To think most people *haven't* eaten dinner by 6pm??

[JumboShiitake]

According to DP "most people" have eaten dinner by 6pm.

Referring to adults, not children.

He's obsessed with eating at a time I consider pretty early.

I'm giving him the side eye

When we were working we always ate between 5.45 and 6.15. We just wanted to get it done and cleared away giving us more time to relax in the evening. Were usually home around 4.30/5.00 as could start between 6.30 and 7.00 in the morning.

Have continued this since retiring as we still like to get cleared away earlyish and not have to faff around all evening.

Breakfast at 6.30. Lunch at 12.00 dinner at 5.30. Bed at 9

In "normal" times we wouldn't even be home before 6 so no wouldn't be eating until at least 7pm. Since we have both been wfh we eat earlier though. The kids are hungry earlier and I eat better if food is cooked earlier. All depends on your circumstances I suppose!

We have ours anywhere between 5 and 6.

We prefer to eat with our dc and dp is starving when he comes in from work at 5

I eat at 5pm with the kids. But DH and I used to eat around 6.30-7pm when we were child free, which I would say is the most typical time, based on people I know. Friends of ours don't even start cooking their evening meal until their children are asleep so they usually eat around 9.30pm (which when we visit always throws me as I'm used to eating so early now!)

I prefer to be sitting down to eat at 6 or soon thereafter. I hate to eat later than 7, if I can help it. My husband would probably eat slightly later, left to his own devices, but he's okay with sticking to my preferred schedule.

Before I had kids I would never be home until about 7pm. Usually are around 8pm, but sometimes as late as 9pm. I think that's pretty standard. Not changed much since really, only that now if I eat with the kids it's more like 6/6.30pm so they eat just before bed.

Mostly I feed the kids and then come back to mine though so I can eat in peace!

Even my kids have never eaten their evening meal by 6.

That’s really quite early unless you’re eating with small children. We’ve started eating at about 6.45pm since lockdown 1 and it feels quite early. I found I was getting hungry (probably boredom) and snacking so we eat earlier and it’s helped a lot.

Isn't it relative. When you get up , go to bed! Have lunch! Age of children, whether you have dinner with your children.

We aim for a 5.30 tea, we have 1 school age child and I work in schools so have a 12pm lunch! Also dp is up at 4 so is in bed before 9. But I often have a supper!

I don't care when other people have tea/ dinner.

Not at ours! Back from work-pick up youngest DC& head to gym( most nights) home, shower heat up a dinner..usually its7.30 at earliest.
Dont think we've had dinner at 5.30 since DC were 8-9 yrs?

@EggysMom

This may be a cultural thing - I believe Europeans tend to eat later, Americans eat earlier.

I'm born and bred English, we eat dinner (tea?) at 7pm.

6:30 to 7:00 is pretty typical here in the US. It may be a bit earlier if we're getting a takeaway and don't have to cook.

Must be cultural. Most people I know have dinner between 5 and 6pm. We do. Well me and the DC. My DH has a long commute but that's unusual round here, so his dinner gets left in the oven and it's still warm when he gets home at 7.

I thought it was a European thing to have dinner so late. When I lived in the UK my British housemates had dinner around the same time as me?

I don't finish work until close to 8Pm most days

We have dinner at 5 as we eat with the kids

YANBU.
I've often had jobs that finished at 5 rather than 5.30, don't believe in doing free overtime and lived close to work and even I haven't always had and finished my dinner by 6.
Eating at 6, yes sometimes, but being done by 6 is different.

5.30-6.30. I'd never sleep if I ate as late as some of you!

I think it may be a class thing, passed down through the generations - manual workers would've been hungrier earlier. And we call it tea.

Unsurprisingly when abroad (remember that...) we're always the first in restaurants in the evenings! As for being hungry later in the night, that's what tea and biscuits are for.

I tend to eat about 1730 so we can eat with DS, but on weekends sometimes we will do something for him and then me and DH will eat later at 2000. Out of choice if it was just me I would probably have dinner halfway between the 2 around 1900ish!

@LizFlowers it doesn't matter, but there's a certain section of MN which has a horror of the possibility of being thought common so spend quite some time working out what that is and isn't. Supper; rotary airers; leopard-print; mum; loo brushes....

(I'm the opposite: I loudly proclaim my ancestry and roots at every opportunity in a mildly pathetic attempt at being thought Salt of the Earth )

I eat dinner early with DD, but DP doesn't eat until at least 8pm. Partly because of work, but also because he'll just eat again later on in the evening if he eats that early.

When we were kids we ate around 5pm/6pm and were then packed off to bed.

I would have thought a lot of people wouldn't even be finished with work/home from home by 6pm...

We eat at 7.30pm.

My parents eat at 8pm.

I've house shared with lots of people in my 80s and would say 7-8pm is pretty usual.

One of my housemates didn't eat until 10pm because he was weird Spanish.

5-6pm here.

By 6pm? Like, before 6pm? Has he been hanging out at nurseries and old people's homes?

How early would you have to get home to have cooked and eaten before 6pm? How many jobs and commutes allow that? Not many (even now, especially not in normal times), pl

Plenty of jobs of jobs finish before 6.pm Manufacturing, retail. Cleaning. Office work.

My dp works shifts in a factory and also does days. Finished either at half four or 2 pm. I start at 6 and finish at 2 quite often

My last job I finished at 4.30 and was home by 445

We don't all work in offices or high end management jobs and we all don't have hours off commuting everyday because we're not working in cities etc

Even post lockdown there's still many many jobs where people finish at 5 or so

We haven’t eaten yet.
Usually aim for 8pm but running late tonight.

This is one of those weird class things where some people think it’s common to eat early.