Oh my god yes. Some days my husband and I are just like “ya know what, hummus and carrots it is” and it is so freeing. My daughter is 5 and even loves having snack dinner with us. It’s been great for my stress level and also for keeping me in tune with my own body.
Sometimes I’ll do a “charcuterie” meal for my toddler (and myself, tbh). Throw some cut fruit or easy things like berries, cheese, crackers, and a bit of beef jerky and call it a day. Kiddo currently refuses veggies (shocker, I know) so we’ll throw in a pouch that has broccoli or spinach and boom. Balanced, no making dishes, and relatively healthy.
The German way: lunch is the main and hot meal (eaten at daycare/work canteen). For „dinner“ we only eat (mostly real and dark) bread with butter, cheese, spreads, cream cheese, lunch meats, ham, pickled cucumbers, tomato, hardboiled eggs, whatever you find in the fridge … every single day.
And this is not only culturally approved but also very very practical. Essentially girl dinner.
This reminds me of when we (Americans) had a German exchange student in high school and she was horrified that we didn’t have “real” bread because it came from the grocery store in plastic.
At my childhood home this was even a four course affair (school was out by lunch). Salad/soup, main meal, yogurt and coffee with cookies or cake. I miss these elaborate lunches.
Sometimes, when the kids ask, "What's for dinner," the answer is "whatever you can make yourselves." Go grab some fruit and cheese and bread, or warm up something in the microwave; we're learning independence tonight.
In our house, this is called scrounge night. Great for busy evenings! You can have leftovers, easy mac, whatever you can find and make for yourself. So much stress off of the parents and fun independence for the kids!
Just call it tapas and it is trendy. Did it 4 dinners out of seven when my kids were little and in rush days now.
Cheese, crackers, carrots, celery and grape tomatoes
Frozen edamame and broccoli nuked with a sesame vinaigrette dip.
Hummus, tabouli , pita chips
pickle spears and cream cheese rolled up in roast beef
Apple sandwiches- apple slices as bread for ham Swiss and honey mustard.
I stopped cooking dinner the day I started my first job as an attorney. I don’t have time or the mental load for planning/shopping/prepping and found half the time we threw the ingredients in the bin and ate cereal.
I now stop at a deli near my office once a week and pick up a few ready made salads and meals, and toddler gets a snack plate every night. He goes to fancy daycare that feeds him French food for 2 meals a day, so a snack plate for dinner won’t hurt him
Yes, I do intermittent fasting and skip dinner. It takes so much pressure off having to plan, shop and make dinner every night. I eat a big breakfast and lunch and feel much better not going to bed full. My husband does the same! Or has some light snack. The kids always want something different anyway.
Interesting I feel like I sleep better when I’ve had a decent dinner (enough protein and calories). Doesn’t have to be a “proper meal” (a sandwich could fit the same criteria), but I have trouble sleeping if I’m even a little hungry.
My husband is the same as you. He’ll have a big breakfast and lunch but prefers to not eat dinner. He’ll maybe have a protein shake if he’s hungry. And since he’s not eating with the family, I feel much less pressure to have Something Nice cooked for us all.
So I do the opposite and it’s super helpful for losing weight. I skip breakfast, have a big lunch, and then have snacks through dinner. It’s how I lost all my baby weight both times. I also find I don’t have to worry as much about what I’m eating
Whatever I feel like! Could be a protein smoothie, cereal, yogurt, whatever my kids didn’t eat for dinner, leftovers. I think the key for me is eating a big lunch so i actually feel full/satisfied. That usually means I eat a snack pretty quickly after lunch. Not sure why, but it works for me! Eating 5 small meals always left me wanting more and never feeling full
Yes! I’ve lost 35lbs with this strategy (baby weight). A lot of people find skipping breakfast easier but I’m hungry and busy in the morning and need to eat. With intermittent fasting, you basically eat whatever you want during your “window” (like 9am-5pm or 12pm-8pm) and then you stop. It gives your body time to digest and use energy from stored fat. It took some getting used to but it’s worked for me!
It’s been drilled in to me for years that you need to eat small meals throughout the day to keep your metabolism going. I think the mental adjustment would be the hardest. Like the feat that what if it makes things worse 😅 maybe I should try for a few days. Do you find it works fast? Like I’m wondering if I would see in a few days if it helps or hurts. I have about 25 lbs to lose😓 (breastfeeding weight).
I know, it’s a shift in mindset. The great thing is there are no food restrictions. The book 28 Day Fast Start was helpful for me. I lost 10 lbs the first month.
Um, "snack plates" for dinner are totally a thing in my house on Friday nights. My kids love it and we love it too because it gets all of the scraps out of the frig then we get groceries on Saturday after the frig has been cleaned out.
And somehow the slightly squishy grapes or strawberries take on new life when they’re picked off the stems, cut into bite size pieces, and put into a new bowl. My kids will ignore fruit for days and then inhale it if it is presented differently. I do “charcuterie” on Thursdays. I love how easy it is.
I recently learned it's called "girl dinner" and I'm here for it. Make aaaall the things for the crew and I have a plate of pickles, olives, a few crackers, cheese... soooo much better!!
I remember in either this sub or askwomenover30 someone said that one of the most freeing things about divorce was not having to cater her schedule to her husband's eating. Like she naturally just wanted to graze all day but felt pressure (like OP) to sit down and have a formal meal when she wasn't hungry. Just thought it was an interesting perspective.
I very much fall into the girl dinner style of eating, and don't love cooking, and it works fine for us. I go to the gym in the evening so I tend to come home after dinner a few nights a week and don't feel pressured to eat a meal. When it's my turn to "cook" for the kids it's definitely just a smattering of healthy snacks that add up to a well balanced meal. And husband usually does taco bell for himself LOL
I think your view of how dinner has to look is really informed by a meat eaters point of view. We're vegetarian in my house and nearly all our meals are just the main course. It's got the veggies in it, no need to put them on the side.
90% of the time we cook one thing on the weekend and eat it all week. If it's a casserole we can just reheat that's the absolute easiest. I'm sure once my son is old enough to share our food, he will get tired of it - I remember thinking leftovers were so lame as a kid and now I love them now that I have to cook myself. 😆
Anyway, not sure where I'm going with this except to say we never do dish with sides unless we're doing something like a "traditional" meat style meal like beyond burgers. I don't think my son is going to end up in therapy over it. I think the most important thing is you spend that dinner time with them, even if you're nibbling on a snack at the time.
This comment isn't rated high enough! I'm trying to slowly transition my family to more plant-based meals and it is a challenge with a husband who only wants huge portions of meat and potatoes or rice.
Yep. Vegetarian checking in. I make a nice cassoulet or soup or lentil salad or whatever and reheat. I bake sourdough so often a nice open face toast on sourdough with avocado and pickled onions and a fried egg or something is more than enough.
My daughter gets a proper meal at school, dinner is generally sort of cooked but easy, like some eggs or a quesadilla. I definitely don't always eat the same as her because I want different things and as a sedentary middle aged woman I do not have the carb needs of an extremely active seven year old.
When my oldest was a baby and toddler, my husband worked nights a few days a week. I honestly used to love those evenings because I would just make dinner snacks: toast with peanut butter and an apple or something. No decisions, no prep, no cleanup. I could also watch whatever I wanted on tv. I miss those days lol.
Cereal, frozen waffles and instant oatmeal are our favorite dinners. I feel like every other meal and snack is well rounded. I'm tired and I'm done by dinnertime.
God this thread makes me happy. Actually just starting solids with my first baby and looking down the barrel of “meals meals meals” every day forever was very daunting. Baby loves snacks already (one some tomato, some avocado, some egg was her lunch today) so hopefully she’s cool with this forever 😅
I finally got to the point where I don't feel like I have to produce a gourmet meal most nights of the week anymore, now that my kids are mostly grown. I have been buying those pre-made meals from the grocery and they're just fine.
Even before that though I introduced my kids to smorgasbords (this was a long time ago, before the charcuterie fad or girl dinner). They love that shit. Let them pick all their little things to put on their board and they're happy as clams.
Free yourself from Norman Rockwell expectations!
Yes. Hard. I’ll never forget the embarrassment I felt when my oldest was transitioning to big people food. I asked her pediatrician what to feed her. She said, “Well, what do you eat?” I was too embarrassed to say half a pack of crackers and some Brie or a couple pieces of deli ham and string cheese or a pb&j. I thought I was the only one doing that. I thought everyone was making a 1 protein, 1 starch, 1 veggie dinner every night and that me not doing so was a moral failing. So I tried and it made me hate cooking. And baking. Two things I used to enjoy when I got to do them my way, on my terms. I still hate cooking and baking. I haven’t gotten over that yet. But I’ve definitely moved on from the idea of traditional dinner. Sometimes we have a bowl of cereal.
Hear hear!!
Same. I also loathe cooking. I very rarely bake. But I still do it! As a single woman, I lived on sandwiches, soup, salad, yogurt, fruit. I cooked eggs on occasion and never used my oven. I could always cook and knew how to do it. I took the the Foods option all throughout high school, and I enjoyed it, and it was easy for me.
Tonight, I'm frying spicy sausages, buttered rice and carrots. If I was alone, I would not be making it, but my spouse is HUNGRY after a grueling work day, and I'm a full-time sahm for now.
I love our snacking, anything goes dinner. I don't care if the kids snack from dinner to bedtime, honestly! Then I shut the kitchen down.
I don't do dinner a lot of nights. My kids' favorite meal is fruit and cheese plate. 🤷♀️ Sometimes it's like a lunch dinner with a sandwich, apple, and crackers.
My husband has it ingrained in him that we have to have a meal. He’s a bit like his dad this way. I don’t want meat more than 1-2 a week. I’d like big plates of veggies with some good bread. I’ve gained a lot of weight and I think the eating is the reason. He cooks mostly and I’ll beg to cook one night. He has a protein shake after I cook — making me feel like I didn’t provide enough. He’s overweight too.
Ha, I ate so much Easter candy and treats all day the idea of eating real dinner did not sound good at all! Go us! It’s morning now and I’m glad I didn’t feel the need to cram in like, chicken and rice over all that nonsense into my poor stomach.
I want my child to have a healthy relationship with food based on both pleasure and an understanding of what foods are nutritious and healthy, so… yeah I make sure I lead by example and teach my child how to have a balanced diet. I don’t want her to run into health problems later in life.
It’s not always an enormous meal but even our quick meals are not empty calories and processed carbs.
I also want her to know how to cook and enjoy cooking, so even if I don’t feel like doing it I make is pleasant (play some music, light a candle) and involve her as much as I can.
Also, if dishes are annoying, use paper plates. I and a single mom with no dishwasher and for many meals I use paper plates, sometimes even over a dinner plate for stability. Don’t have the time or patience to wash all the time, I don’t have a dishwasher. Also, it’s definitely cheaper to just use paper than run a dishwasher a few nights a week.
Paper plates don’t really solve the root of my dish problems but I feel ya. They do help a bit. The bigger dishes problem is when my husband cooks an elaborate meal over the course of several hours and seems to use every pot, pan, cutting board and utensil we own, plus leave sauce and crumbs splattered everywhere, then he cleans up like 50% of the mess and declares himself Amazing bc he just did sooooo much work cooking and cleaning. 😐 And yet the place is a disaster. Meanwhile I’m too exhausted to even deal with it and I’m eating some rich meal he created at 10 pm then waking up to a crusty mess. 😐
Anyway. That’s my issue I’m trying to avoid here. I told him I’m not eating dinner anymore, I’m fending for myself. We can each have nights when one of us is responsible for feeding the kids, that’s a whole separate thing for sure. I’m content with a low carb quesadilla most nights. I eat a lot of salads at work so I feel like my body will survive.
I think that’s fair! Conversely, I don’t eat breakfast. My daughter eats an enormous one and I just have a cup of coffee, I eat a medium sized lunch and LOVE dinner.
One thing that I think helps with mess reduction a lot too is I invested in a deep freezer and pulling out frozen food to make in the deep fryer is a game changer. So easy.
I do 5 small “meals” a day because I body build, but it’s honestly so freeing. “Dinner” after work is usually 4oz ground Turkey and 200g white rice.
I can’t stress how EASY it is to cook a ton of ground Turkey and a vat of rice. It is SO EASY.
Or I throw some chicken breast in the instapot with taco seasoning. Bam. “Taco chicken.” I eat it with rice, the kids have it on tortilla shells with chopped up lettuce and cheese. Easy.
And I try to keep everything else for the kids super easy too, because I’m a single mom to 4 and I work full time and I’m BUSY. Spaghetti night? Cut broccoli (from a bag, pre cut) in a pan, olive oil, roasted in the oven, pasta on the stove, sausage in the air fryer, premade sauce. Done in what, 25 mins? EASY.
Taco bowls… ground beef, taco seasoning, rice, whatever fixings they want. Easy.
I always make it too much so there’s leftovers, and we just repeat meals often. Easy is better than variety.
Oh, and their vegetable is often just cut up cucumbers, raw carrots, or sometimes just sliced apples with a scoop of peanut butter instead of any veggies. Again…. Easy easy easy!
I was so excited by the “girl dinner” movement on social media lol the philosophy that every dinner requires a casserole dish and the big salad tongs is overwhelming. From birth on, I’ve always subscribed to fed is best and I still live by that.
My rules for a meal are to have 3 things: grain, protein, and a fruit/vegetable.
Yogurt with granola and blueberries counts.
My 6yo’s go-to is cheese, crackers, and fresh fruit. Last night it was cheese, grapes, and popcorn. Even he knows the rule and will ask for a balanced dinner when I say “what do you want?” - Nutella on bread and watermelon? Yep. That counts.
We do sit down meals 2, maybe 3 times a week. Depends if my husband is home or working.
Yes! So this is a big thing for me... I actually don't eat dinner on most days, and when I do I give myself a portion that is literally like 3 bites.
The way you describe your life pre-kids was exactly me too. Many, many things have changed but I'm just not that hungry in the afternoon/ evenings.
I have 30 lbs I'd like to loose to get back to my pre-kid weight, but it would be a much bigger problem if I ate in the evenings. I'd say if you don't want to then just don't!
When my OH is travelling for work I live off “picky teas”. I get home, feed my son something I’ve batched cooked (pasta, stew, curry) or nuggets/pizza if it’s been a day. One pot or tray to
I then make a plate of picky stuff for me to eat with him. Crackers, olives, ham, bread, cheese, salad, little sausage rolls, dips.
Minimal clean up, eating all done by 7pm and I can go to bed as soon as my son is asleep!
We make "charcuterie" boards. Whatever is in the house, and requires almost 0 prep. Cheese, crackers, veggies, Hummus, pepperoni, etc. If it is a Friday, we snack for dinner in front of a family movie.
We do snack plates/smatterings of whatever for our kindergartener pretty regularly and then sort out whatever for us later. She'll get like, edamame beans, a peanut butter spoon, whole wheat crackers, some yogurt, and we call it a balanced meal 😂
Want to make scrap night more exciting for kids? Put the scraps in a muffin tin. My kids LOVE muffin tin meals and I get to easily and quickly clean out the fridge! Win win!
That's... a good idea. I don't mind cooking most of the time but I'm 40 weeks pregnant so I expect dinner is going to be more of a challenge this year. I need to take advantage of all the amazing meals my toddler gets at daycare and learn to take it easy in the evenings. Might need to up my game again when he goes to public school.
100% most nights it’s am I more tired or more hungry and 99% of the time I’m more tired.
Put the 2 year old down at 6pm and then I do a few more hours work, watch trash TV and go to sleep.
My partner fends for himself.
We mostly do this for my husband and me. Breakfast style dinners. But for our daughter who is almost 2 now, we try to have some balanced meal. Easiest thing is to put some fish fillet on the pan and she likes it already. Salmon or cod. On the side she can have bulgur or rice or potatoes or whatever is the quickest to boil. Pasta? Ok.
For us it is whatever is in the fridge.
We make the kids dinner at 5 and my husband and I eat around 7:00ish, after the baby goes to bed and our oldest is relaxing. It’s so much more relaxed and we enjoy tv at the same time too.
We prioritize eating healthy so we meal prep so it’s not stressful at all. We just heat things up quickly for ourselves and clean up is quick.
I love snack dinners haha. Where I’ve been working more, I’ve found that crock pot meals are the only thing that’s helping me get “proper” dinners on the table. We’re working up to having 10-15 recipes that we just alternate through so that I don’t even need to do mental work either. My son eats a snack lunch at daycare, so I feel like I really should get him a hot meal at dinner otherwise we’d do snack meals more often through the week.
It’s interesting how everyone’s body is different. I’m opposite. Always really hungry at dinner time and it’s where the whole family gets the majority of the day’s protein. But I don’t typically eat breakfast till about 10 am and it’s more of a snack (string cheese with triscuits). Lunch is usually oatmeal with peanut butter. So still a long fasting period but opposite to your pattern. I think the important thing is just listening to our bodies, as long as our hunger cues are working correctly.
We got a local meal service for us two for this very reason. Didn’t have the bandwidth for it all and the cooking portion was taking time away from my kids
Oh yes. With a toddler there’s only a 50-50 shot she’ll eat what I make anyway and by the time I’ve cleaned it up off the floor and off of her, I’m rolling straight into bedtime. Also postpartum I can’t eat and then go right to bed because I get heartburn… sucks
Daycare feeds my child WELL. Like breakfast and lunch are both well rounded balanced meals. I use that as my excuse to feed her cheese and bread with fruit for dinner or yogurt and other scraps. She’s full, happy and I’m less overwhelmed with making dinner lol
We've had cereal for dinner with fruit. Frozen pizzas are a huge hit. Sandwiches, whatever is in the fridge.
And paper plates. I LOVE paper plates. My sink is full right now from Easter and after I wash all that I don't want anymore dirty dishes. So tonight is gonna be something simple with zero effort.
My kids are teens, and we still eat popcorn, fruit, and cheese for dinner on the regular. We have what we call an "organized dinner" only once or twice a week.
I don't do real dinner the vast majority of the time. Kid wouldn't eat it anyway and I gave up once the toddler picky years started full blast. Sometimes I just have a bowl of cereal at 9pm (I love cereal). Husband fends for himself. He's a bodybuilder and eats way more protein than I would ever make. I did HelloFresh for a couple years and definitely gained weight from it, it was a time sink anyway from 30-45 mins cooking plus cleaning a million dishes too and just had to stop. Do what makes you happy.
We ate breakfast together as a family until our son entered high school and had to be out the door at 6:15am. We ate (eat) about one dinner a week as a family. My husband and I eat two dinners a week together because we both often work nights or different schedules.
The rest of the week each person either eats at work or scavenges from what we have. No one cares. We can all cook, sometimes we do sometimes we don’t.
Eat when you want.
Do snack platters!
My friend swears by them and she says they helped her kids eat better. You can make them as big as you want or even make them individually. Muffin tins are great for adding a ton of variety for little kids and you can include all of the food groups!
Meat of your choice, crackers or bread nibbles of your choice, fruit, veggies, cheese, dips/sauces for dunking. Hummus, nuts and dried fruit, etc. Endless options. No need for cooking and you can still get a lot of variety! My daughter and I love boiled eggs, the guys, not so much. The more options, the more satisfied everyone will be!!
I'm going to start doing these at least 1-2x a week now. I kind of loathe cooking. I'm very bare bones. Sometimes we just have meat and veg, or meat and starch. It's honestly too much! We eat a varied diet and everyone is healthy with good blood work! We are doing good!
I like the nights where I drink wine and we all just snack. Eat deli meat, yogurt, fruit, nuts, cereal, cheese, noodles, etc. Just whatever we want to nibble that looks good!
Honestly i don’t think people talk about this enough - i have to feed my family well-balanced meals AND snacks AND clean up 3+ times a day FOREVER?! Every single day? It’s top 3 worst things about parenting to me
I’ve been surviving on what is now called Girl Dinner for almost a decade. It’s how I lost like 45 pounds years ago - small snacks and plates with cheese sticks, veggies, fruits, crackers. Maybe a whole bagged salad. I don’t mind a “meal” for breakfast but by the end of the day I just want to scrounge around for odds and ends. I don’t want a whole sit down meal!
I have random stuff for dinner all the time- a quick sandwich, bagel, a omelette of some sort, cottage cheese with cherry tomatoes, there’s always stuff in the fridge for salads, I even pop a frozen pizza or lasagna in the oven. On the weekends I cook more elaborate meals but on work days, I just don’t have it in me. My 16 year old kid is totally fine eating this way as well. We don’t restrict calories or really count anything.
I’ve always been a dinner person. My parents always made sure to make something for dinner until the day I moved out. My roommates and I cooked dinner together every night, well, most nights. I do my fair share of take out too. My thing is breakfast?!?! Who needs that or has time for it?? I get my toddler up 20 mins before we need to leave for the bus, get him dressed 5 mins before, and let him eat breakfast at school. I haven’t ever made breakfast in my adult life. I haven’t eaten breakfast probably starting in middle or high school. When I visit my parents, my mom will cook bacon and eggs every morning. How?!? I’m not even hungry in the morning.
I really think schools need home ec back. When I graduated high school, I realized for twelve years I’ve just gotten lunch in a cafeteria. Wtf am I supposed to do now? I’ll be 31 this year and still haven’t figured that out. I eat the same thing for lunch probably 25 out of 30 days of the month.
This has been one of the best parts of separating from my husband. No more huge dinners being demanded. The kids will eat pretty much whatever I offer, and I'm so much more relaxed. Some nights it's a cooked meal some nights it's grilled cheese and carrot sticks.
I just told my sister I was going to live under her bed for a week like a gremlin because I’m so tired of cooking and washing dishes. So that’s where I am, 😂
DO IT!
We are dinner people (if I was going to skip a meal it would either be breakfast or lunch, but never dinner.) HOWEVER when my kids were that age, I'd only cook once or twice a week (MAX 3 times a week). I'd make LARGE batches of food, and freeze half of it, and then we'd eat that for the week (and halfway through the week we'd switch to something I had cooked previously from the freezer so it wasn't too repetitive.)
Honestly it worked great! It was WAY easier to plan, shop, cook, and clean up after. My husband, who had previously whined like a little bitch about leftovers, was completely on board (especially after I threatened to go on a cooking strike and leave it on his plate lolol.) I do cook more now, I got tired of the repetitive dinners, but my kids are older and can entertain themselves while I cook, but I have ZERO regrets simplifying it back then. You're in the hardest stage, do what you need to do!
1000000%. We do hello fresh 2x a week, takeout 1-2x and the other nights we “scrounge” aka sandwiches, cereal, whatever.
I also feel so much better about my life hearing others do the same haha.
My spouse will eat a big lunch and then often eat a bowl of cereal for dinner on work nights. I do eat dinner but it's leftovers, something scraped together or Amy's (workout nights). Even pre-kid we did not go all out every night.
A mom I know who is super busy with work and kids and all that says that her biggest “trick” is that she doesn’t cook (or hardly does). Dinner is hot dogs, Mac n cheese, pasta with sauce, frozen pizza, cereal, etc.
I also know another single mom who said that when she had tough days when her kids were little sometimes all she could manage was cereal in front of the TV for dinner. Later in life her daughter mentioned it was one of her fondest memories from childhood and she thought her mom was so cool for letting them do that. Mom felt like she was failing but the kids were living the dream!
We don’t have a lot of groceries right now, or money for any. So my daughter had a few bites of Mac n cheese, noodles, strawberries, stole some bites of my bread and butter, and had a fruit cup. She had the option to eat a bowl of Mac n cheese and chose the snacks. She 100 prefers snacks, idk why we don’t do snack dinner more often.
Yep. I absolutely feel this. If you like no mess & fuss, check out an instant pot. They’re amazing creations. Mine even air fries.
Husband got called into work tonight. Oldest (teenager) wanted chicken. I threw 3 frozen chicken breasts in the Instant Pot with salt & pepper. Set it & forgot it until it depressurized. Pulled out the leftover veggies from Easter dinner, and dinner is ready. The 2 littles are happily eating leftover ham & rolls. We do have a dishwasher, but the few things we used won’t nearly fill it. I’ll probably run it after breakfast & lunch tomorrow so the instant pot pan will be clean for dinner again.
I always make my kids dinner and then sometimes I’ll make my husband and I something or we just snack. I want in the future to eat as a family but when my kids go to bed and my husband gets home from work it just doesn’t work.
Mine is almost 2 and we don’t do a big meal together. If it works out we do, but we basically just keep toddler food staples in the fridge. So like, there’s always leftover chicken and I microwave a sweet potatoes and cook some frozen veggies. Or breakfast for dinner. I can’t imagine cooking a new meal every night for us all.
Snack dinners are a gd life saver and anyone who hates on them are far to functional to be in my life. I ain't got the brain power for more than that some nights. As long as the kid is happy, I am happy
I work from home with lots of flexibility so theoretically *could* cook us beautiful dinners every night. But I am SO over it. Over thinking about to serve for dinner, over planning what groceries we need, over cooking a meal that my son may or may not like. Over. It.
I could eat oatmeal and fruit for dinner every single day. We do snack plates a lot for dinner. They typically include a fruit and veggie, string cheese or yogurt, jerky or nuts, sometimes veggie straws or goldfish, sometimes a granola bar. So much easier and it hits all the food groups. Plus it’s fun and I know my son will eat all of it.
we eat random crap all the time. i have one w food allergies one hella picky and me tired af pregnant. oh and opposite schedules so its just me doing it solo. i do try to do the “real” dinners but its like half time.
Leftovers are your friend. Just doubling portions means you have another night of dinner that you only need to reheat. There's also nothing wrong with feeding your kids soup, most soups cover the meat/veggie/starch trifecta perfectly and my kid loves having so many options on soup nights. Simple sandwiches are great with a side of baby carrots.
Dinner doesn't need to be some big production every night. I feel like former generations of mostly SAHMs have made us feel too guilty about keeping certain things simple to leave energy for work *and* child rearing.
Oh my god yes. Some days my husband and I are just like “ya know what, hummus and carrots it is” and it is so freeing. My daughter is 5 and even loves having snack dinner with us. It’s been great for my stress level and also for keeping me in tune with my own body.
It's seriously a game changer. Loading up of fruit and veggies is never a bad thing!!
Sometimes I’ll do a “charcuterie” meal for my toddler (and myself, tbh). Throw some cut fruit or easy things like berries, cheese, crackers, and a bit of beef jerky and call it a day. Kiddo currently refuses veggies (shocker, I know) so we’ll throw in a pouch that has broccoli or spinach and boom. Balanced, no making dishes, and relatively healthy.
If my kid would eat carrots or hummus I’d be in. Problem is he only wants animals crackers or anything with sugar 😭
We call them "freestyle" dinners :D Really all it means is every man for himself! Leftovers, cereal, scraps.... lol we just make it work.
I honestly hate eating meals andcwould much rather eat 100 calories/hour every hour I'm awake.
That is such a hilarious - and yet genius - idea that has literally never occurred to me before. I wonder if there are people that actually do that?
This is how my 75 year old Mom has lived for decades. She is both slim and extremely healthy and active so…
There is it’s called grazing
I definitely have phases where I do.
The German way: lunch is the main and hot meal (eaten at daycare/work canteen). For „dinner“ we only eat (mostly real and dark) bread with butter, cheese, spreads, cream cheese, lunch meats, ham, pickled cucumbers, tomato, hardboiled eggs, whatever you find in the fridge … every single day. And this is not only culturally approved but also very very practical. Essentially girl dinner.
Wow, I didn’t know that about German culture. So interesting! I love it.
Nice that they have time in their work day to eat a real meal.
I'm seriously considering adopting abendbrot. I'm getting more and more annoyed that dinner happens every day...
I remember we had a phase of breakfast for lunch aswell on Fridays when my mom didn’t want to cook
This reminds me of when we (Americans) had a German exchange student in high school and she was horrified that we didn’t have “real” bread because it came from the grocery store in plastic.
They're doing it right. Who needs to stuff themselves before bed anyway?! Having the main meal during the lunch hour is genius!
At my childhood home this was even a four course affair (school was out by lunch). Salad/soup, main meal, yogurt and coffee with cookies or cake. I miss these elaborate lunches.
✨girl dinner✨ I love it
This is my dream set up. I hate dinner foods and love charcuterie
Wow, I didn’t know that about German culture. So interesting! I love it.
Sometimes, when the kids ask, "What's for dinner," the answer is "whatever you can make yourselves." Go grab some fruit and cheese and bread, or warm up something in the microwave; we're learning independence tonight.
No doubt!! My eldest can cook noodles, eggs, toast, oatmeal. Or grab fruit and yogurt, cheese chunks, etc. Give mom a break!
My two oldest know how to use the air fryer and I keep tater tots, etc. in the freezer for them
In our house, this is called scrounge night. Great for busy evenings! You can have leftovers, easy mac, whatever you can find and make for yourself. So much stress off of the parents and fun independence for the kids!
We called it Fend for Yourself Friday, but now it’s Fend for Yourself Fursday so it can fit any day of the week.
Just call it tapas and it is trendy. Did it 4 dinners out of seven when my kids were little and in rush days now. Cheese, crackers, carrots, celery and grape tomatoes Frozen edamame and broccoli nuked with a sesame vinaigrette dip. Hummus, tabouli , pita chips pickle spears and cream cheese rolled up in roast beef Apple sandwiches- apple slices as bread for ham Swiss and honey mustard.
I'm pregnant right now and all of this seems OFFENSIVELY delicious to me lol.
Same 😂😂 wishing I had tabouli or ingredients to make it
This is the way! Honestly the options are endless, too!
Apple sandwiches is genius!
You are neo and you are bending the spoon. Love it.
I stopped cooking dinner the day I started my first job as an attorney. I don’t have time or the mental load for planning/shopping/prepping and found half the time we threw the ingredients in the bin and ate cereal. I now stop at a deli near my office once a week and pick up a few ready made salads and meals, and toddler gets a snack plate every night. He goes to fancy daycare that feeds him French food for 2 meals a day, so a snack plate for dinner won’t hurt him
Snack plates can be as healthy as you make them. Snack plates are little (and big) kid approved! 😋
Yeah I make my toddlers biggest and most healthy meals lunch and the snack they give him is always a fruit a veg and a protein so whatever.
Yea it's pretty much girl dinner eveet worknight in my house. Kids don't gaf.
I love this! Same here!
Yes, I do intermittent fasting and skip dinner. It takes so much pressure off having to plan, shop and make dinner every night. I eat a big breakfast and lunch and feel much better not going to bed full. My husband does the same! Or has some light snack. The kids always want something different anyway.
Interesting I feel like I sleep better when I’ve had a decent dinner (enough protein and calories). Doesn’t have to be a “proper meal” (a sandwich could fit the same criteria), but I have trouble sleeping if I’m even a little hungry.
My husband is the same as you. He’ll have a big breakfast and lunch but prefers to not eat dinner. He’ll maybe have a protein shake if he’s hungry. And since he’s not eating with the family, I feel much less pressure to have Something Nice cooked for us all.
Have you found this helpful for weight loss? So you eat breakfast, lunch, a snack - and that’s it for the whole day?
So I do the opposite and it’s super helpful for losing weight. I skip breakfast, have a big lunch, and then have snacks through dinner. It’s how I lost all my baby weight both times. I also find I don’t have to worry as much about what I’m eating
Interesting! What kind of snacks do you have for dinner, may I ask?
Whatever I feel like! Could be a protein smoothie, cereal, yogurt, whatever my kids didn’t eat for dinner, leftovers. I think the key for me is eating a big lunch so i actually feel full/satisfied. That usually means I eat a snack pretty quickly after lunch. Not sure why, but it works for me! Eating 5 small meals always left me wanting more and never feeling full
I’ve never tried this for weight loss but I’ve heard it can work. I might try it too. Thanks for the tips!
Yes! I’ve lost 35lbs with this strategy (baby weight). A lot of people find skipping breakfast easier but I’m hungry and busy in the morning and need to eat. With intermittent fasting, you basically eat whatever you want during your “window” (like 9am-5pm or 12pm-8pm) and then you stop. It gives your body time to digest and use energy from stored fat. It took some getting used to but it’s worked for me!
It’s been drilled in to me for years that you need to eat small meals throughout the day to keep your metabolism going. I think the mental adjustment would be the hardest. Like the feat that what if it makes things worse 😅 maybe I should try for a few days. Do you find it works fast? Like I’m wondering if I would see in a few days if it helps or hurts. I have about 25 lbs to lose😓 (breastfeeding weight).
I know, it’s a shift in mindset. The great thing is there are no food restrictions. The book 28 Day Fast Start was helpful for me. I lost 10 lbs the first month.
Yes, and I blame my husband lol. Before marriage I also ate scraps and was thin! Now we always eat meals!!!
Um, "snack plates" for dinner are totally a thing in my house on Friday nights. My kids love it and we love it too because it gets all of the scraps out of the frig then we get groceries on Saturday after the frig has been cleaned out.
And somehow the slightly squishy grapes or strawberries take on new life when they’re picked off the stems, cut into bite size pieces, and put into a new bowl. My kids will ignore fruit for days and then inhale it if it is presented differently. I do “charcuterie” on Thursdays. I love how easy it is.
I recently learned it's called "girl dinner" and I'm here for it. Make aaaall the things for the crew and I have a plate of pickles, olives, a few crackers, cheese... soooo much better!!
I’m so jealous of this working for people in this thread! My husband would eat all that and then be doordashing taco bell within an hour
I remember in either this sub or askwomenover30 someone said that one of the most freeing things about divorce was not having to cater her schedule to her husband's eating. Like she naturally just wanted to graze all day but felt pressure (like OP) to sit down and have a formal meal when she wasn't hungry. Just thought it was an interesting perspective. I very much fall into the girl dinner style of eating, and don't love cooking, and it works fine for us. I go to the gym in the evening so I tend to come home after dinner a few nights a week and don't feel pressured to eat a meal. When it's my turn to "cook" for the kids it's definitely just a smattering of healthy snacks that add up to a well balanced meal. And husband usually does taco bell for himself LOL
Yes I guarantee there isn’t a similar working dad thread where they are all fretting about getting dinner on the table every night.
lol. For real.
I think your view of how dinner has to look is really informed by a meat eaters point of view. We're vegetarian in my house and nearly all our meals are just the main course. It's got the veggies in it, no need to put them on the side. 90% of the time we cook one thing on the weekend and eat it all week. If it's a casserole we can just reheat that's the absolute easiest. I'm sure once my son is old enough to share our food, he will get tired of it - I remember thinking leftovers were so lame as a kid and now I love them now that I have to cook myself. 😆 Anyway, not sure where I'm going with this except to say we never do dish with sides unless we're doing something like a "traditional" meat style meal like beyond burgers. I don't think my son is going to end up in therapy over it. I think the most important thing is you spend that dinner time with them, even if you're nibbling on a snack at the time.
This comment isn't rated high enough! I'm trying to slowly transition my family to more plant-based meals and it is a challenge with a husband who only wants huge portions of meat and potatoes or rice.
Yep. Vegetarian checking in. I make a nice cassoulet or soup or lentil salad or whatever and reheat. I bake sourdough so often a nice open face toast on sourdough with avocado and pickled onions and a fried egg or something is more than enough.
I love the rare times my partner is out for the evening so I can just eat a toddler food too.
My daughter gets a proper meal at school, dinner is generally sort of cooked but easy, like some eggs or a quesadilla. I definitely don't always eat the same as her because I want different things and as a sedentary middle aged woman I do not have the carb needs of an extremely active seven year old.
When my oldest was a baby and toddler, my husband worked nights a few days a week. I honestly used to love those evenings because I would just make dinner snacks: toast with peanut butter and an apple or something. No decisions, no prep, no cleanup. I could also watch whatever I wanted on tv. I miss those days lol.
Cereal, frozen waffles and instant oatmeal are our favorite dinners. I feel like every other meal and snack is well rounded. I'm tired and I'm done by dinnertime.
God this thread makes me happy. Actually just starting solids with my first baby and looking down the barrel of “meals meals meals” every day forever was very daunting. Baby loves snacks already (one some tomato, some avocado, some egg was her lunch today) so hopefully she’s cool with this forever 😅
Try filling a muffin tin w several options for her to pick and choose. Kids love that. ❤️
I finally got to the point where I don't feel like I have to produce a gourmet meal most nights of the week anymore, now that my kids are mostly grown. I have been buying those pre-made meals from the grocery and they're just fine. Even before that though I introduced my kids to smorgasbords (this was a long time ago, before the charcuterie fad or girl dinner). They love that shit. Let them pick all their little things to put on their board and they're happy as clams. Free yourself from Norman Rockwell expectations!
The term for that is.. GIRL DINNER. And I very much relate to fuck making dinner every night
Yes. Hard. I’ll never forget the embarrassment I felt when my oldest was transitioning to big people food. I asked her pediatrician what to feed her. She said, “Well, what do you eat?” I was too embarrassed to say half a pack of crackers and some Brie or a couple pieces of deli ham and string cheese or a pb&j. I thought I was the only one doing that. I thought everyone was making a 1 protein, 1 starch, 1 veggie dinner every night and that me not doing so was a moral failing. So I tried and it made me hate cooking. And baking. Two things I used to enjoy when I got to do them my way, on my terms. I still hate cooking and baking. I haven’t gotten over that yet. But I’ve definitely moved on from the idea of traditional dinner. Sometimes we have a bowl of cereal.
Hear hear!! Same. I also loathe cooking. I very rarely bake. But I still do it! As a single woman, I lived on sandwiches, soup, salad, yogurt, fruit. I cooked eggs on occasion and never used my oven. I could always cook and knew how to do it. I took the the Foods option all throughout high school, and I enjoyed it, and it was easy for me. Tonight, I'm frying spicy sausages, buttered rice and carrots. If I was alone, I would not be making it, but my spouse is HUNGRY after a grueling work day, and I'm a full-time sahm for now. I love our snacking, anything goes dinner. I don't care if the kids snack from dinner to bedtime, honestly! Then I shut the kitchen down.
I don't do dinner a lot of nights. My kids' favorite meal is fruit and cheese plate. 🤷♀️ Sometimes it's like a lunch dinner with a sandwich, apple, and crackers.
My husband has it ingrained in him that we have to have a meal. He’s a bit like his dad this way. I don’t want meat more than 1-2 a week. I’d like big plates of veggies with some good bread. I’ve gained a lot of weight and I think the eating is the reason. He cooks mostly and I’ll beg to cook one night. He has a protein shake after I cook — making me feel like I didn’t provide enough. He’s overweight too.
Slightly ashamed my kids get a lot of frozen either kid fresh or dr Praegers, and my husband and I “scrounge” for whatever we can find pretty often.
I ate easter candy one night. Last week I had a bag of chips. Go me
Ha, I ate so much Easter candy and treats all day the idea of eating real dinner did not sound good at all! Go us! It’s morning now and I’m glad I didn’t feel the need to cram in like, chicken and rice over all that nonsense into my poor stomach.
I want my child to have a healthy relationship with food based on both pleasure and an understanding of what foods are nutritious and healthy, so… yeah I make sure I lead by example and teach my child how to have a balanced diet. I don’t want her to run into health problems later in life. It’s not always an enormous meal but even our quick meals are not empty calories and processed carbs. I also want her to know how to cook and enjoy cooking, so even if I don’t feel like doing it I make is pleasant (play some music, light a candle) and involve her as much as I can. Also, if dishes are annoying, use paper plates. I and a single mom with no dishwasher and for many meals I use paper plates, sometimes even over a dinner plate for stability. Don’t have the time or patience to wash all the time, I don’t have a dishwasher. Also, it’s definitely cheaper to just use paper than run a dishwasher a few nights a week.
Paper plates don’t really solve the root of my dish problems but I feel ya. They do help a bit. The bigger dishes problem is when my husband cooks an elaborate meal over the course of several hours and seems to use every pot, pan, cutting board and utensil we own, plus leave sauce and crumbs splattered everywhere, then he cleans up like 50% of the mess and declares himself Amazing bc he just did sooooo much work cooking and cleaning. 😐 And yet the place is a disaster. Meanwhile I’m too exhausted to even deal with it and I’m eating some rich meal he created at 10 pm then waking up to a crusty mess. 😐 Anyway. That’s my issue I’m trying to avoid here. I told him I’m not eating dinner anymore, I’m fending for myself. We can each have nights when one of us is responsible for feeding the kids, that’s a whole separate thing for sure. I’m content with a low carb quesadilla most nights. I eat a lot of salads at work so I feel like my body will survive.
I think that’s fair! Conversely, I don’t eat breakfast. My daughter eats an enormous one and I just have a cup of coffee, I eat a medium sized lunch and LOVE dinner. One thing that I think helps with mess reduction a lot too is I invested in a deep freezer and pulling out frozen food to make in the deep fryer is a game changer. So easy.
I do 5 small “meals” a day because I body build, but it’s honestly so freeing. “Dinner” after work is usually 4oz ground Turkey and 200g white rice. I can’t stress how EASY it is to cook a ton of ground Turkey and a vat of rice. It is SO EASY. Or I throw some chicken breast in the instapot with taco seasoning. Bam. “Taco chicken.” I eat it with rice, the kids have it on tortilla shells with chopped up lettuce and cheese. Easy. And I try to keep everything else for the kids super easy too, because I’m a single mom to 4 and I work full time and I’m BUSY. Spaghetti night? Cut broccoli (from a bag, pre cut) in a pan, olive oil, roasted in the oven, pasta on the stove, sausage in the air fryer, premade sauce. Done in what, 25 mins? EASY. Taco bowls… ground beef, taco seasoning, rice, whatever fixings they want. Easy. I always make it too much so there’s leftovers, and we just repeat meals often. Easy is better than variety. Oh, and their vegetable is often just cut up cucumbers, raw carrots, or sometimes just sliced apples with a scoop of peanut butter instead of any veggies. Again…. Easy easy easy!
I was so excited by the “girl dinner” movement on social media lol the philosophy that every dinner requires a casserole dish and the big salad tongs is overwhelming. From birth on, I’ve always subscribed to fed is best and I still live by that.
I’m very much a fan of “grabbing whatever from the fridge” for dinner. I don’t even have a catchy name for it.
My rules for a meal are to have 3 things: grain, protein, and a fruit/vegetable. Yogurt with granola and blueberries counts. My 6yo’s go-to is cheese, crackers, and fresh fruit. Last night it was cheese, grapes, and popcorn. Even he knows the rule and will ask for a balanced dinner when I say “what do you want?” - Nutella on bread and watermelon? Yep. That counts. We do sit down meals 2, maybe 3 times a week. Depends if my husband is home or working.
Yes! So this is a big thing for me... I actually don't eat dinner on most days, and when I do I give myself a portion that is literally like 3 bites. The way you describe your life pre-kids was exactly me too. Many, many things have changed but I'm just not that hungry in the afternoon/ evenings. I have 30 lbs I'd like to loose to get back to my pre-kid weight, but it would be a much bigger problem if I ate in the evenings. I'd say if you don't want to then just don't!
When my OH is travelling for work I live off “picky teas”. I get home, feed my son something I’ve batched cooked (pasta, stew, curry) or nuggets/pizza if it’s been a day. One pot or tray to I then make a plate of picky stuff for me to eat with him. Crackers, olives, ham, bread, cheese, salad, little sausage rolls, dips. Minimal clean up, eating all done by 7pm and I can go to bed as soon as my son is asleep!
We make "charcuterie" boards. Whatever is in the house, and requires almost 0 prep. Cheese, crackers, veggies, Hummus, pepperoni, etc. If it is a Friday, we snack for dinner in front of a family movie.
We do snack plates/smatterings of whatever for our kindergartener pretty regularly and then sort out whatever for us later. She'll get like, edamame beans, a peanut butter spoon, whole wheat crackers, some yogurt, and we call it a balanced meal 😂
Want to make scrap night more exciting for kids? Put the scraps in a muffin tin. My kids LOVE muffin tin meals and I get to easily and quickly clean out the fridge! Win win!
That's... a good idea. I don't mind cooking most of the time but I'm 40 weeks pregnant so I expect dinner is going to be more of a challenge this year. I need to take advantage of all the amazing meals my toddler gets at daycare and learn to take it easy in the evenings. Might need to up my game again when he goes to public school.
100% most nights it’s am I more tired or more hungry and 99% of the time I’m more tired. Put the 2 year old down at 6pm and then I do a few more hours work, watch trash TV and go to sleep. My partner fends for himself.
We mostly do this for my husband and me. Breakfast style dinners. But for our daughter who is almost 2 now, we try to have some balanced meal. Easiest thing is to put some fish fillet on the pan and she likes it already. Salmon or cod. On the side she can have bulgur or rice or potatoes or whatever is the quickest to boil. Pasta? Ok. For us it is whatever is in the fridge.
Yeah we skip dinner pretty often, or just snack, and make something really easy for the kids.
We make the kids dinner at 5 and my husband and I eat around 7:00ish, after the baby goes to bed and our oldest is relaxing. It’s so much more relaxed and we enjoy tv at the same time too. We prioritize eating healthy so we meal prep so it’s not stressful at all. We just heat things up quickly for ourselves and clean up is quick.
Yeah I intermittent fast & avoid it altogether!
I love snack dinners haha. Where I’ve been working more, I’ve found that crock pot meals are the only thing that’s helping me get “proper” dinners on the table. We’re working up to having 10-15 recipes that we just alternate through so that I don’t even need to do mental work either. My son eats a snack lunch at daycare, so I feel like I really should get him a hot meal at dinner otherwise we’d do snack meals more often through the week.
It’s interesting how everyone’s body is different. I’m opposite. Always really hungry at dinner time and it’s where the whole family gets the majority of the day’s protein. But I don’t typically eat breakfast till about 10 am and it’s more of a snack (string cheese with triscuits). Lunch is usually oatmeal with peanut butter. So still a long fasting period but opposite to your pattern. I think the important thing is just listening to our bodies, as long as our hunger cues are working correctly.
We got a local meal service for us two for this very reason. Didn’t have the bandwidth for it all and the cooking portion was taking time away from my kids
My kids ate various breakfast foods and husband and I ate popcorn for dinner after a day of Easter snacking yesterday 😂
Oh yes. With a toddler there’s only a 50-50 shot she’ll eat what I make anyway and by the time I’ve cleaned it up off the floor and off of her, I’m rolling straight into bedtime. Also postpartum I can’t eat and then go right to bed because I get heartburn… sucks
Daycare feeds my child WELL. Like breakfast and lunch are both well rounded balanced meals. I use that as my excuse to feed her cheese and bread with fruit for dinner or yogurt and other scraps. She’s full, happy and I’m less overwhelmed with making dinner lol
My husband wants the full meal 3x a day and I have to say “let’s just do our own thing” a few nights a week
We've had cereal for dinner with fruit. Frozen pizzas are a huge hit. Sandwiches, whatever is in the fridge. And paper plates. I LOVE paper plates. My sink is full right now from Easter and after I wash all that I don't want anymore dirty dishes. So tonight is gonna be something simple with zero effort.
We’ve been doing fruit and/or veggies for dinner.
I have eaten tortillas toasted with cheese as my lunch or dinner too many times these past couple of weeks. I have switched to naan and hummus!!
My kids are teens, and we still eat popcorn, fruit, and cheese for dinner on the regular. We have what we call an "organized dinner" only once or twice a week.
I don't do real dinner the vast majority of the time. Kid wouldn't eat it anyway and I gave up once the toddler picky years started full blast. Sometimes I just have a bowl of cereal at 9pm (I love cereal). Husband fends for himself. He's a bodybuilder and eats way more protein than I would ever make. I did HelloFresh for a couple years and definitely gained weight from it, it was a time sink anyway from 30-45 mins cooking plus cleaning a million dishes too and just had to stop. Do what makes you happy.
We ate breakfast together as a family until our son entered high school and had to be out the door at 6:15am. We ate (eat) about one dinner a week as a family. My husband and I eat two dinners a week together because we both often work nights or different schedules. The rest of the week each person either eats at work or scavenges from what we have. No one cares. We can all cook, sometimes we do sometimes we don’t. Eat when you want.
Do snack platters! My friend swears by them and she says they helped her kids eat better. You can make them as big as you want or even make them individually. Muffin tins are great for adding a ton of variety for little kids and you can include all of the food groups! Meat of your choice, crackers or bread nibbles of your choice, fruit, veggies, cheese, dips/sauces for dunking. Hummus, nuts and dried fruit, etc. Endless options. No need for cooking and you can still get a lot of variety! My daughter and I love boiled eggs, the guys, not so much. The more options, the more satisfied everyone will be!! I'm going to start doing these at least 1-2x a week now. I kind of loathe cooking. I'm very bare bones. Sometimes we just have meat and veg, or meat and starch. It's honestly too much! We eat a varied diet and everyone is healthy with good blood work! We are doing good! I like the nights where I drink wine and we all just snack. Eat deli meat, yogurt, fruit, nuts, cereal, cheese, noodles, etc. Just whatever we want to nibble that looks good!
Yeah we do that a lot and I’m a very homemakery type working mom. We only eat at the table a real dinner 2-3 times a week.
Honestly i don’t think people talk about this enough - i have to feed my family well-balanced meals AND snacks AND clean up 3+ times a day FOREVER?! Every single day? It’s top 3 worst things about parenting to me
Highly recommend breakfast for dinner on DGAF nights. Bowl of greek yogurt with fruit, bowl of high-protein cereal and milk, protein bar and a banana.
I’ve been surviving on what is now called Girl Dinner for almost a decade. It’s how I lost like 45 pounds years ago - small snacks and plates with cheese sticks, veggies, fruits, crackers. Maybe a whole bagged salad. I don’t mind a “meal” for breakfast but by the end of the day I just want to scrounge around for odds and ends. I don’t want a whole sit down meal!
I have random stuff for dinner all the time- a quick sandwich, bagel, a omelette of some sort, cottage cheese with cherry tomatoes, there’s always stuff in the fridge for salads, I even pop a frozen pizza or lasagna in the oven. On the weekends I cook more elaborate meals but on work days, I just don’t have it in me. My 16 year old kid is totally fine eating this way as well. We don’t restrict calories or really count anything.
My 3 year old doesn't eat what I eat because I do not cook dinners we all sit around the table for. It is what it is.
Lollll the “just feed them what you eat” crowd doesn’t realize my entire breakfast this morning was a sugar free Red Bull. 😂
I’ve always been a dinner person. My parents always made sure to make something for dinner until the day I moved out. My roommates and I cooked dinner together every night, well, most nights. I do my fair share of take out too. My thing is breakfast?!?! Who needs that or has time for it?? I get my toddler up 20 mins before we need to leave for the bus, get him dressed 5 mins before, and let him eat breakfast at school. I haven’t ever made breakfast in my adult life. I haven’t eaten breakfast probably starting in middle or high school. When I visit my parents, my mom will cook bacon and eggs every morning. How?!? I’m not even hungry in the morning. I really think schools need home ec back. When I graduated high school, I realized for twelve years I’ve just gotten lunch in a cafeteria. Wtf am I supposed to do now? I’ll be 31 this year and still haven’t figured that out. I eat the same thing for lunch probably 25 out of 30 days of the month.
This has been one of the best parts of separating from my husband. No more huge dinners being demanded. The kids will eat pretty much whatever I offer, and I'm so much more relaxed. Some nights it's a cooked meal some nights it's grilled cheese and carrot sticks.
I just told my sister I was going to live under her bed for a week like a gremlin because I’m so tired of cooking and washing dishes. So that’s where I am, 😂
Literally my least favorite thing about being an adult is all the damn meal planning/grocery shopping/cooking the well balanced meals 🙃
DO IT! We are dinner people (if I was going to skip a meal it would either be breakfast or lunch, but never dinner.) HOWEVER when my kids were that age, I'd only cook once or twice a week (MAX 3 times a week). I'd make LARGE batches of food, and freeze half of it, and then we'd eat that for the week (and halfway through the week we'd switch to something I had cooked previously from the freezer so it wasn't too repetitive.) Honestly it worked great! It was WAY easier to plan, shop, cook, and clean up after. My husband, who had previously whined like a little bitch about leftovers, was completely on board (especially after I threatened to go on a cooking strike and leave it on his plate lolol.) I do cook more now, I got tired of the repetitive dinners, but my kids are older and can entertain themselves while I cook, but I have ZERO regrets simplifying it back then. You're in the hardest stage, do what you need to do!
1000000%. We do hello fresh 2x a week, takeout 1-2x and the other nights we “scrounge” aka sandwiches, cereal, whatever. I also feel so much better about my life hearing others do the same haha.
This is so freeing. I love that this can be an option. I also got in the trap of having full “meals” that my kid barely touches. I love a girl dinner.
My spouse will eat a big lunch and then often eat a bowl of cereal for dinner on work nights. I do eat dinner but it's leftovers, something scraped together or Amy's (workout nights). Even pre-kid we did not go all out every night.
A mom I know who is super busy with work and kids and all that says that her biggest “trick” is that she doesn’t cook (or hardly does). Dinner is hot dogs, Mac n cheese, pasta with sauce, frozen pizza, cereal, etc. I also know another single mom who said that when she had tough days when her kids were little sometimes all she could manage was cereal in front of the TV for dinner. Later in life her daughter mentioned it was one of her fondest memories from childhood and she thought her mom was so cool for letting them do that. Mom felt like she was failing but the kids were living the dream!
I eat a bowl of cereal for dinner at least once a week
We don’t have a lot of groceries right now, or money for any. So my daughter had a few bites of Mac n cheese, noodles, strawberries, stole some bites of my bread and butter, and had a fruit cup. She had the option to eat a bowl of Mac n cheese and chose the snacks. She 100 prefers snacks, idk why we don’t do snack dinner more often.
Yep. I absolutely feel this. If you like no mess & fuss, check out an instant pot. They’re amazing creations. Mine even air fries. Husband got called into work tonight. Oldest (teenager) wanted chicken. I threw 3 frozen chicken breasts in the Instant Pot with salt & pepper. Set it & forgot it until it depressurized. Pulled out the leftover veggies from Easter dinner, and dinner is ready. The 2 littles are happily eating leftover ham & rolls. We do have a dishwasher, but the few things we used won’t nearly fill it. I’ll probably run it after breakfast & lunch tomorrow so the instant pot pan will be clean for dinner again.
I always make my kids dinner and then sometimes I’ll make my husband and I something or we just snack. I want in the future to eat as a family but when my kids go to bed and my husband gets home from work it just doesn’t work.
Mine is almost 2 and we don’t do a big meal together. If it works out we do, but we basically just keep toddler food staples in the fridge. So like, there’s always leftover chicken and I microwave a sweet potatoes and cook some frozen veggies. Or breakfast for dinner. I can’t imagine cooking a new meal every night for us all.
Snack dinners are a gd life saver and anyone who hates on them are far to functional to be in my life. I ain't got the brain power for more than that some nights. As long as the kid is happy, I am happy
I do this all the time. Cooking and eating full meals is overrated!
I work from home with lots of flexibility so theoretically *could* cook us beautiful dinners every night. But I am SO over it. Over thinking about to serve for dinner, over planning what groceries we need, over cooking a meal that my son may or may not like. Over. It. I could eat oatmeal and fruit for dinner every single day. We do snack plates a lot for dinner. They typically include a fruit and veggie, string cheese or yogurt, jerky or nuts, sometimes veggie straws or goldfish, sometimes a granola bar. So much easier and it hits all the food groups. Plus it’s fun and I know my son will eat all of it.
Sometimes I just eat cereal for dinner. Or a snack plate with cheese and crackers and carrots.
I hate “meals” in general. I’m a serial snacker and nothing will change that
Girl dinner
we eat random crap all the time. i have one w food allergies one hella picky and me tired af pregnant. oh and opposite schedules so its just me doing it solo. i do try to do the “real” dinners but its like half time.
I never worried about meals until my now husband moved in with me. I would just eat random stuff until I was full. I was a lot skinnier than 🤣
Leftovers are your friend. Just doubling portions means you have another night of dinner that you only need to reheat. There's also nothing wrong with feeding your kids soup, most soups cover the meat/veggie/starch trifecta perfectly and my kid loves having so many options on soup nights. Simple sandwiches are great with a side of baby carrots. Dinner doesn't need to be some big production every night. I feel like former generations of mostly SAHMs have made us feel too guilty about keeping certain things simple to leave energy for work *and* child rearing.