In many homes, dinner is the one time of the day where the whole family comes together and spends time in each other’s company. Family mealtimes are the ideal time for everyone to share their news and chat about their day. However, sometimes the reality of family mealtimes fails to match this expectation. For many parents, dinner can be a source of stress. When you have a hectic schedule and have had a difficult day at work, finding the enthusiasm to decide what to cook can be challenging. If your kids decide that they don’t want to eat the dinner that you have just spent time preparing, mealtimes can become even more stressful. But, mealtimes do not need to be this way; these tips should give you some ideas on how to make family meals simple and far less stressful for everyone:
Plan Ahead
Everyone has those days where they stare aimlessly into the fridge, hoping to find some inspiration on what to make for dinner. It can be hard to get motivated and cook after a long day at the best of time, and especially if you have no idea what to make for your family.
To ensure that you are never left wondering what to cook for dinner, why not try meal planning? Planning your meals in advance has lots of benefits and can even help you to save money. Planning your evening meals for the entire week and ensuring that you have all the ingredients needed for each meal will make your life so much simpler.
If you would like to get even more organised, you could try batch cooking some meals so you always have something delicious in the freezer prepared and ready to heat up if you need it.
Don’t Cook Multiple Dishes
Many parents find cooking dinner especially complicated because they need to cook different meals for different family members. Finding meals that the whole family loves to eat will help make cooking your evening meal so much easier and far less time-consuming. Why not try this frozen chicken strips in air fryer recipe to create a versatile evening meal the entire family will enjoy eating?
Building up a list of several healthy meals that every family member enjoys eating will make cooking dinner far less stressful. You should also find that you have less food waste as everyone loves their meal and that your food shopping is less expensive as you are not buying ingredients for multiple meals.
Get the Whole Family Involved
One of the main reasons mealtimes become stressful is that getting dinner on the table becomes a race against time. On weeknights, life can be particularly busy with afterschool clubs to attend and homework to complete. Getting everyone to help out at mealtimes will help to lighten the load and get dinner on the table faster. Getting the kids to help out with age-appropriate tasks such as laying the table and drying up will help make mealtimes a team effort.
