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

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We almost always eat at the table apart from pizza and film nights about once a month. Easy meals/pre-prepped do it’s not an ordeal (we have 2 under 5)

At the moment, my daughter is just under 1 years old. We tend to feed her dinner at 4:30 and then ours follows at around 5:30-6pm. It works for us all but soon are planning on her having the same tea time as us.

Once a week the grandparents come over and we have a proper family meal with certain essential elements - nibbles and drinks to start, meal, salad, pudding followed by a piece of chocolate and a quiz.

Other regular elements include grandpa getting grumpy because he's a bit deaf and missed a joke, granny complaining she's had too much to eat, teens checking phones under the table and the dog getting fed under the table by dh.

We always eat together as a family, except for two nights a week as son has activities and so he has to eat first so that we can get him there in time and we eat while he's out. In our crazy, hectic lives, dinner time is a tiny bit of peace!

During the week, our 8yo autistic son eats separately from us because his bedtime is before our dinner time but he loves family dinner time at the weekend, particularly a roast dinner on Sunday afternoon. He gets a huge buzz from sitting down with us to eat alongside us - so much so, that we make a point of always making time for family dinners at the weekend no matter what we are doing!

We love to catch up when we are eating our meals, thats why its a special bonding time. Whether we are at the dinner table or in front of our tv with a tray, mealtimes are the times we actually have eye contact and share moments together!

Tidy up, wash hands and face and sit down nicely!

It’s difficult during the week for us to eat dinner as a family but we look forward to Saturday nights, when we all sit down together in front of the TV to watch BGT or the X Factor and enjoy sharing the box of chocolates for afters!

DH & DS both eat meat, so DH cooks for them.
DD and I don't, so I cook for us.
Twice a week, by luck, we all eat together.

Our weekday ritual is me running around like a headless chicken to get something on the table for my daughters to eat. My husband doesn't get in until the kids are just about to get to bed. On the weekend it is a bit more relaxed, the kids do help with setting the table and getting glasses.

No ritual, eat once a day when I feel really hungry, the reduced price food from the Supermarket. :(

We usually try and have a takeaway on a Saturday and eat in front of the TV as usually we all sit at the table.
When the oldest ones were younger we all sat round the table together but now they're older, we aren't always eating at the same time due to clubs, being with friends etc so it's far more relaxed.
There's lots of planning for the week and we cook from scratch so it's a lot easier to sit some aside for later eaters.

We regularly sit down to eat around 5.30 every evening. With two active girls, it's important to have regular mealtimes. We also make sure tea-time is strictly family time at the table, where we can catch up on the day's activities. At the weekend, the girls help out with simple preparation tasks and they love to get involved.

Meal times are hit and miss in our house, as everyone is busy with school, uni, work and travel. We always have a big Sunday roast, with whoever is there that week. We sit and chat over dinner, then have a lazy afternoon in front of the TV.

Having meals together is so lovely a;nd i think its important to do, although a few years ago, I began to cook a hot meal ready for straight after school, as the kids snack otherwise, so its healthier if they eat almost straight away, but at weekends we all eat together still....

We always sit at the table for family meals. Usually something simple and quick during the week due to activities. Weekends are when we do a roast dinner.

Our family meal times are pretty non existant, my husbands job means he works very unsocial hours. So when we do get the chance to have a sit down meal together its lovely, we chat about what we have been up to throughout the day and normally talk about our future plans. Our lg will quite happily sit in her high chair eating/throwing whatever we are having, I cherish those little moments of us being together.

One of the things I insist on is that we all sit at the table together for our tea and that the TV and mobiles are not allowed. I see it as a time for us to actually talk to each other. I dont know how other families operate without it, as I see it as the only way we all dedicate time to each other to talk about anything.

I always try to cook a meal that is good for us but sometimes when I am tired or ill we get take away or a pizza to put in the oven. Even our doggie is used to our tea time ritual now - when he first came he used to jump on tables, now he knows to wait (he usually has a little sleep) and as soon as we are finished he surfs around the kitchen waiting to see if any scraps (we are careful what we feed our doggie).

Sometimes life gets in the way - the teenager has to be somewhere, or the man works late etc, but I think my family realises the next time they sit that our teatimes together are worth it and sometimes is all laughing or sometimes just listening to the man moaning about work, but we are there for each other.

Teenage son asks me what we are having & when it will be ready. Then every 10 minutes he asks me if it is ready yet.
When it is served he hoovers it up at an impossible speed!

We have a 'family ticket raffle' for laying the table and getting meals ready and clearing away each day - its great fun - especially if you do not pull the winning ticket!

we try to at least once a week sit as a family and eat together, the kids enjoy it. i cant say i do much because of all the arguing that happens. But the kids get to choose what we have and that can vary from pasta to roast dinner or homemade burgers.

My big tip is batch cooking. I love cooking up a storm on a rainy sunday and then decanting the dishes to tupperware and freezing them. It makes busy days so much easier when I know that I have a delicious and nutritious home cooked meal in the freezer at home and even on the busiest nights I can just microwave something and we can all sit at the table and enjoy a meal together as a family.

My ritual it to just get food on the table that will be eaten. We have busy schedules and food has to be quick and well received. Sometimes there is not time to think about making from scratch or pulling off a 5 star nutritiously balanced meal. As long as I have fed children - all is well,

Our favourite mealtime is Sunday afternoon where we all sit together, it is a lot harder in the week as our children need to eat earlier than Daddy finishes work (He finishes one hour before their bedtime).
So on a Sunday I always make a family favourite and it's often a help yourself affair with some random accompaniments so the kids get to try different things at the same time as enjoying their favourites. Fish pie is their favourite so I use different seafoods, use interesting sides like samphire and so on. It gets the kids talking and using different words, I love it!