One of the emails I get all the time is pretty basic: “If I want to make family dinner happen regularly, where do I start?” And in spite of 650 blog posts, my next book coming out on that very topic, and, oh, roughly 5000 family dinners logged in my own house at my own kitchen table, it’s still one of the harder questions to answer. I like to think this is not because I am incompetent (though the jury is still out on that one) but because I am a realist. The truth is, family dinner is not an easy thing to make happen, and any blogger or magazine article or cookbook author who claims otherwise (“Family Dinner in Five Easy Steps!”) should be viewed with a healthy dose of skepticism. The way I see it, like anything, there are different levels of the game, and if you concentrate on mastering one level at a time, and building from there, it’s a lot easier (and more long-lasting) than just assuming your family of athletes and picky eaters and late workers and on-again, off-again vegetarians is going resemble a Norman Rockwell painting on the very first time you try. (And by the way: Is there anyone left who believes that a Norman-Rockwell-imagined world still exists?) Here’s the way I see it progressing, with the subtext being that EVERY LEVEL QUALIFIES as family dinner.
Level 1: Sitting Down Together
This is where you start. Forget about the food and just focus on logistics. Get everyone sitting around the table at the same time. Try to make the event last more than six minutes. If you can pick three or four days during the week to make this happen, you can consider yourself ready for Level 2. Level 1 menu ideas: storebought Rotisserie Chicken with a basic salad; packaged dinners you feel good about, or something from the freezer like Meatballs.
Level 2: Sitting Down Together to Something Homemade
So you’ve mastered the logistics. Now it’s time to focus on the food. Don’t panic and don’t put too much pressure on yourself to make something overly complicated. (This is supposed to be fun, remember?) Take a step up from storebought foods and prepare something homemade that’s simple enough to make on autopilot (spaghetti with marinara? Omelet? Your grandmother’s famous curry?) Don’t feel bad about supplementing with a peanut butter sandwich if someone at the table protests. Just try to make that peanut butter sandwich with whole wheat toast and good-quality peanut butter. In our house, dinners that qualify for Level 2 are: Pizza, a Baked Potato bar; or a Roast Salmon with mustardy-dill yogurt sauce.
Level 3: Sitting Down Together to Something Homemade That Everyone Likes
OK, if we were talking college sports here, I’d say you’re getting into Division 1 territory here. If you feel like you’ve sufficiently nailed down Levels 1 and 2, you can start to think about cooking one thing that everyone will eat. This is, of course, where Deconstructed Dinners come into play: Indonesian Chicken Salad, Tortilla Soup, Salmon Salad (page 62, Dinner: A Love Story) are all great choices, but if you have meals that fall into this category I’m always interested in hearing about them. Always!
Level 4: Sitting Down Together to Something Homemade That Everyone Likes and that You Can Feel Good About on a Cosmic Level
This level is actually the whole reason I wrote this post. In fact it was supposed to be the whole point of the post — the idea that we have been going all flexitarian lately, eating less meat, following the philosophy of “meat as condiment,” and really paying attention to where our pork, beef, and chicken is coming from when we do eat it. I don’t know a lot, but I know enough to realize that being able to philosophize about what’s on your table (as opposed to just, you know, getting something–anything! — on your table) is a very luxurious way to think about dinner — especially when you factor in the costs of high-quality meat. If I had to categorize this level of thinking, I’d call it Premier League Family Dinner. And though I can’t play at that level all the time, I aspire to it almost every night. Most recently with this recipe which taps into the idea that a little bit of really good sausage goes a loooong way.
Lentils with Crispy Sausages
Pictured above
1 1/4 cup brown lentils
2 1/2 – 3 cups liquid (chicken stock, water) or enough to cover lentils by about an inch
1 1/2 teaspoons Dijon mustard
1/4 cup vinegar (I used white balsamic, but you can use tarragon, red wine, regular balsamic)
1/3 cup olive oil (plus more for frying)
salt and pepper
1/2 pound good-quality sausage (sweet or spicy Italian work well), removed from their casings
1 bunch scallions (white and light green parts), chopped
3 tablespoons chopped bell pepper
leaves from two sprigs of fresh thyme (or finely chopped parsley)
In a medium pot, boil lentils in broth-water combo, then reduce heat and simmer for 15 minutes until they are tender, but firm enough to still hold their shape. Drain.
While lentils are cooking, make your dressing by whisking together mustard, vinegar, olive oil, salt and pepper.
In a medium skillet over medium heat, fry sausage in a little olive oil, breaking up with a fork, until cooked through and crispy. Remove to a paper-towel lined plate.
Toss lentils with scallions, pepper, thyme, sausage bits, and vinaigrette. (You may not need all the vinaigrette — so drizzle it in instead of dumping it until it looks right.) Serve with crusty bread.
Other meat-as-condiment options: Hawaiian Pizza; Shredded Asian Cabbage with Chicken or Shrimp; Soba Noodles with Chicken
We have a few level 3 dinners (your salmon salad and asian chicken salad among them!). The current one is using acorn squash from the CSA. Kids eat acorn squash, roasted with brown sugar and topped with candied walnuts from Trader Joe’s. Adults eat the squash on arugula salad: balsamic vinaigrette, lentils, candied walnuts, and blue cheese. Maybe some dried cranberries as well. I think I got this salad from a Whole Living cover – I miss that magazine!
Like @Margit, I’m a bit puzzled too. I thought we Europeans eat smaller portions than Americans, but if I served that lovely plate of lentils for dinner, my kids would look expectantly at me, wondering where the main dish was.
As we ate dinner last night & i basked in the glow of all four of us devouring the same dish i remembered this post & knew i had to comment. Although that dinner was a brilliant level 4, it is not always so,always it is 2 or at times 3. But last night sublime perfection, this is a share but also a thank you because what we ate was my version of your very own teriyaki salmon bowl. Thank you thank you for putting this idea into my head & now allow me to share with you how i have run with it. teriyaki salmon, sauce made from scratch, sushi rice, sometimes i make it short grain brown rice with sushi rice seasoning(from scratch also) but often i give in to the traditional white. That is the basis & then the magic happens, paper thin cucumber rounds (last of the season from my greenhouse) (add daikon if i have it) tosssed in a rice vinegar & umeboshi plum vinegar (my 6 year old swoons for these insta pickles), toasted sesame seeds, always avocado slices, sliced scallions, steamed greens (last night is was garden chard but whatever is on hand), roasted squash (from my plot also) & at least one steamed vegie (rainbow carrots grown by me last night but anything is possible) . Ta da mix & match perfection. I lay it all out on the table & everyone can create their own idea of happiness. So thank you again, even if this is only one meal a week which hits all these points i am a happy cook.
Very late to this post, but everyone in our family loves homemade korean tacos. We make dak bulgogi (marinated chicken, which you marinade the night before), asian slaw, store bought kimchi, sometimes wilted asian style spinach, bean sprouts, avocado and sriracha sour cream and anything else we think might work. Everyone makes their own soft taco. The kids might just have a chicken and avocado taco, or might branch out. We always serve it with a few cut up vegetables and everyone’s happy.
I love, love, love this recipe for lentils. It has quickly become one of our go-to options. It’s so quick to get on the table and my 7 and 4 year olds will eat it with minimal complaining (obviously a miracle). It’s so nice to be able to hit level 4 once in a while!
Wonderful. Love your writing! I’ve been on the hunt for good lentil recipes for me and my wonderful but picky-eater husband. He will eat this!
this looks like it reheats well. my kids go in and out of beans/legumes phase. very frustrating when you’re trying to eat less meat…
As a lifelong vegetarian who is now moving into solar, non-fossil fuel cooking, I think its wonderful the meat eaters out there are finally pondering where their food actually comes from. It scares me to death when I read stories about how the US government ok’s slaughtered chickens being shipped to China to be “processed” aka injected with salt water from their polluted wells and chemicals by low cost penny laborers, shipped back across an ocean again, and this is sold to you dead chicken eaters as “pure American” chicken because the chickens died in America. It scares me and I don’t even eat that crap, hellllll no. You couldn’t pay me to eat it. I do notice it though, for example when other afficianados post videos of their recipes for solar cooking chicken, that unlike normal veggies, the grocery store bought chicken when slow-cooked in natural sunlight releases what seems like a gallon of some kind of weird liquid substance that pools at the bottom of the cooker. They say this is the liquid that was injected into it to make it weigh more so when you buy chicken at the store, you pay double because of some kind of artificial saline chemical solution injected into it in China. No thanks, OMG, if eating a 6 month old dead chicken that has been deep frozen and shipped back and forth between two continents isn’t disgusting enough for you, lets inject chemical saline preservative liquids that leach out when you cook it and pool in your pan (gag).
I did a version of this just last night, but for 1 person. Leftover link of pork dinner sausage cut into little bits, 3 tbsp. brown lentils cooked with 2 crushed garlic cloves in water, 1 chopped scallion, 1 sprig Rosemary, 1 generous tablespoon butter. While the lentils happily bubble away, saute the sausage in a dry non-stick pan oven medium high heat until it starts to brown. Add in the scallion and Rosemary with 2 tbsp. water and let it sizzle down to nothing. Add 2 more tbsp. water. Keep doing this until the lentils are done. Drain lentils and garlic and add to sausage pan, stirring around to make sure every last little pulse gets coated in fat and herb. Tip into a bowl and top with the butter. Enjoy. I kid you not, there is enough salt in the sausage that you won’t need to add any more.
Thank you for the inspiration for this dish ^_^