Five easy family dinners (where cutlery is optional).

I am a huge fan of dinner foods where cutlery is optional. Actually, even when I make food that SHOULD be eaten with cutlery, my children tend to prefer to use their fingers… rice, spaghetti…

Anyway, here are some dinner ideas where cutlery is definitely optional. Why does food taste better when we use our fingers? Because fingers are nature’s cutlery, that’s why.

Yes, some of it ends up on their clothes and on the floor but that happens when forks and knives are used as well, at least it does in my house.

The brilliant thing about dinner finger foods is that they make EXCELLENT school lunches the following day.

Monday finger food: Mozzarella Puff Pizzas

These delicious pizzas make an excellent dinner for everyone and because they use puff pastry you can roll them, make them large, small. Also, the pastry on top stops all the topping from falling out so you can cram extra vegetables in there.

Get the recipe here.

Tuesday finger food: Middle Eastern Kebabs

Kids love food on a stick. Actually, so do I. Introduce some new flavours to their little pallets with these delicious traditional kebabs. Serve with salad or pull the meat off and wrap it in bread. Delicious.

Get the recipe here.

Wednesday finger food: Easy Tomato Bruschetta

Tomato bruschetta is one of our favourite dinners because it is so quick and simple. My daughter calls it ‘tomato squeeze’ because she likes to squeeze each tomato so all the juice and dressing soak the bread. Bruschetta is a great way to use up leftover bread and you can add so many different ingredients to it. Keep it simple like this or toss in some feta, even some leftover barbeque chicken.

Get the recipe here.

Thursday finger food: Skewered Chicken

Chicken on a stick. Does it get any better than this? Older children can help you put the chicken on the sticks and then you can eat them without making a huge mess. We normally do them on the barbeque but they are also delicious baked in an oven.

Get the recipe here.

Friday finger food: Croque Monsieur (fancy ham and cheese sandwich)

This is seriously the most delicious cooked sandwich you’ll ever eat. The French sure know how to fry a sandwich in butter. Yes you can use tasty cheese, yes you can do it in the sandwich maker – just always remember it’s about the butter and the dijon…

Get the recipe here.

This post originally appeared on iVillage.com.au. Need more dinner inspirations? Try these …

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So, what’s for dinner at your place this week?