Celebrating the benefits of building family bonds and improving both the physical and mental health of parents and children in the long term, Eating Together: A recipe for healthier, happier families has been expertly created by Dr Clare Bailey Mosley, Professor Stephen Scott and Kathryn Bruton. Photo: Supplied.
Family meals are the ties that bind us. Eating Together: A recipe for healthier, happier families is a title whose message is self-evident. In today’s fast-moving, rapidly changing world, moments of calm and genuine bonding are essential but elusive, especially within close relationships.
Dr Clare Bailey Mosley, her late husband Dr Michael Mosley (author of the Fast 800 series) and their four children always shared family meals around the kitchen table.
“When I was growing up in the 1960s and 1970s, we always ate our meals together sitting around the table as a family,” Dr Bailey Mosley writes. “Our family culture is forged at the table, in the shared experience of meals, not just the menu.”
Family mealtimes were an important part in the upbringing of Clare and Michael, and it seemed natural to want to try to repeat that pattern with their own children.
“Those are such wonderfully warm memories — everyone around the table, laughing, chatting and fighting to get a word in edgeways,” Dr Bailey Mosley notes.
Family meals have always had an important place in the parenting mix. However, there are concerns about how this lovely ritual has been slowly slipping away.
“With our hectic lifestyle we are short on time. Healthy eating on a busy schedule isn’t always possible. But there’s growing evidence to suggest that families who cook and eat together are more likely to eat healthily,” Dr Bailey Mosley writes.
“And, beyond that, there are plenty of studies showing the huge benefits of eating together, and how it provides an important, safe, predictable time for family members to connect, repair relationships and have fun.”
Dr Bailey Mosley has a passion for helping parents and is convinced that eating together is one simple thing that really benefits family dynamics while increasing the awareness and consumption of healthy food.
She has a notebook of family meals, always thinking about how children could get involved in preparing food so they could expand their taste repertoires and learn to love good, healthy, home-cooked meals.
Dr Bailey Mosley has worked closely with food writer Kathryn Bruton to fine-tune the recipes and ensure they always pack a nutritional punch. Some of their favourites — combined with expert, research-backed advice on how to use mealtimes to better bond with your children, building strong relationships and enhancing mental resilience as well as physical health — are shared in this book.
Dr Bailey Mosley has also worked with Professor Stephen Scott to develop an evidence-based online parenting program named Parenting Matters, which is centred on a concept they call “love and limits”.
The Professor of Child Health and Behaviour at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience at King’s College London recalls: “In Clare I met someone who was passionate about disseminating that information in such a way that all parents — regardless of income, background, personality and parenting style — could create better bonds with their children and be better placed to set their children up to be balanced, inquisitive and interested young people.”
Beautifully illustrated, Eating Together has more than 70 recipes plus tips and tricks to bring toddlers and teens to the table. It’s about achieving overall balance across every life aspect for the family unit, with advice on pantry essentials, what not to feed your children, how to make mealtimes fun, how to involve the whole family in the preparation and cooking process, and healthy, family-friendly recipes free of ultra-processed foods for all occasions.
It’s also about building health-conscious living habits through praise, connections, instructions, kindness and boundaries, along with a four-week, step-by-step program. From family meals to dips and treats, the delicious recipes include crunchy chocolate spread, chicken skewers, dahl with sweet potato, turbocharged porridge, cheese and almond biscuits, and protein-packed pasta dishes.
In Dr Bailey Mosley’s view, eating together regularly is one of the keys to a healthy, happy family life. It goes beyond mere sustenance. We are offered a precious, grounding ritual in a fast-paced world, reminding us of what truly matters. Mealtimes matter. Nourishing connections at the table matter.
“It’s rooted in the values that shaped our own family of six — those everyday meals that brought us back to each other, no matter how busy or chaotic life felt. This book isn’t just about food. It’s about connection. About what happens when we pause, sit down together, and share more than a meal — laughter, stories, calm, even the tricky conversations.”
Eating Together: A recipe for healthier, happier families, by Dr Clare Bailey Mosley and Professor Stephen Scott, Hachette Australia, $39.99
