Dealing with family dinner every day for the rest of your life!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:At least they pretended to like it, OP!
I feel you; it’s awful. I’m counting the days until I am responsible only for feeding myself.

I count that they pretended to like it a major WIN! I work part time but my job is at weird hours and one or both kids always seem to have something in the evening so getting dinner on the table is logistically challenging. DH tries to help, but I’ve just accepted that we cannot replicate the family dinner scenario I had growing up—at least not during the week. I usually cook 2-3 nights and usually it’s dishes that I can prep in advance and just throw in the oven (or crockpot), have leftover scramble, or order takeout. We rarely get takeout on the weekends because that’s when I actually have time to cook something.

I am soooo sick of figuring out what we are eating all the time….

[Anonymous]

When I worked part time I cooked a lot more from scratch. Now working full time I rely more on salad bags and shortcuts.

I keep a list of dinners we have had and liked on my notes app. It goes back a couple of years now. I don’t spend time noting recipes because I mostly cook without them (but I probably should when I cook something new) just the main cooked item and the sides only if they were special. Then I can go through with the fam and ask what they’re in the mood for.

My dh and both teens can cook, but I’m better and faster. The teens are also pretty busy with activities and homework and friends and I would frankly rather have them do their chores than cook whole meals. But they do it once a month or so. More in the summer when they have more time.

I have an instant pot and one of those big air fryers with trays (I can cook two things at a time like fish on one tray and vegetables on another and rice in the instant pot. I have a slow cooker but don’t use it as much, but that’s one to add to your rotation, especially in winter when you can just add ingredients for pot roast or stew in the morning and go to work. Basically—look for tools to help you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Career nanny here. This is what I have done for all my nanny families (and a few friends who are busy moms):

1) Come up with a list of 18 meals your family at least sort of likes. This is 6 meals a week plus one day of leftovers or takeout.

I like to break it down by day so like every Sunday is something I have to bake in the oven, every Monday is a crock pot meal, Tuesday soup/salad, Wednesday sheet pan dinner, Thursday pasta, Friday stir fry, something like that.

You now have a Week 1 menu, Week 2 menu and Week 3 menu.

2) Write out a shopping list for ingredients for each week. Depending on how often you like to shop, break it into two lists (Sun-Tuesday and Wed-Friday for example).

Going forward shop according to the list and make whatever is on the list for that night. Your family is never eating any particular meal more than on e every 21 days so you can do this for years and nobody will because absolutely bored of a specific food.

Ok, that's easy when you are a nanny and cooking for the family but what about when you aren't a nanny and don't have help?

I am the nanny poster and I have set up the same system for lots of different families, including my BFF who is a single mom with full custody and a job.

Yes as a nanny I have more time at home, but that just means I choose different recipes.

For my friend, most of what was on her list was sheet pan meals/crock pot meals which she could prep the night before and pop in the oven either in the morning or as soon as they all walk in the door, or things like pasta, Indian or Asian dishes from tjs so she is just heating up a pouch and using a rice cooker.

If you truly have zero time between when your family walks in the door and when you need to eat, then you probably need to eat things you can quickly reheat in the microwave (frozen foods?) or things you can prepare in advance and serve cold (like salads, crudités, fruit and cheese plates), and honestly that’s fine too. Just write down 21 versions of that (apples and pb toast, chicken salad on croissants, etc.) and you are good to go.

[Anonymous]

I just want to commiserate, OP. The worst is when I’m not hungry myself for whatever reason.

[Anonymous]

I just signed up for Hungryroot to help with this. They have some prepped meals and a number of options to help with shortcut meals. It adds some variety, so we're not just eating the seven-ish meals I normally make. Depending on the week, I'll figure out 2-4 meals from their site, 2-3 meals myself, then pizza or takeout for the others.

[Anonymous]

I love using my crockpot during the colder months. Just throw the ingredients in and it's ready when you get home. Add some bread and a salad.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Career nanny here. This is what I have done for all my nanny families (and a few friends who are busy moms):

1) Come up with a list of 18 meals your family at least sort of likes. This is 6 meals a week plus one day of leftovers or takeout.

I like to break it down by day so like every Sunday is something I have to bake in the oven, every Monday is a crock pot meal, Tuesday soup/salad, Wednesday sheet pan dinner, Thursday pasta, Friday stir fry, something like that.

You now have a Week 1 menu, Week 2 menu and Week 3 menu.

2) Write out a shopping list for ingredients for each week. Depending on how often you like to shop, break it into two lists (Sun-Tuesday and Wed-Friday for example).

Going forward shop according to the list and make whatever is on the list for that night. Your family in never eating any particular meal more than on e every 21 days so you can do this for years and nobody will because absolutely bored of a specific food.

This is genius.

[Anonymous]

We have a rotation of meals as well. And I got very fast at making them. Watching people eat my food and chatting is my happy place so I'm ok making food all the time. Dh does breakfast nearly every day and some dinners so it's not all me.

[Anonymous]

How old are they? They need to help.

Can they set the table, chop onions, research quick recipes, wash the dishes, make a salad?

Can they cook a night?

This is not 100% your job.

If you don’t request help now, they’ll become teens who were taught not to help.

[Anonymous]

My mom freaked out once and said now each of you cook 2x a week and we get pizza once a week. She was done. She was also a horrible cook.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I love using my crockpot during the colder months. Just throw the ingredients in and it's ready when you get home. Add some bread and a salad.

Would you mind sharing some recipes? Lately, every hunk of meat I've put in the crockpot is like shoe leather.

[Anonymous]

We survived using a schedule. 3 kids and 2 parents with stressful jobs.

Monday, chicken, couscous, veggie
Tuesday pasta, veggie
Wednesday veggie burgers...

They don't care if it's the same thing every week on weeknights. We did more interesting means when we had time.

[Anonymous]

Absolutely hate cooking, cleaning, planning meals, grocery shopping. Think of how much time we’d have if we didn’t have to do this!

[Anonymous]

I have lots of thoughts and they may not work for you but I’ve always worked full-time, as has my husband, and our twins are 10 so I haven’t been doing this forever but it’s been a while.

- Your husband needs to help with this responsibility. There is no reason he can’t be equally in charge of food. If his work schedule doesn’t allow him to actually cook at dinner time, he can still come up with meals, place a pick up grocery order, prep stuff, etc.
- Your kids need to also take responsibility for this if they are old enough to talk. They should each come up with a dinner once a week. It is not your job to feed multiple people with no input or help. You have a job. You have other things you do. This shouldn’t be all on you.
- You don’t need to have a perfectly balanced dinner all the time. Pizza is fine. Cereal is fine. Don’t strive for perfection, it’ll drive you crazy. It may seem weird to have a banana on the side of a pasta dish but if you don’t have time to steam broccoli, it’s ok. And, gasp, if you serve a dinner that doesn’t have produce on the side, that’s also ok. No one is going to get scurvy because they didn’t have a fruit or vegetable that night.
- Make easier food. Get a rotisserie chicken instead of making one from scratch, for example. Buy pre-chopped vegetables. Do what you can to make the steps easier sometimes.
- Make dinners that allow for customization. We eat a lot of Mexican food, so every week we grill a big batch of chicken, cook peppers and onions, make guacamole, do a huge pot of rice, and make black beans (from a can, I’m not soaking them for hours or anything). From that we get multiple meals that people can customize. Burritos, fajitas, nachos, quesadillas, bowls, salads, etc. I do similar with Asian dishes - sauté vegetables, cook some chicken and often beef, buy some frozen potstickers. Then we can have stir fry, fried rice, potstickers, meatballs, noodles, etc. Depending on the sauce you want to put on, you can make it Korean, Chinese, Thai, etc. That way everyone gets the flavors (I like spicy, my husband prefers salty) and consistency (one kid likes rice, the other prefers noodles) they want.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I love using my crockpot during the colder months. Just throw the ingredients in and it's ready when you get home. Add some bread and a salad.

Would you mind sharing some recipes? Lately, every hunk of meat I've put in the crockpot is like shoe leather.

That's odd because the whole point of the crockpot is to make cheap tough meat tender.
I put in a 2 pound chuck roast, bag of baby carrots, bag of baby potatoes, couple cups of water with Better than Bouillon and leave it on low for the entire work day. I don't care for this meal particularly but husband and kids love it. I use the meat to make a little sandwich.