What time do you prefer to eat dinner?

[TripletDaddy]

I like that about Europe. It's one of the reasons I'd like to live there someday.

another option is to save yourself a trip halfway around the planet and simply start eating later at your own house.

[CardiacCoug]

My wife and I had different concepts about dinnertime when we got married.

In my family we usually ate around 5 PM. In my wife's family, they ate between 7 and 8 PM. We compromised and eat around 6 PM usually, although I'm sometimes still at work.

In general, I think people who grow up on a farm or in the country traditionally eat dinner a lot earlier than people who grow up in cities.

Also, our ideas about Sunday dinner plans are different. I like to eat a big Sunday dinner around an hour after we get home from church because that is how my family always did it. My wife treats Sunday like any other day -- small lunch right after church (either 12 or 2 PM) and a big dinner at the usual time in the evening. I've been trying to convince her to do Sunday my way for the last 12 years, but haven't made much progress.

[CardiacCoug]

6.

Any later and I feel like I am going to get fatter.

One of my mission companions went on a diet where the only rule was that he wouldn't eat anything between 6 PM and 6 AM -- kind of a reverse Ramadan. He lost about 40 pounds over 4 months.

[Hazzard]

another option is to save yourself a trip halfway around the planet and simply start eating later at your own house.

See first post.

[BlueHair]

We're done by five.

Weird. I always pictured you as a young lady.

[BlueHair]

We generally eat at about 9:00 PM. I would love to be one of those up all night and sleep all day guys.

[kccougar]

Funny - mrs.kccougar and I were just discussing this last night. At our home, we eat dinner pretty regularly at 5:30. My wife has a single-mother friend that serves her main meal to her and her 2 boys at 3 or 4, right after they get home from school. It makes sense since that kids are always hungry when they get home from school.

If it were up to me, I would eat later, but my wife can't go many hours without eating. She's always surprised when I call her from out of town, usually on my way to eat somewhere around 8 or 9 pm.

My preferred eating schedule:
Breakfast - nothing.
Lunch - 11:30a
Dinner - 8:00p

[marsupial]

We eat soon after danimal gets home from work and we're usually done with it by 6 p.m. This is fine with me. If we had to eat any later though, I'd have to have a snack to tide me over. We're early risers, so we eat breakfast early and lunch early (sometimes even before the clock strikes 11) so there's no way I'd make it to 7 or 8 from then.

[Babs]

Weird. I always pictured you as a young lady.

I was wondering when somebody would get the Furrs joke in.

[Babs]

We're early risers, so we eat breakfast early and lunch early (sometimes even before the clock strikes 11) so there's no way I'd make it to 7 or 8 from then.

I avoid these problems by having a strict policy of eating every three hours. 8, 11, 2, 5, 8. Makes for a lot of dishes, though.

[Pheidippides]

I am all over the map. For various reasons involving bedtime and other such things, the wife and kids eat at 5:30. For various reasons that mostly involve work, I am not there very often. I feel bad about that, but not bad enough to take a lower paying job.

[cowboy]

I love eating dinner at 6.

Please note that dinner is not my final intake, but dinner at 6 is fine with me.

I generally quit work at 6 and home by 6:30, so dinner starts between 6:30 and 7:00, and it lasts until I go to bed.

[PaloAltoCougar]

How 'bout those Spaniards? When we tried to get reservations at 7 at a Madrid eatery, the maitre'd laughed at us. Apparently the Spaniards don't get serious about dinner until 9 or 10. We persuaded the place to seat us at 8, but we dined alone until others starting wandering in after 9. When we left shortly after ten, the restaurant was just beginning to fill up. Europeans tend to eat later, but the Spaniards seem to be on the far end of the time scale.

7 is fine for me.

[Clark Addison]

I usually eat a banana for breakfast and a carton of yogurt for lunch, so I like to eat as soon as I get home. That's usually between 6:30 and 9:00, so it varies.

[cowboy]

How 'bout those Spaniards? When we tried to get reservations at 7 at a Madrid eatery, the maitre'd laughed at us. Apparently the Spaniards don't get serious about dinner until 9 or 10. We persuaded the place to seat us at 8, but we dined alone until others starting wandering in after 9. When we left shortly after ten, the restaurant was just beginning to fill up. Europeans tend to eat later, but the Spaniards seem to be on the far end of the time scale.

7 is fine for me.

I respect a culture that knows how to eat. When they eat doesn't matter so much, but what they eat is important. Brazilians come to mind, as do the Polynesians. Don't call it a meal unless there is some sort of animal roasting over an open flame - that's my motto. And it ain't a formal meal unless multiple species are involved.