Everyday Systems

Hi all,
I'm struggling a bit lately with a virtual plating issue, and I'd love to hear any wisdom you may have.

From my check in thread:

I'm having a hard time lately with plating, mostly due to my son's meals. We introduced solids, and I'm currently giving him a bunch of finger food at breakfast lunch and dinner. Veggies and fruits mostly. I'm also trying to eat with him at the dining table, so we set up the idea of meals as a family thing, sitting at the table, etc. The problem is that sometimes, especially in the evening, I eat a small serve of veggies as finger food with my son, and then the main part of my meal later with my DH. This virtual plating is of course very easy to take advantage of and start playing fast and loose with the rules (i.e. just eat two dinners, one small and one normal sized).

Hi, I think it's great to eat with your child, I hate seeing parents shovel food into their child's mouth whilst they are on the phone etc and then exclude them from the proper dinner! It sets up poor eating habits for life.

I don't know about your schedule so I don't have any advice but what has worked for us is having an early family dinner so we can all eat together (sometime between 5-6). We did baby led weaning so Ruby ate the same food as us from 6 months onwards and never choked (but did smear it all over the place!)

My husband doesn't mind as he can grab a snack later on. I thought I would be starving by bedtime, but my appetite has adjusted and I just get hungry at 5!

I've not yet mastered virtual plating so I avoid it wherever possible!

Perhaps you can eat the veggies only with your son, and the remainder of the food with your husband? Depends on how much veggies you like to eat...a third of your plate or a half of it. Then later, with your husband, fill your plate 2/3 (or 1/2) with the other food offerings. You could do the same with a casserole. Just leave a space on your plate which the veggies (or whatever) formerly occupied.

Like Minkymoo's family, we've always done an early family dinner. Our schedule is different now so we eat closer to six but it was closer to 5 when DD was little. DH may have a snack later in the evening but it is pretty rare, like once a month or so. We both grew up in homes with early family dinners so this seems natural to us.

If you are eating two evening meals, it may be good to come up with a few dietary defaults (veggies, fruits and the like) that you can have during your meal with your little one so you don't have to worry about the logistics too much.

From the time they started eating solids, the kids always ate with us. It was always my goal to get them on our schedule rather than change our schedule to suit them.

We made our family dinner time earlier too, between 5:30 and 6:00. But that only works if everyone can be home on time. Otherwise, you could stick to non-starchy veges at the earlier dinner, you can never have too many of those.
For a while, several years ago, I was making two dinners. One earlier for my daughter and then cooking a second time for my husband and I. I soon found that was way too much work and decided there would only be one dinner. The kids eat what we eat and we all eat together.

Thanks for all the replies, I knew there would be some words of wisdom from the forum

I think the idea of just making dinner earlier is probably a good one. At the moment baby dinner is around 5pm, with BF at 6 and bedtime about 6:30pm. We're doing baby led weaning too, so the food he eats is the same we have later (with a few exceptions if we're having something really spicy). So, all I was doing was having a mini-serve early with baby and then another serve of the same foods later. I'm happy to eat at 5, I don't get too hungry by bedtime.

My DH has sports training a few nights a week (home after 7:30), which is why I was doing our dinner later after our son is in bed, but perhaps I can just have a tea (or a wine) and chat with my husband while he eats?

All of this will get easier once our son is a bit older and we can move his dinner a little later and all eat together.

I used to give the kids a small snack at the earlier "mealtime" and then they ate dinner later with us. So, a small snack at 5 or earlier, then dinner with us at 6-ish, then bath and bed.