🥘 How to introduce family dinner?
One of the easiest weekly traditions your family can start in a small, simple way, no matter how old your kids are.
📺 TL;DR video
👋 Intro
It can sound daunting, but family meals are a great way to connect, learn to love and appreciate different foods, and settle down from a long day. You don't have to be Alice Waters to get your family to eat altogether - just do what you're doing now, with a bit more structure and intention.
🤓 Family Meals 101:
🍝 Keep it simple: Don’t worry about how healthy or complicated your meals are. The goal is for everyone to be together, enjoying eating and each other. If that means dinner is Ramen noodles and canned peas, it's all good.
⏰ Keep it short: Kids have short attention spans. Go for quality, not quantity. Toddlers might only be able to handle 10 minutes at the table. If you want kids to stay longer, offer dessert with each meal, or a fresh juice pop (you can use toothpicks and an ice cube tray) to eat at the table when they finish their dinner.
🍽 Get kids involved: Kids are more likely to eat food they’ve helped prepare. Get them shopping, gardening, chopping, whatever. Toddlers can put a napkin on each plate, preschoolers can chop veggies, and older kids can search for recipes or even cook simple dishes.
🍱 Offer everyone the same food: Put dishes out for everyone to serve themselves and eat what they like, instead of making chicken nuggets for the kids and lobster fettuccine for the adults. Separate ingredients as much as possible (parsley in a separate bowl, dressing on the side) so that kids can choose how much risk to take in what they’re eating, but don't offer substitutes that aren't on the table, like a bowl of cereal.
🍚 Mix new with familiar: Always include “safe foods” like rice, pasta, bread, or other components of the meal that you know your kids will consistently eat. Then introduce a new food as an add, not a replacement.
😅 Keep it relaxed: Avoid fighting, scolding, or negotiating with kids about what or how they are eating. Your job is to present meals at consistent times, serve 1 to 2 foods that each person will eat, and relax and enjoy your family.
✨ Your Options
Table Talk: Suggest a structure for dinner-time conversation. Try conversation starters like “if you could be any kind of animal, what would it be?” to keep everyone engaged. Or have each person say their "Rose (highlight), Thorn (low point), and Bud (thing they are looking forward to)" from the day.
Dive into DOR: With the Division of Responsibility approach to eating, even infants can be slowly taught to trust their own eating instincts.
Think about a parents job being to:
- Choose and prepare the food.
- Provide regular meals and snacks.
- Make eating times pleasant.
- Step-by-step, show your child by example how to behave at family mealtime.
- Be considerate of your child’s lack of food experience without catering to likes and dislikes.
- Not let your child have food or beverages (except for water) between meal and snack times.
- Let your child grow into the body that is right for him.
And then trust your child to:
- Eat the amount he or she needs.
- Learn to eat the food you eat.
- Grow predictably in the way that is right for them.
- Learn to behave well at mealtime.
See this handout for more.Practice Meal Planning: Each weekend, make a plan for the coming week's meals and shop for the ingredients you'll need. They don't have to all be home-cooked or recipe-based, but can include easy options like frozen food, canned food, and simple pasta and rice meals, as well as leftovers. The goal is just that you know what's generally for dinner each night and who's responsible for cooking. You can get kids involved in this step by asking them if they have one meal request for the coming week, having them make grocery lists that you dictate, or teaching them to prepare a manageable part of some meals. Here’s more on How to Meal Plan.
🧰 The Tools
TableTopics Family - set of cards to keep at the dinner table.
📚 Read more:
A Guide to Cookery Skills By Age