Share your tips and tricks for harmonious family meals - £200 voucher to be won

[EllieSmumsnet]

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We all know how busy family life can get, so mealtimes can be a great way to come together, bond as a family and share great food, but it isn’t always easy; picky-eaters, wasted food and a lack of time to think of and prepare healthy meals that the whole family will enjoy. How often does your family eat together? What are your best tips and tricks for happy, healthy family meals and empty plates?

• Share your tips and tricks below for happy and harmonious meal times
• One lucky MNer will win a £200 voucher for a store of their choice.

Here’s what Veg Power has to say:

“Half of mums tell us that they struggle to get their kids to eat more vegetables, with many admitting that they have given up trying. Our mission at Veg Power is to get kids excited about vegetables and to help parents and carers serve up those vegetables with confidence. Families enjoying positive meal times together is an essential part of that and sadly in many homes that's a challenge. Although we're supported by an amazing panel of nutritionists, psychologist and chefs we find that the best ideas often come from parents. We'd love to hear your views.”

We have 3 veggies with most meals, we let the kids decide what vegs they want with that meal. Making it their choice what we have has definitely improved the amount of veg eaten by them a meal times

Batch cooking snacks like protein balls or flapjacks so always something quick to grab.

Fun designs for younger children and keep them occupied during diner so talki about their day not their veggies

Batch cooking on Sunday, always something I can disguise my veg and herbs in, and making a spag bol, filled jacket potatoes, and a lasagne with my kilo of mince I have whipped up. Usually I have clean plates, and no complaints, we have always included our DC's into menu ideas and table etiquette to avoid distractions.

I go through my on-line shop every Monday for the following Saturday, we plan our weekly menu and they help choose what we will be eating (only sensible choices) If we have fish fingers it comes with peas and air fried wedges, and we like to make our own pizza, so buy the bases, and add a selection of colourful veg (sweetcorn mushrooms, yellow and red pepper and cheese, and tomatoes. When they have an input into what they eat, I found that mealtimes tend to be easier and there is less waste and drama at the table.

I love Mitch Lane's book "feed your family for a 5er". My go-to dish is the spaghetti with meatballs. I love adaptable dishes that suit the different tastes around our table. I am the only vegetarian so I like meatballs rather than a bolognese that's mixed through the sauce as I can simply omit the balls from mine.
I also like meals with hidden veg. Tesco do a 30% veg range of meat that's cheaper and has hidden veg in, I always but my mince from that range but it's usually quite a small section on the shelf, you have to look out for it.
I use leftover bananas that are black and squishy to make a banana cake from the BBC good food website. The kids love it warm from the oven as an after school treat that fills them up until dinner.
I also think that we as a generation are so busy and that food manufacturers play on that and try to sell us food that we really don't need ready made and harge us extra for the privledge. Food our mothers could have whipped up in their sleep. Yorkshire puddings are just batter and don't need to be bought frozen. Custard is just egg yolks, milk and cornflour. A simple jam sponge can be done in the microwave in 5 minutes and us just butter, flour, eggs sugar and a splash of milk with a blob of ham in tbe bottom of the bowl.
We also need to be eating more seasonally, it's better fir the planet abd our purses and its nice to lion forward to the next thing. Save strawberries for the summer and enjoy apples and blackberries in the winter!
Finally, grow your own veg or use a community garden or allotment. It's fun and educational for the kids as well as cheap and satisfying.

Also nothing at all between meals and no orange squash etc. they eat when they are hungry and by the time they are teenagers they will eat you out of house and home, especially boys! I used to call my teenage son a stomach on legs!

When all else fails in my house, I opt for a stir fry with a really nice sauce, pieces of chicken, and red onion, red pepper, mushrooms, tiny sweetcorn, it looks colourful, smells aromatic and with some egg noodles is our go to tea which everyone can eat. I sometimes bribe by putting the television on IF they eat as much as they can before leaving the table.

I try to add as much veg as I can to any sauces/stews/pies etc so we get the benefit but isn't noticed. I then have a few veg options with each meal as everyone prefers something different but at least if there is a choice on the table, they will often try something else.

Breakfast is our main family meal of the day.

Otherwise with two small children there's a lot of imaginative play at dinner. We play 'naked fork' where we encourage the fork to keep its clothes (ie food) on at the table so it doesn't get cold and the children delight in making the fork naked by eating what's on it. I also tend to put some things on my plate which 'aren't for children' then realise I've left something in the kitchen so leave the table only to come back and discover they've eaten all my grown up red peppers. Shock horror! They know it's a game, but it's a fun way to encourage them to try new things. We don't push them to eat anything if they've tried it and don't like it, and respect when they say they're full. Mostly this means mealtimes are fun and stress free.

Kids love to learn and enjoy a hands-on approach to things, so we get ours in the kitchen to help prepare and cook vegetables you want them to eat. You never know, they might be so proud of their cutting skills with the peppers that they want to eat them all!

To make meal times easy, I ask the little one to lay the table then I serve the dishes onto the table making sure there is always a veg / salad option with the main. Everyone dishes their own plate up so can control how much they want to eat, if they want to try something new etc. By passing the plates around and asking if someone has tried xyz it creates conversation and I find less likely to be fussy as it's a shared experience

For us it is fun plates where a design is revealed, child size cutlery which are easy to hold, and them knowing what you are making for dinner, and knowing it is something they will eat and a little bit of a 'new' flavour when you want to introduce a new food stuff. I cook without salt, which can make food bland so I have researched what herbs work with foods - rosemary roasted carrots and potatoes, and garlic, oregano and sage with some mince meals.

I use mixed veg on weekdays in a bowl (peas carrots and sweetcorn) and I use my airfryer for new potatoes and carrots cut lengthways with a spray of oil and some herbs, I find a chicken breast strips fried with a cream cheese sauce added is always easy to chew, has taste and is speedy to cook.
We try spicier foods now again, and fish in breadcumbs on Friday. It's all about give and take, patience and making your food as tasty as possible,

I find that home cooked food is much better than pre-prepared - but a real pain to get organised on my own. I tried the batch cooking of mince with pureed veg, some herbs, and this during the week I can make a variety of meals a lot quicker. I also batch made fishcakes on Sunday, and added zest of a lime for flavour, and made my breadcrumbs from crushed doritos, this was a real winner, and really easy to reheat, the airfryer is the best for this - I can add some parboiled carrots and chipped potatoes and airfry these badboys.
Make what wont stress you out time wise and what they will eat. Turn off the telly and reward clean plates !

I’ve never made a big deal about eating everything on the plate, so meal times are happy relaxed occasions which in turn mean children are more likely to try new veg.

I don’t purée or hide veg either as that won’t help the child learn to love veggies and when their older they need to know to automatically eat healthy and pick the right foods for a balanced diet.

I also have crudités and hummus on offer at lunch and in the fridge for quick snack ideas, fruit is unlimited and kids help out in the kitchen so are used to chopping veg.

Definitely don't make mealtimes a battle, things that work for my family are having a weekly meeting with everyone to plan the dinners for the week so the kids feel involved and they also love to help me prep the dinner in some way, I do find they eat more when they get involved. I also have frozen veg in the freezer so easy to pop into the slow cooker or casseroles with minimum hassle. I also add frozen spinach to spagetti bolognaise which they don't notice. My kids also love the novelty of small veg like cherry tomatoes, baby cucumbers or mini corn on the cob.
We also have a fruit or veg of the week where we eat something that we have never eaten before to try it, if no one likes it that's fine but we have had quite a few successes doing this.

For me is having set mealtimes, snacks should be limited, they may be thirsty not hungry, I used to give in and give snacks in the afternoon, then dinner would not be eaten. We make a sharing plate, and sharing bowl of vegetables, and use butter to season our veg (just a drizzle). They can take some and then add to their plate, they seem to eat more as they are not overwhelmed by a large plate of food. Finally the TV in the dining room can be your friend if it keeps them at the table, and they know you will pause the programme if they are messing around at the table and not eating nicely.

Spend some time in the kitchen, teaching your children about vegetables and their benefits. Put things into ‘kid terms’, aka broccoli will make you super strong like a superhero and carrots can help you see in the dark. They’ll soon be nibbling at their veg to test these theories.

Play the ‘Colour Night’ game. One night a month let your kids choose a colour and then create a meal made up of ingredients that are only that colour. Let’s say they pick red, this means you can rustle up a delicious continental platter style dinner featuring tomatoes, peppers, red onions, beetroot, steak (let them watch the steak go from red to brown) chorizo, ham and red potatoes.

My tips is to have a white board in you kitchen/dining room and ask your child/ren what they want for tea each night, (mine take turns) but they know it has to be healthy. Each night they know what is for tea, and they know if they play up or choose not to eat that - they don't get to pick next week I or their sibling will pick. We have burgers and wedges with home made coleslaw, thai fishcakes corn and sweetcorn wedges, cottage pie, pasta with a veg sauce, and port loin slices in a mustard sauce with mash and carrots this week.

We try to eat dinner every night as a family.
I meal plan every week and write this down so everyone knows what the meal will be so no surprises.
If possible, children are involved in dinner times at some level whether that's helping to cook, wash up, set the table, tidy up, sort drinks etc.
We eat at roughly the same time every day and everyone has the same meal.

How often does your family eat together?

We eat together every night around 5, I know this will change when they go to high school, but for now this is our routine.

What are your best tips and tricks for happy, healthy family meals and empty plates?

For us it's meat and 2 or 3 veg - I try to batch cook at weekends when I have time and freeze left overs to be made into a frittata at the weekend. I cook in the airfryer (I have a family size one) and for wedges and roasted carrots I find par boiling first makes them fluffier inside and the carrots roast quicker - with a herb and olive oil drizzle they are all devoured - I favour quick stir fries, and mince/bolognaise dishes which are quick and with added herbs are tasty.

We would make home made pizza with various veg toppings they could choose.

The other thing I did was try not to think about how much food is eaten at each meal and consider the whole day or week’s consumption instead. Once I this wit’s dd1 meal times were much less stressful.

would also ask them to guess the flavours once they were older.

Harmonious family meals have to be well timed - no too hungry or not hungry enough, make something they have eaten before and sometimes I add a new twist to see if they will eat - they won't eat circle carrots but will eat carrot and turnip mash with seasoning, or carrots cooked lengthways.
My tips for time saving is to batch cook, or cook things which can be cooked quickly - I buy large packs of chicken and portion, and freeze what i wont use, and have a defrosting day ahead of when I need this.
Chicken breast coated in smashed up doritos are our KFC nights, and chicken kebabs, marinaded in a soy and garlic soy then skewered with peppers of different colours make a colourful bitesize meal we all enjoy.

My top tip is to gamify healthy eating and mealtimes. It has always worked with my kids to make mealtimes fun and something they looked forward to, and it still does. We do verbal quizzes, the memory game, etc. When they were small, it would be facts about the foods they were eating, like who could remember what vitamins were in red pepper, for example, and the health benefits. We also had a game for giving silly/alternative names to vegetables; my favourite was the 'ghost of broccoli' for cauliflower.