I have a rotation of one-pot meals that can keep warm for a couple hours. Each person eats wherever it fits their individual schedule.

Crockpot / Dutch oven / Instant Pot: braised beef with potatoes and carrots, pork chile verde, sausage & lentil stew

Oven: baked ziti, mac & cheese, scalloped potatoes with ham and peas cover with foil and leave the oven on low), spiral sliced ham

Then we keep a big salad in a bowl in the fridge.

A different direction is cold dinners that can keep in the fridge: pasta salads, etc.

Last resort option is to set out a bunch of sandwich fixings. It works in a pinch.

We eat together at 8:30 once everyone is home. I don’t like eating that late, but that’s how it plays out. Either DH or I will prepare while other is running around. And we carpool a lot.

The crockpot is definitely your friend. Have easy sides - rolls, fruit, cut up vegetables.

Food on the island works also.

Sandwich night (if they will go for it).

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Stop making this harder than it is. This is what microwaves are for.

Cook dinner. Whoever is home when it ready eats. Put dinner in frig. Anyone not home that needs to eat later makes themselves a plate and re-heats.

Soups/stews could sit out a couple hours and stay warm.

It is hard for working parents who barely have time to do any actual cooking before schlepping kids to practice.

Hence all the slow cooker recommendations.

I interpreted the above poster’s point that you do whatever you were doing for dinner before, and now people use microwave to heat up their portions. I agree with that advice (and also think people make this harder than it needs to be).

My kids eat dinner at 430. Snack after sports. The end.

Anonymous wrote:Stop making this harder than it is. This is what microwaves are for.

Cook dinner. Whoever is home when it ready eats. Put dinner in frig. Anyone not home that needs to eat later makes themselves a plate and re-heats.

Soups/stews could sit out a couple hours and stay warm.

It is hard for working parents who barely have time to do any actual cooking before schlepping kids to practice.

Hence all the slow cooker recommendations.

To add to the fun, I have a growing 15 year old boy who eats 3 dinners. First at about 4 when home from school, 2nd at 6pm before practice and a third at 9pm after practice. I make a lot of food to keep up and make sure to have leftovers to be reheated for the 4pm meal.

This isn’t hard.

Crockpot meals are great. Instantly meals are great. As a bonus, foods like stews, curries and legumes are really filling for sports practice. Make a side of rice and call it a day.

Stop making this harder than it is. This is what microwaves are for.

Cook dinner. Whoever is home when it ready eats. Put dinner in frig. Anyone not home that needs to eat later makes themselves a plate and re-heats.

Soups/stews could sit out a couple hours and stay warm.

Crockpot + rice cooker + leftovers are your friend.

I try to do large batch cooking on the weekends, and freeze half of whatever I cook so we're not eating the same thing for days on end.

Dinner is cooked by 6 pm. One kid eats then. Other kid eats at 6:30, either at room temp or warms up in microwave. You guys eat whenever you want. Try Hello Fresh for some variety. We ate a lot of their Asian meals — a protein/veg stir fry with rice.

The crockpot should become your friend if it is not already. You can make all of these + have warm for everyone -

* meatballs
* ham
* turkey breast
* brisket
*chicken
*vegetables
* chili
*soup
*queso

I also cut up lettuce every day + vegetables to make salads.

And, I cook noodles + rice in advance to have ready to microwave.

Anonymous wrote:We've finally hit the ages I've been dreading where both kids have activities basically during dinner. Thanks to baseball, I now somehow have to feed one kid that gets HOME at 6:30 and another that has to LEAVE at 6:30, not to mention DH and me. And of course, everyone in the house except for me is a picky eater.

Tonight I'm making tacos and will just leave everything on the island and people can help themselves en route, but what other ideas do more experienced moms have for nights like this? I feel like my brain is breaking a little at the thought of having to feed 4 people 3 separate meals!

That's what I do - make a dinner as if everyone is home and eating together. Each person eats the same dinner, just at a different time.

Or the other thing I do is plan leftovers for our crazy night. We'll eat leftovers that are up to 3 nights old. So M, T & W are "fresh meals." Thursday is a hodgepodge of the leftovers. DH may be eating Mondays dinner, DS & DD are eating Wednesday's dinner and I'm eating Tuesday's dinner.

I do have one who will eat some food cold, especially cold chicken. So he sometimes eats dinner on the go.

If your children are old enough, have them serve themselves. We typically just use the microwave for re-heating.

Don’t cater to picky eating unless there are genuine issues.

We've finally hit the ages I've been dreading where both kids have activities basically during dinner. Thanks to baseball, I now somehow have to feed one kid that gets HOME at 6:30 and another that has to LEAVE at 6:30, not to mention DH and me. And of course, everyone in the house except for me is a picky eater.

Tonight I'm making tacos and will just leave everything on the island and people can help themselves en route, but what other ideas do more experienced moms have for nights like this? I feel like my brain is breaking a little at the thought of having to feed 4 people 3 separate meals!