about the songs, the day and plans for the next day or week. The dog always comes and sits on the mat in the kitchen...Not sure why, we don’t feed him from the table ever...maybe just enjoys our company. I suppose we have a dull life.

I love the conversations dinner time at the table bring. I really miss our dinnertimes if we have to change the plan. My 3 year old chats and learns about what were eating, and usually saves all his interesting, inquisitive questions for dinner time! Sometimes awkward!