Working moms - when do you cook dinner?

[Anonymous]

I don't. I either buy healthy premade meals (expensive), or we do cereal and fruit, eggs and waffles, etc

i only have time to good on the weekend

[Anonymous]

Crockpots. Make sure one prepared meal lasts at least 2 days. If you do have to cook on a weeknight, then somebody (you, a partner if you have one) has to prep the night before (chop onions, etc)

[Anonymous]

My kids eat microwaved Turkey hot dogs or chicken nuggets for dinner. I drink wine.

[Anonymous]

I'm usually home from work between 5:15 and 5:30. In a typical workweek, I'll cook 3x and we'll do one night of leftovers and one of takeout. I try to have dinner on the table NLT 6:15, as I start bath/bedtime routine with DD (3) at 7.

Meal planning and grocery shopping over the weekend is crucial, and batch cooking helps (made meatballs over the weekend - 2 lbs. of meat yields 32 meatballs, which is 4-5 meals' worth). I don't necessarily meal prep, but in the winter I might throw a soup or roast in the crockpot in the morning before work, or now I'll put meat in marinade for grilling. Takeout is often a rotisserie chicken, which can then yield a second meal (chicken salad, tacos, etc.).

[Anonymous]

i make meals at 6am three times a week. i split into tupperwares so it can work for lunches/dinners. we all leave the house at 755am.
2 year is very picky so her food is cobbled together basics.

only left the oven on all day once. here's to having it all.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The first year after having your second should involve low expectations re: dinner. A lot of nights were: rotisserie chicken and prepackaged salad; doctored up instant ramen; Costco premade meals, etc. Also a lot of Uber eats.

I work from home a lot, so sometimes I do a little prep before picking up the kids. Sometimes we make pizza (premised crust) as a family, which my 3 year old loves. Sometimes we end up just feeding the kids something easy like mac n cheese and then DH and I make a real grown up dinner after they’re asleep (toddler is asleep by 7-ish and 4 y/o goes down at 8).

It really varies each week based on work schedules, whether one of us is going to the gym or has other plans out, etc.

I’m intrigued by your doctored up ramen! What do you add?

We buy the good ramen from Costco (I love Nissin Roah). You might be able to order it online too or another similar brand that is a step up from the generic kind at every store. We will soft boil a couple eggs or throw leftovers on top (pork tenderloin is a good one). Add some chives, packaged seaweed, miscellaneous leftover veggies, etc. in if you’d like. I love it because it’s so versatile and quick!

[Anonymous]

I get home at 5/5:15pm and cook 4 nights/week. I have an infant and a 4yo. On Fridays we either go out or eat leftovers.

I carry the infant while I cook (suuper easy heh) or I put her in high chair and throw food at her. I put 4yo on the counter and got her some kid knives and let her go nuts on some fruits or something.

I meal plan on the weekend and shop usually on Sundays. Each day I buy enough to feed us all + lunches the next day. Every dinner has 3 parts: protein, vegetable, and starch. I really like food and enjoy cooking for the most part so that plays into this too.

Some examples:
- Breaded fish fillets, steamed green beans, rice. I make rice in the instantpot, beans on the stove and fish goes in oven all simultaneously.
- pasta bake: saute loose sausage while boiling noodles, dump sausage and noodles into a pot with sauce, cheese, and some veggies, bake for 15min
- turkey meatballs with boxed cream of mushroom soup "gravy", over couscous (instantpot) with steamed asparagus on the side
- homemade pizza + salad

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If your DH is leaving early so you have morning duty, he needs to get home in time to prep an easy dinner.

Also, because if he's leaving early and doesn't get home until 6:30, that's a ridiculous schedule for a parent with an infant. He needs to figure his ish out so he can help around the house. He needs to figure out how to work after bedtime so he can get home before 6.

It doesn’t always work like this. DH is a surgeon and he goes to work early and gets home late. I was responsible for all drop offs and pick ups. It was rough when I worked.

Similar here. DH is an anesthesiologist. When we were in residency, my kids were the OPs kids ages.
I remember:
a) getting fast food a lot (baked potatoes and side salads from Wendy’s were big)
b) packing a picnic and eating at the playground post-daycare
c) crockpot meals that would last several days

[Anonymous]

I don’t think I have ever put kids down for bed, then cooked a full dinner just for DH and I. That sounds exhausting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The first year after having your second should involve low expectations re: dinner. A lot of nights were: rotisserie chicken and prepackaged salad; doctored up instant ramen; Costco premade meals, etc. Also a lot of Uber eats.

I work from home a lot, so sometimes I do a little prep before picking up the kids. Sometimes we make pizza (premised crust) as a family, which my 3 year old loves. Sometimes we end up just feeding the kids something easy like mac n cheese and then DH and I make a real grown up dinner after they’re asleep (toddler is asleep by 7-ish and 4 y/o goes down at 8).

It really varies each week based on work schedules, whether one of us is going to the gym or has other plans out, etc.

I’m intrigued by your doctored up ramen! What do you add?

We buy the good ramen from Costco (I love Nissin Roah). You might be able to order it online too or another similar brand that is a step up from the generic kind at every store. We will soft boil a couple eggs or throw leftovers on top (pork tenderloin is a good one). Add some chives, packaged seaweed, miscellaneous leftover veggies, etc. in if you’d like. I love it because it’s so versatile and quick!

Amazon will deliver Nissin Roah to your door! We love it too. I also did breakfast (scrambled eggs and sausage and fruit salad) one night a week when the kids were little. One pot meals. Rotisserie chickens and frozen veggies or salad.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think I have ever put kids down for bed, then cooked a full dinner just for DH and I. That sounds exhausting.

+1. Insane to cook two meals.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think I have ever put kids down for bed, then cooked a full dinner just for DH and I. That sounds exhausting.

+1. Insane to cook two meals.

It doesn't sound like she is feeding her kids dinner when she gets home. Sounds like they have already eaten.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think I have ever put kids down for bed, then cooked a full dinner just for DH and I. That sounds exhausting.

+1. Insane to cook two meals.

NP. “Cooking” for kids can mean a pb&j and some carrot sticks, which takes like 5 min. Sometimes I like to make something nicer for DH and I to enjoy once they are in bed. Not as a regular occurrence, but 2-3x/month we might plan something a bit nicer as our schedule allows.

[Anonymous]

When kid 2 was 12-24mo we ate a lot of takeout.

Tonight I made dinner while my 2.5 yr old and 4.5yr old played in the sandbox outside my kitchen window.

Last night I came home, dumped a bag of chicken and ingredients in the instant pot (made the bag the night before) and dumped some rice in the rice cooker before I picked up the kids. When we got home, dinner was almost done.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The first year with a baby and a toddler was survival mode, for sure. My evening schedule was programmed to the minute:
5:00 leave work
5:45 arrive home (I dropped the kids off in the morning and DH picked them up in the afternoon)
15 minutes to kick off my heels, change into sweats, and turn on the stove
6:00-6:25 cook dinner
6:30 sit down to eat
6:50 done with dinner, start bath
7:30 both kids in bed (DH did dishes while I did bath/bedtime, or vice versa)
7:45-8:30 prep bottles, lunches and dinner for the following day
8:30-9:15 catch up on a few work emails and set my schedule for the following day
9:30 start getting ready for bed
10:00 lights out for me
Up at 5 the next morning to start all over

As you can see, the magic to this schedule is having dinners that can be mostly prepped in advance and cooked or reheated in 20 minutes. Lots of batch cooking on weekends. Prep the night before might mean cooking ground beef for tacos and prepping the sides; dinner is just warming up. Or slicing chicken breasts into thin cutlets and trimming green beans; dinner is a quick pan-fry for the chicken (7-8 minutes) and pan-steam the green beans. Or order pizza from my phone on the way home.

Luckily, that level of craziness only lasted for a couple of years. Honestly, that's why I stopped at two. I couldn't picture starting all that over again.

This approximates how we did it too.