I hate food

I think there's a couple of things going on here where you could make life a lot easier for yourself

Plan your weeks meals & ensure that for at least 2 if not 3 meals you can double cook & have it 2 nights in a row. Things like beef stew, mild chicken & veg curry, chicken pie, cottage pie, bolognaise, fish pie, chicken casserole, mild chilli, lasagne etc

Serve dc theirs at 5pm & have yours & dhs ready to heat up whenever you're ready to eat

Share the cooking with your dh. He should be cooking a couple of nights a week

Build up a stock of small portions of dinners your dc will eat & freeze them. That way you have a quick hassle free proper dinner for them. Freeing you & dh up to have something you enjoy from time to time - a spicier dish, a takeaway or a supermarket ready meal deal etc

Focus on your own health & prioritise that. Even at 5ft 10" at 16 stone you're overweight & I'm sure you know that. You will feel better & have more energy if you tackle that & start eating healthily & properly. And it's a far better example for your dc too.

This doesn't mean starve yourself. It means being mindful to eat 3 proper nutritious meals each day. They can be v simple. I have lost 2.5 stones this year & generally only by eating mindfully & healthily. No fad diets.

A general I have weetabix for breakfast.
Soup for lunch. Either supermarket fresh tub or canteen in work or at least once a week I roast all the left over veg in the fridge &,add herbs & spices & stock & blend- gives us lunches for 2 or 3 days. I have mine with brown soda bread & real butter.

Dinner is something like fish, steamed potatoes with butter & salt & pepper & peas; or chicken & veg Curry - rice & naan for dh & dc, cauliflower rice for me; caesar salad kit from supermarket. Add extra such as tomato, Avocado, chicken or ham or hard boiled egg. Sparing on t by the dressing

Roast veg with herby chicken- one tray pan roast etc

Good luck!

I should add that when we were in the OPs position (kids eating earlier and us later) we did it differently in that I (at the time I was home earlier) cooked for the kids at 5ish and then DH cooked for us at 8-9 ish because neither of us would have wanted reheated food every day. That’s what worked for us. Now they’re a bit older (10, 9 and 4) we all eat together at around 6.30pm, depending on what activities everyone has in the evening.
I would absolutely never have cooked twice, that’s why DH and I shared the cooking. Maybe the OP’s DH could cook for the 2 of them if he wants to eat later?

Yeah I guess so. I just wouldn’t really enjoy one pot type stuff every day and I think my family would get a bit sick of it too. Then again my DH does the majority of the cooking as he works from home so it’s not something I have to stress about too much. Everyone has to do what’s right/convenient for them.

Which is why you wouldnt do a meal like that if you were in OPs position would you

The point is you plan meals around your lifestyle and routines, she has kids that need to eat early and then the adults eat later so you wouldnt cook a dish earlier on that cant be (or wont taste as good) reheated, you would do dishes like stews, curries, chillis, bolgnese, soups, pies, etc that can be reheated.

Cook one meal at 5 anyone not eating can reheat or make their own.

I'd try to eat three meals a day at set times. Make t a routine

This.

Make a casserole in a slow cooker, or a pasta sauce, feed your dcs and then reheat for you & DH.

Or Food for DCs is pretty easy. My DS when at primary school ate basically.....

Fish fingers, chips and peas
Sausages, mash and French beans
Tomato & bacon pasta
Chicken fajitas with salad
Spaghetti & meatballs
Pork chop & sweetcorn with couscous
Cheese & tomato omelette & chips

I could make any of these in 15 minutes.

That leaves you free to have a decent ready meal or a takeaway or persuade your DH to cook on the days you don't want to.

I would try and only cook once. So either you reheat food for your husband later or you reheat a previous days’ food for the kids. If you can make double the amount of food and freeze it sometimes that might help too.

If people are reheating meals for later, what sort of meals do you have? I get it for things like bolognese or other ‘one pot’ type stuff, but otherwise doesn’t it go a bit rank? Yesterday we had steak, corn on the cob, broccoli and garlic and rosemary potatoes, I can’t imagine eating that reheated!

I kept my mealtimes the same as the Dc when they were small. DH’s was
plated up and reheated later. No way I would be cooking twice, weekends or if DH working from home he would eat with us at 5pm

OP, when my DC were little and starving and needed to eat at that time to get to bed for 7-7.30, we basically ate on a rota.

E.g. make a big bolognese on Monday. Kids eat it at 5 pm, adults eat it later.

Same idea on Tuesday, different meal (e.g. curry).

Wednesday - easy pizza for kids, adults have leftovers from Monday (bolognese).

Thursday - kid meal early and parents eat leftovers from Tuesday.

Friday - cook once, eat different times (or together if you stretch bedtime ).

Sat/Sun eat together, slightly later. Cheese and crackers for adults after kids in bed.

Mine were in nursery and then after-school club a couple of days and had a sort of meal there so only really needed a sandwich in the evening.

My XH was a good cook, but basically left it to me unless it was a weekend. But if your DH would pick a couple of days then it becomes much easier.

One of my DC is now vegetarian and I keep a list of veggie meals everyone likes and meals that can be slightly tweaked to add meat at the end. Then I can pick one when I can't think of anything in the moment.

My DC are teens now, but they still come home from school ravenous and need a substantial snack to wait until 6.30 pm to eat dinner.

I used to cook a nice meal for me and DH, but one suited to leftovers. Then I would reheat the leftovers the next day for the toddlers at 5pm. Worked really well as it meant I wasn’t cooking with them under feet and could quickly get it on the table for them.

Just depends on preference really. I like to be winding down by 8pm, not cooking and washing up! I'm in bed by 9pm to read/scroll my phone and go to sleep around 10.

I go to the office most days but DH works from home. He logs off about 6 and starts cooking, so we can eat at 6.30pm when I get in.

I wfh too, but I’d never eat that early! Same as I said with my retired family, they eat 8pm earliest!!

No, full time here, I just work from home the majority of the week so all I need to do is turn off the laptop at 5 and can start getting dinner ready.

I remember this stage well. It seemed as though I was constantly cooking and I hated it. Now the kids are older we all eat together from Friday to Monday. When we are in the office mid week and not home til 6:30, the kids are fed at after school childcare and we eat at 8:30ish.

I did a meal for us at 8.00, and then heated up the leftovers for the DC for their tea at 5.00 the next day.

This doesn’t work with some things (stir fry) but for spag bol, or mild curry, or cottage pie, or baked potatoes etc it’s fine and it feels like a lot less cooking.

We eat at 5.30pm. We’re all hungry then. Dh finishes work at 5pm and walks home, he gets in about 5.10pm (only works 5 mins or so up the road) and it works for us. I wouldn’t be doing two lots of dinner, if your dh really can’t eat with the kids then he can either heat up whatever it was later or help himself to something.

I view that sort of time as toddler tea time, not adult tea time and Im still at work in any case!

OP you just need to (if you are the one doing cooking) cook up a tray bake a day or one dish dinner a day and then the kids eat at what time is suitable for them and you and OH eat later (if you are hungry)

If you are carrying a lot of excess weight then clearly you're eating enough but perhaps not the right things as you say, snacky things rather than real meals which wont be helping your energy levels or motivation

Do the people who eat at 5/6pm have a non-working parent, or very part time at least? I don't understand how it can be done if you're both working until that time.

We also have horses so 5-7 is the time we look after them and ride etc. So little chance of eating before 8 here.

All of which i realise wasn't the point of the OP. To that I'd suggest cooking one meal and heating later for adults.

Loads of people work from home these days though! I work full time but eat around 6pm on WFH days, I start cooking usually when I finish work at 5.

You haven't said why your DH wants to eat so late - if it's because he's working, you eat with the dc and he has his warmed up. We did that for years when my DH was working late.

Otherwise maybe compromise and eat at 6. There's no good reason for you to be spending hours in the kitchen each evening, and there's nothing more likely to put you off food.

Get a slow cooker, stick everything in in the morning, there are some really good slow cooker cook books on kindle if you need inspiration - you can literally make everything. Then you are all eating the same thing, no 'cooking' involved, can feed everyone as and when.

Have you thought about getting a big family sized slow cooker? You can literally just chuck all your meat veg and a sauce in there in the morning, then at 5 kids can have theirs, you can switch it to the keep warm setting, then later on you and dh can have yours?

I hear you. “What’s for dinner?” Has become my most hated and dreaded question. I’m so fed up with thinking, planning, shopping, cooking, cleaning up. Aaaaaagh!

my partner usually says “thanks for dinner, it was delicious!” Last night they all had chicken burgers because I am feeling ill and I didn’t want or eat anything. He said “thanks for dinner, it was………..dinner.”

furious. I wish that I could get him to take on some of the burden but he works long hours and I currently don’t, so it’s my job.