I was married to an Italian for a decade and I ate many meals in Italy around a big table where food, laughter and stories flowed long into the evening.
Even lunch time was a family affair with everyone meeting midday for a hot home-cooked meal and conversation.
I admit… it felt very foreign to me. The huge emphasis on family meals was even more foreign to me than all the tiny cars and motorized scooters zooming at terrifying speeds down narrow streets and around blind corners.
But while I wouldn’t take driving lessons from an Italian, I definitely look to them for inspiration on making mealtimes meaningful.
In Italy, sharing a meal is about showing love.
As my daughters’ Nonna filled our plates with pasta, she was literally pouring out her love upon us.
And as she encouraged us to eat more and more, I could profoundly feel her desire to show us more and more love.
Mealtimes in Italy last much longer than our rushed routines here in North America. Everyone pitches in to set the table and start chatting about their days as the matriarch finishes preparing the food.
While we ate our appetizers, first and second courses, cheese and bread, and then sipped our coffee, the conversation got louder and more boisterous as family stories were told and retold with roaring laughter.
And I think at most of those meals, if I watched the pasta drop into the pot to cook, I’d see it coming from a Barilla box.
Nonna’s cupboards were full of Barilla.
A Taste of Italy
I had a rare chance to actually experience life in Italy, sharing a table full of love and family recipes. On those trips I learned both cooking and life lessons.
You may not ever share a table with a family in Italy, but you can experience the next best thing…
You can journey along with Chef David Rocco through a culinary tour of Italian life in his new book “Made In Italy”.
The mouthwatering photos, delicious recipes and photos of daily life in Italy will inspire you to make mealtime as meaningful and tasty as it is in Tuscany.
Take a peek inside the book…
Share The Table
Barilla, a leader in the global pasta business, is coming to the rescue of family dinners in Canada with Share the Table™ – a program designed to help to reinvigorate family dinners across the country.
Barilla Canada has partnered with David Rocco, host of Food Network’s Dolce Vita and author of three best-selling cookbooks, including David Rocco’s Dolce Vita and Made In Italy to spread the #ShareTheTable message.
Janice recently interviewed David about how David handles family dinner time, feeding kids, and how to make meal times work better for everyone at the table.
To find more about David Rocco, visit his site DavidRocco.com and definitely check out his newest cookbook, Made in Italy.
Your Family Could Win a Trip to ITALY
Italy is amazing and of course you want to go… Well, you might get a chance…
Barilla is giving away three trips to Italy.
To enter, Canadian families can submit photos, videos or blog posts to www.sharethetable.ca, revealing how they are making dinner a more significant, fun and meaningful occasion. All submissions will be entered to win a trip for four to Italy from May 11 to July 31, 2015.
For every submitted contest entry, Barilla will donate a meal to Food Banks Canada throughout the Share the Table promotion period, up to 60,000 meals.
For more information on tips, recipes and advice on how to Share the Table, visit www.sharethetable.ca.
Enter to Win a Barilla Prize Pack
For our Canadian readers, you can enter to win a copy of “Made In Italy” and an assortment of Barilla pasta products. Simply leave us a comment letting us know how you make mealtimes meaningful for your family… or how you plan to make mealtimes more meaningful… and then enter using the form below.
(To our US friends, sorry this is one of those rare giveaways that is only open to Canadians. But they deserve it… they miss out on so many giveaways.)
Disclosure:This post is part of a campaign with Barilla Canada. Our opinions are always 100% our own.
Written by Susan Carraretto, co-founder of 5 Minutes for Mom
Talk with me: @5minutesformom and Facebook.com/5minutesformom
Pin with me at pinterest.com/5minutesformom
We have our dinner at the table and talk about our days.
We like to get everyone involved in making the dinners, so that they are made together.
We sit down every night and eat together.
For starters actually sitting at the table instead of scattered is a good way to make mealtime more meaningful for us.
I make sure everyone eats at the same time to discuss everyone’s day
Oops ! Canada only…please disregard my entry above.
Thank You for the giveaway…our family meals are a time to enjoy food, and each other’s company. As such, we put on some light classical music, turn off all our phones, serve the food, and talk with each other & eat; our meals aren’t rigidly formal, but we are teaching our kids to concentrate on social interaction instead of the distraction of phones, tv’s, etc.
Our dinners have a no-cellphones rule. We interact and talk about our days. I would love to make our meals even more meaningful by having specific topics and questions to bring up for discussion.
I think we make mealtimes meaningful by making good healthy food and all sitting down and eating together
by preparing real comfort food and an ear to listen
We put our phones away and all sit down as a family. We try to have family dinners 6-7 days a week. It’s our time to talk and bond.
my wife and i love to cook together so that makes it meaningful for us
We all cook together.
We limit TV to after the dinner and get excited for desserts
i like to have dinner at the table i think we can conenct better that way, with eachother and our food
A family, like us, who cook together, and eat together, will always be together
My children help me cook supper or prepare the food. THis way they know what goes in it and they want to eat it
I don’t allow phones at the dinner table
I think I make mealtimes memorable when I take the time to make a good home cooked meal because my family always tells me how much they love my cooking.
Eat at the table, not in front of the TV
We talk about our day, or our plans for the weekend. We just unwind. Thanks for the chance.
We make mealtimes more meaningful by limiting the distractions. there is no television, cell phones, headphones, etc. We sit together and eat and talk; that simple.
We make mealtimes meaningful by simply eating together everyday!
We eat pretty much everyday together – family is important
No tv, cell phones at our table.
We try to eat dinner together several times a week. It’s hard, due to everyone’s work and school schedules,
When my children (all 7) lived at home, I always insisted that they all be home for the evening meal. They all came home from school at different times and this was our only chance for all of us to catch up on what was happening in each others lives. It was always a big meal and we took our time to enjoy it, no one was allowed to leave the table until every one was finished eating. There was no getting up and dashing off to watch TV, answer the phone, play games etc.
It’s just me and my little girl so I just make her favorite foods!
We all eat meals together. Sometimes we plan the meals together, and we also do the clean up together.
I think it is more special when we cooks together
Eating together no matter how late it is!
We have a strict no technology policy at the dinner table. Everyone eats at the same time.
We have mealtimes as a family. No TV’s or electronics. We all talk about what we did that day or what our favorite part was!
I try to do more than one dish so that we have to sit down for longer and have time to talk.
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We try to all sit down for dinner at the same time, though some days doesn’t work that way, we have the kids help us cook ,they pick out a favourite meal once a week that they help with!
We sit together for our evening meal and discuss our day and plans for the next day. We don’t rush and we just enjoy the time together enjoying a homemade meal.
We take the time to sit down and eat together as a family, we put away our cell phones or tablets in another room
Dinnertime is the one time we are all screen/phone free so we discuss the days events, what’s going on in everyone’s life……family talk time!
We do eat together as a family, and there is no arguing (I’m thinking of the kids here!) allowed!
We make mealtimes more meaningful by all eating together at the table.
we try to talk about our days and no screens!
i have them cook with me my youngesy loves to cook in the kitchen
We get rid of all other distractions so we can focus solely on each other.
always eat together and no cell phones
We make mealtimes meaningful by eating together as a family.
We eat together every day. It’s our time to catch up and reconnect!
we have no electronics at the table and try to chat about our day!
Mealtimes is another chance for us to relax, chat and share our day together as a family. It’s perfect to make future plans too!
We sit at the table for our meals The weekends are when we are sure to eat together and plan our meals as a family to.
We eat our dinner together and share our experiences from the day. Great catching up and bonding time over homecooked food!
We make mealtime meaningful by eating together. Also, we prepare meals and cleanup as a family 🙂
We always eat together
Mealtimes are more meaningful when the family eats together.
We always try to sit down to eat at the same time & discuss the events of the day!
Making time to actually sit down together to chat makes it meaningful
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We make sure all kids are present every day for dinner!
Making dinner together as a family or having everyone pitch in a little always makes dinners more meaningful for us.
We always play a little conversation game while eating. One of out favourites is we each say one thing we learned that day.
Everyone gets to pick a meal a week and that’s when we cook together and talk during the process of making and eating dinner.
We always try and eat together as a family with no other distractions. It doesn’t always happen but we try our best to do it most of the time.
We are going to start turning off the tv during dinner – give us an opportunity to talk
We try to sit down together as often as we can and discuss each other’s days.
turn off tv and put their phone down
we make sure we all sit together at the dining room table
We sit at the table to eat and share our day.
We make mealtimes meaningful by trying to eat together as a family and discussing important issues in our lives.
Every night we sit at the table without interruptions, no phone, tv, etc. & talk about our day.
We try to plan out what to have during the week and also everyone helps preparing the food or cleaning up.
we make it meaningful by preparing a couple of meals a week together and then actually sit down at the table a a family.
We cook and eat together
i make mealtimes about family , we sit and eat and talk about our days , with no cells or tablets at the table and i plan on making it more memorable by letting the kids help more
we sit down as a family and eat at the table 7 days a week
We enjoy our dinners together where we catch up on our day and share laughs
When use mealtime to catch up on everyone’s day.
We always sit down to eat together….it’s the only “us” time we get all day!
We always eat together and I try to get the kids to help.
We eat together at the table, no cell phones or TV.
We eat dinner together every night at the table – no TV, no electronics! It’s our time to reconnect as a family and catch up on the days events.
I make sure that we all have dinner together without any electronic devices until we are completely done. We eat and talk about our day to stay connected as a family.
We make sure we always eat supper together as a family. It’s a time to share about our day with each other. That’s how I grew up too so it’s important to me. 🙂
Dinner is very important and we will have pasta nights, shephard pie nights etc.
WE always have dinner together and we tell each other 1 exciting thing that happened to us, even if it’s as simple as me finding peaches on sale!
We cook our meals together as much as possible, then enjoy our creation together. (No cell phones, or tablets allowed). Then we relax and and enjoy our meal together as a family, no rushing it (as often as possible). Clean up is also done together, everyone pitches in.
By eating together and sharing what we did during the day
Dinner is the only time of the day we get to spend together and eat and talk. We have no tv or devices at that time.
we always eat together or try to at least
With a baby on the way, my nesting instinct compelled me to get us a kitchen table 🙂 I grew up having family meals almost every day, and want that for my child as well.
My whole family always eats dinner together at the table every night
we try our best to all sit together at least 5 times per week, no electronics and just talking
Meals are when the kids tell us all about their day. Such an important time to stay connected in their lives!
I plan to have more meals where all of us sit down together.
We like to let the kids help cook – it helps them appreciate the food 🙂
Sitting down with my family each night for dinner is very important. It is when we get to share our day with each other and laugh. Making favorite meals is always key for a happy home. My son is always concerned about his next meal, so I don’t mind his input because it makes my life so much easier when I know what he wants to eat. Sunday meals are also very important as we have lunch with my parents and they are very special because family means everything to me. Good food, great conversation= great memories!
I try to make them meaningful by making sure we all sit down at the table together for dinner and catch up on what has gone on during the day. No TV or Cell Phones allowed.
I follow on Bloglovin as Judy Cowan (https://www.bloglovin.com/people/judycowan-4483101)
Dinnertime is a time to reflect on our days, talk about upcoming events and schedules, laugh, unwind and just be together. It happens less than I’d like (and I’m hoping to change that) with our busy schedules/activities, but each time we do, we always seem to be able to slow down a little and enjoy it.
I’ll admit we have a hard time having meaningful meal times. Right now we are selling our house and we eat out almost every day, the only good thing about that is that we are together every night for dinner.
I like to start with preparing dinner with my children! It’s a great way to teach old family recipes and spend quality time together. Dinnertime is always at the table with no devices! It’s when we all sit together to enjoy each others company and to discuss our day!
Sitting around the table all Electronics OFF and like the good old days of chatting about your day!
We take turns cooking or help each other out when cooking and eat around the table at dinnertime.
We sit around the table and talk about the day. And every week we take turns picking out a favorite meal to eat.
We try to eat together but it is hard during the week. We will try to do that every night now.
I make supper in the morning and then reheat, everyone is always so busy and this way it is easier to get everyone together really quick with little clean up.
I have to be honest they have not been very meaningful. I want to try to have more family meals that we can all catch up with what is happening in our lives
We eat together for every meal after cooking the meal from scratch. We eat without distractions to talk and will continue to do so
We always eat together and no cell phones or tv.
We sit around the table at meal times and discuss everybody’s day.
It is important to us to sit down every night and eat together as a family. No TV or phones so we can enjoy our time together! Wonderful and delicious giveaway! Thanks eh!