People get tired of cooking. Tired of meal planning. Feel inadequate cooking or planning. Lack time/energy for grocery store trips or to produce a meal.
I think about growing up and what was on our table. I actually wish I could glance back and see our dinner table offerings in a week. Judging by what my mom still seems to do my guess is that dinner back then was: main entrée, vegetable, starch/carb, bread, drink. Often a salad too. Wow, that’s a lot of effort - thanks mom! And usually some dessert item for later “snack”.
What does “dinner on the table” look like at my home now? Maybe a little different now that kids are not home. Usually 2-3 items at the most. Last night it was open faced philly steak sliders with baby carrots.
Usually a main item and a vegetable. The main item might be a casserole type combined thing. Usually a vegetable OR a salad. Sometimes it’s just everything in a bowl - rice, chicken, veggies.
I’ll do more for a special dinner or when others are here. But bread on the table nightly? No. 3-5 food items? No.
A protein, a starch, a veggie. If people are still hungry after dinner they can help themselves to cheese or fruit. H keeps dessert in the house for himself (and now D too).
We tend to eat seasonally so we are transitioning to salad based dinner meals now. Now that everyone is working from home, I’m also eliciting help so I’m not cooking 24/7.
Everyone is on their own for breakfast or lunch since everyone’s schedule is different and then I typically cook 5 nights/week and D and H will pick up the other night. Last night D made a chicken caprese pasta salad for dinner. It was yummy and she did all the cooking and clean up. Whoo hoooo for adult children ; )
Definitely no bread on the table. I’d weigh 100 pounds more if we did that ; )
I do most of the cooking - I like fresh ingredients and simple! Often no real recipes. Tonight is grilled salmon and asparagus, last night grilled strip steak, roasted sweet potatoes and red onions. A homemade minestrone soup the day before. Lots of salad entrees.
Some of our typical dinners–always served with milk and either homemade or store purchased desserts available (like cookies/ice cream/pudding) H is the only one who regularly has a bread item, so we have frozen rolls that can be prepared in 8 minutes or I will purchase Italian bread and I rarely make a bread item from scratch.
-chicken enchiladas with refried beans or kidney/pinto beans from the instapot
-tacos (with lettuce/tomato/cheese sour cream) and beans. H and S19 like to have chips/cheese/salsa as a side.
-roast of some kind in the instapot, mashed potatoes, gravy, vegetable (usually french cut green beans/corn/broccoli) or mixed vegetables or carrots cooked in the instapot
-hamburgers, baked beans, homemade french fries or mustard potato salad
-tator tot casserole (has ground beef/corn/green beans/mushroom soup in recipe)
-brats (w/saukraut for me!)/baked beans/homemade french fries or mustard potato salad
-steak for the guys, crab cakes or fish for the gals, baked potato, frech cut green beans or corn
-spaghetti or spaghetti rings…sometimes with salad or broccoli, but often, just spaghetti with ground beef meatballs or meat sauce with pepperoni sliced in the sauce and baked with mozzerella cheese on top.
-chicken parmesan with spagetti or spaghetti rings…with broccoli option on the side
-I just discovered a recipe for Southwest Chicken in the instapot–enjoy that it is so easy and everything in the pot (rice/beans/chicken)–add some sour cream and taco sauce or put in a burrito
-Walleye (big treat), with baked beans and mustard potato salad
-H makes fried rice and we either make sweet and sour chicken on the stove w/ purchased sauce, but recently have found prepackaged orange chicken and General Tsao Chicken that is easier and we like, but H still makes the fried rice in the wok.
-Pasty (with ground beef/chopped carrots/chopped potatoes/onions)
-meatballs/gravy/mashed potatoes/french cut green beans or corn
-philly cheesesteak, french fries,
-turkey breast (from frozen to oven-Jeanio brand, I think) cranberry sauce from a can (my H likes it that way best), stove top stuffing, mashed potatoes and gravy.
These are our typical evening meals that I can think of for now. We eat at the table, and the tv is on in the background but we are not really paying much attention to it, but always on.
We prefer simple grilled fish, chicken, pork and beef. I will sometimes make a recipe, but it will be simple. Stir fry, pan sautéed chicken, tacos, that sort of thing. I don’t really like cooking (although I enjoy baking), and neither H nor I likes heavy dishes. I also make soup regularly in the cold months.
I always have a salad and vegetable. Typically, but not always, I make a side like rice or potatoes. I make awesome rolls, and that is my usual accompaniment, with a salad, for soup.
I cooked this way when the kids were young, too. I am not the mom who is known for cooking delicious meals!
D’s MIL is an awesome cook who really enjoys cooking for family. She regularly provides dinner for D & SIL when she babysits our granddaughter. I sometimes wish I could get into that, but I swear, meal planning gives me anxiety.
We do cook every night, but DH and I both enjoy it, so it’s a pleasant part of our days. We don’t think in terms of food groups when planning a meal, just what we’d like to eat that night which is often some form of fish, a roasted vegetable or two, and a salad as we’re somewhat pescatarian. Like @leftrightleft, fresh ingredients, simple, no need for a recipe.
Right now, however, we’re getting ready to shut the house down for our five-month stay in Maine, so we’re eating our stores. The fridge and freezer need to be completely emptied in the next three weeks, so we’ll end up having some “interesting” combos. Not sure what to do with those frozen buffalo wings bought for a party that never happened (looking at you, COVID). I’ve told my mom to feel free to shop our pantry while we’re gone as we’d love to start over completely when we return.
A British family lived across the street from us for a couple of years. They had an S the same age as one of mine, and he would always play over at our house. He got fed the same thing as mine. Once when we were talking to the parents, the Dad said “Did you really feed the kids pancakes and pretzels for lunch?” Why, yes. Yes, I did. And I thought I was doing pretty well making pancakes (from a mix) during my lunch hour.
When the kids were home, I’d do a protein, starch, and veggie. With them gone, I drop the veggies. I like salads, but I’m not chopping and we don’t have any salad bars. We sometimes do the bagged salads in the summer. I don’t make any sauces and I’ve learned to love the microwaved flavored rice and canned chicken.
We eat a lot of mini pizzas using pita bread as a crust. I also do a lot with tortillas - quesadillas (mexican or barbecue chicken) or breakfast burritos. I also like to make sandwiches - cheesesteaks, chicken parmesan (thanks to the Peyton Manning commercial), meatball. Salmon cakes are H’s favorite, so I throw that in there a couple of times a month. I make a few casseroles, but those are better when the kids are home because I hate leftovers. Waffles/pancakes are also a common meal, but with protein powder added to the mix. We also eat a lot of garlic cheese bread that I make out of the leftover sandwich/pita bread.
I do most of the weekday cooking and like to grill. Usually pretty simple as not much time on weekdays and we both work full time. We pretty much always have a protein, a vegetable or two, and a starch such as rice, french fries, baked or roasted potatoes or pasta. We usually add a salad 2-3 times a week. Week’s protein usually include fish, chicken, steak, pork chops or ribs. We’ll often include seasonal seafood. On weekends we often cook something we can freeze and eat later in the week; such as red beans and rice, lasagna, jambalaya or chili. I don’t eat dessert but everyone else usually has ice cream at some point in the evening.
My mom will normally cook one dish (main entree) and sometimes a soup. My mom is Chinese and my dad is American so we will normally either have burgers, or some stir-fry. For example: yesterday we had chicken, red bell pepper, potato, rice.
Sometimes we will have tortilla chips and guacamole/hummus for an appetizer.
Mine is different and the same. It’s different because my mom made a lot of casseroles, which H & I are not fond of eating, as well as roast beef every Sunday (which I don’t care for). She also made things like fried bologna, but not tacos … she made things I don’t want to eat now, but she didn’t make things I like to eat now.
Same in that we had vegetables every dinner, and we almost always had salad. Different in that the vegetables were often canned, which I no longer eat.
To be fair, my mom ended up eventually cooking the same sort of things I cook now. Change of taste, more time, more money, fewer to cook for.
Drive-through everything.
Seriously.
I no longer make meals because when I did make meals, when my children were in school, they were never eaten. (EX: I ate at Joe’s house. I’m not hungry because Coach took us out. We went to the mall and had dinner there). I used to make really big meals just like my parents and grandparents did. Albondigas ( meatball soup), chili verde with homemade tortillas, lasagna, eggplant parm, roast beef, meatloaf, potatoes of every kind,
Then, I would have to package them up, and freeze or refrigerate them, only to find out that no one wanted to eat the leftovers except the husband. The things that I could reuse, I stuck in their lunches. At that time I was working full-time and had to pre-plan and prepare a lot of my meals. It’s so refreshing not to have to do that anymore.
I’m not complaining because we’ve had some really good drive-through meals with this pandemic. If we choose to eat at home, it’s usually sandwiches grilled items- burgers chicken-vegetables. We snack on laughing cow/ baby bel cheeses, cut up celery, carrots and cucumbers. My husband and I are both really fine on this because we’ve met a lot of different restaurant staffs, and we’ve gotten to know a lot of people on a first-name basis.
I try to limit processed carbs and red meat during the week. Weekday dinners are usually lean protein and veggies - sometimes that’s a roasted or grilled fish or poultry and veggies, sometimes a salad with beans, cheese or nuts. Weekend meals often incorporate more starches and red meat - whether it’s steak and potatoes or spaghetti and meatballs or whatever I have been craving all week. On Saturdays we often do takeout (in the “old” days we would go out) but we make a point of cooking an elaborate Sunday dinner every week.
We have at least one non meat meal and one seafood meal each week. The rest is divided between other proteins (I dislike that term as I’ve never thought you know what I really want for dinner is a good protein). I plan the menu each Saturday and go grocery shopping. My weekend meals are often centered around which wine I would like the meal to go with. The weekday meals are planned around our schedules. Some are made ahead, some are slow cooker meals, others are just quick and easy. For example yesterday we had a lemony slaw made with bagged coleslaw and a lemon dijon dressing and a premium crabcake each (from the fresh seafood section) and a baguette. Today will be a spicy ground pork with a lime cucumber salad and rice. Both take about 1/2 hour to prepare. My non meat meal this week will be kind of cheating. I have a Chicago style cheese and tomato pizza with a salad.
I cooked for 5 people for 25 years and hate to cook. I live alone now. My “dinner” might be soup bought at the local store, heated up I miss salad bars!
I’ll have to say the instant pot has made a big difference for us. It has totally cut down a ton of time in making so many dishes. So good! And clean up is so easy. I cook, puree and freeze meals for my dad–I could never do that without the instant pot.
I miss salad bars!