Royal Children Like Prince George, Princess Charlotte, and Prince Louis Can’t Eat with Their Parents at Big Events Until They Master This Skill

Prince George, Princess Charlotte, Prince Louis

(Image credit: Getty Images)

Being a royal child is a world unto itself—in addition to living life in a fishbowl, if you thought your house had rules growing up, insert royal protocol here. “Prince George, Princess Charlotte, and Prince Louis had to learn very early on what they can and cannot do,” The Mirror reports. “The rules start early on.”

One of the rules? You can’t sit with mom and dad at official dinners—including Christmas!—until you have “learned the art of polite conversation.” (A skill a great many adults still haven’t mastered—let’s be honest.) Until that happens, royal kids are sent to the children’s table with the other little ones. “Well, who wants to sit and listen to boring grownup chat when you could be speaking to your pals about police cars, anyway?” The Mirror very astutely asks. Yeah, who wants to do that?

Prince George, Princess Charlotte, and Prince Louis at Trooping the Colour riding in the carriage procession

Former royal chef Darren McGrady—who worked for both Her late Majesty and Princess Diana—said royal children ate Christmas lunch in the nursery with the nannies while their parents and the other adults ate elsewhere. “The children always ate in the nursery until they were old enough to conduct themselves properly at the dining table,” he said. (Pretty sure if those rules applied to all of our families, at least a couple of the adults would be booted to the nursery.)

And, though royal children, they’re also just kids who don’t want to eat their vegetables like the rest of us. McGrady recalled how Prince William and Prince Harry were bribed into eating veggies at mealtimes: “The royal nursery wasn’t just for educating the minds of the young royals, but educating their palates, too,” he said. “[Their] nanny always had control of the menu and made sure they ate balanced meals that included not only lots of healthy vegetables but introduced them to new grownup dishes, too.” McGrady remembered disguising vegetables in the boys’ meals by hiding them in one of their favorite foods, like sneaking it into mashed potatoes. (Again, point driven home—though royal children, they’re also just kids.)

Diana, William &amp; Harry At Thorpe Park

And after all of that work to get the boys to eat healthy and eat their greens, McGrady said that, while Diana was very supportive of her boys’ healthy eating habits, she would also sneak them out to McDonald’s as a special treat.

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Rachel Burchfield is a writer, editor, and podcaster whose primary interests are fashion and beauty, society and culture, and, most especially, the British Royal Family and other royal families around the world. She serves as Marie Claire’s Senior Celebrity and Royals Editor and has also contributed to publications like Allure, Cosmopolitan, Elle, Glamour, Harper’s Bazaar, InStyle, People, Vanity Fair, Vogue, and W, among others. Before taking on her current role with Marie Claire, Rachel served as its Weekend Editor and later Royals Editor. She is the cohost of Podcast Royal, a show that was named a top five royal podcast by The New York Times. A voracious reader and lover of books, Rachel also hosts I’d Rather Be Reading, which spotlights the best current nonfiction books hitting the market and interviews the authors of them. Rachel frequently appears as a media commentator, and she or her work has appeared on outlets like NBC’s Today Show, ABC’s Good Morning America, CNN, and more.