To ask your ‘family menu’ of a typical day

[Cuppasoupmonster]

Stagnating a bit with meal ideas, want to mix it up a bit. Can I ask your ‘typical family menu’ for breakfast lunch & dinner please? Would especially welcome responses from those with picky toddlers..! Thanks x

Hello,

we have a fussy toddler. She doesn’t eat anything resembling a “hot dinner”. Our days usually look like:

• breakfast is porridge, or homemade muesli or nut butter toast, plain yogurt, fruit.
• lunch is crackers/oatcakes, cheese, veg sticks (pepper and cucumber usually), hummus, fruit.
• dinner for toddler is similar to lunch, or dippy eggs and toast, peas/broccoli, occasionally will eat homemade soup or Dahl. We then offer a little bit of our dinner e.g beef stew, lentil bakes, cauliflower cheese, grilled fish, roasted vegetables etc. usually nothing is eaten by her but occasionally a mouthful or two are
• we don’t eat snacks, only drink water

I have a toddler age nearly 3.

Breakfast (same every day): yogurt, there is always cut up fruit on the table and toddler will eat anything from none to huge amount of fruit; cereal is on offer but he usually doesn’t want any.

midmorning snacks: usually a good amount of cut up cucumber, probably also an apple, and some kind of carb (sandwich or plain bagel or cereal)

main meal: at preschool he gets a meat meal with rice/pasta and veg. At home it depends on the day but usually there will be meat or fish or lentils or soya “meat” once a day.

snack: a couple of biscuits. Once or twice a week he will get some crisps or pretzels or similar.

evening meal: a light quick meal like omelette, pasta and tomato sauce, homemade tuna patties, stir fry with tofu, soup. His favourite is pasta with pesto and peas.

Weekends: I’m a bit of a foodie; he gets to eat pretty much what I’m having. He is weirdly enthusiastic about grilled aubergine, probably because the first time I didn’t offer him any as it was “for adults”. He also eats an insane amount of bread if it’s on offer. We don’t usually do puddings but he can spot a cake from miles away.

I give my 1 year old the meals we eat. I don’t want to be cooking twice and she eats better if she can see that we have the same!!

One ds school age who eats most things and has a good appetite. Today’s menu;

Breakfast - Porridge with fruit, glass of orange juice, actimel drink.

Lunch: Toasted sandwich, fruit, yogurt

Dinner : Gnocchi with roasted mixed peppers in a pesto sauce.
Apple crumble and custard.

I have a 16 month old and she usually has something like this

Milk in the morning and evening
Breakfast- buttered toast and yoghurt (sometimes strawberries also)

1 or 2 snacks a day such as apple, orange slices, strawberries, raisins, banana, those veggie puff/stick baby crisp things or a Bear fruit yoyo

Lunch is usually one of the following,
cheese and cold meat omlette, french toast, fish fingers/chicken dippers with low sugar and salt beans or spaghetti hoops, baked potato and cheese

For dinner she loves chicken pasta bake, macaroni cheese, spaghetti bolognaise, chicken curry and rice, pizza and chips/boiled potatoes

She drinks water throughout the day. I need to work on adding more vegetables and better meal options but I'm just glad she's eating what she is. She was a very tiny baby and is still quite small for her age.

We all eat the same, and eat together; we have a three year old.

Typical menu:

Breakfast: Porridge and honey, and he likes toasted fruit bread (I’m coeliac so we eat a GF fruit one by Genius), drink for him is water or very diluted squash at weekends only (he stopped drinking his milk, but eats a lot of cheese and yoghurt)

Lunch: fish cakes and peas or broccoli and new potatoes, he also likes soup and bread, pasta dishes and pizza. He doesn’t like sandwiches, so lunch sometimes might be fish fingers and beans for him, while we eat sandwiches if we want something quick.

Dinner: roast dinner and all the trimmings, curry and rice, chilli and rice, kedgeree (yes, really), lasagne, poached fish with potatoes and broccoli, fish pie, shepherd’s pie, beef stew, chicken casserole, risotto, paella, spaghetti bolognese, macaroni cheese

Snacks: fruit, yoghurt or pain au chocolat or flapjack

Yanbu to ask but it's not really an AIBU question.

My two like anything with mince so will eat spaghetti bolognaise, chili and rice, cottage pie. They also like chicken curry and rice, pasta, jacket potato and tuna or beans. They usually have freezer tapas once a week, fish fingers or chicken nuggets.

I know it is frowned upon on MN but we have very different menus in our family with some overlap. This is because I and DS2 (aged 11) eat everything. DS1 (13) has autism and sensory processing disorder and a very limited diet and DH is a vegetarian who has a very small appetite.

So, a typical day would be this (each bullet point is a different member of the family within our various comfort zones).

B

• toast with marmalade yoghurt and fruit (me)
• toast with jam, yoghurt, fruit and a small bowl cheerios (DS2)
• toast with cream cheese or nutella and a vitamin tablet (DS1)
• sliced fresh fruit (DH)

L

• ham and salad sandwich / vegetable soup/ eggs on toast (me)
• school meals DS2 - today was spagetti meatballs with garlic bread (DS2)
• plain spagetti with cheese and hula hoops (DS1)
• cheese and coleslaw sandwich (DH)

D

• chicken schnitzel with mash, peas, carrots and apple sauce (me)
• same (DS2)
• plain poached chicken with raw carrot sticks and other raw vegetable sticks (DS2)
• salad / vegetable sides from my dinner (DH)

Pudding (if applicable)

• grapes, a piece of chocolate (me)
• same with a chocolate cookie (DS2)
• rich tea biscuit and a cup of herbal tea (DS1)
• tea dn lots of hobnobs (DH)

That would be pretty representative I would say.

We don't do breakfast or lunch (my kids are teens, one rarely eats before dinner, the other has his own strict regime). But most of these dinners were featured, with the odd chicken nugget and chips night if they were being fussy.
So it's dinner only that I cook (though I did make pumpkin soup last weekend which was scrumptious).
On any given night we'll have:
Chilli - I use Nigella's Express recipe
Chicken curry - again Nigella's Express
Hungarian Goulash - Waitrose recipe
Marinated tuna (in olive oil, soy sauce, grated ginger, lime and a bit of sugar), served with tomato, avocado, mozzarella and basil salad.
Pasta and meatballs (I use ready made meatballs in sauce).
Jamie Oliver's Hit n Run chicken (chicken thighs roasted on a bed of onions, tomatoes, peppers and garlic with olive oil and balsamic vinegar with lots of paprika).
Homemade lasagna
Jamie's wild boar salami pasta bake (made with Milano salami as I can't find wild boar).
Sausages, mash and veggies with onions and gravy.
Lamb with baked or roasted potatoes.
Store made chicken Kiev with veg and potato.
That's about it.

Breakfast: pancakes, croissants, fruit or cereal - I let them choose.

lunch: sandwiches, or crackers and cheese, with veggies, small amount of crisps and some yoghurt.

dinner: shepherds pie, roasts, lasagnes, pasta bakes, stews. Anything we eat, I’ll do for the kids. Even curry, I just make it slightly milder.

pudding after dinner: either a bit more fruit with yoghurt or if they’ve had loads of fruit and veg we might have a bit of homemade cake or ice cream.

Only teen DS at home with us at the moment.

Breakfast - cereal for everyone though DS had 2 bacon rolls for a change this morning. DH and I have coffee, DS has water.

Lunch - sandwiches or stuff on toast. Occasionally soup or previous nights leftovers. If it's a school day DS normally has either a full cooked meal or a panini there.

Dinner - We eat a lot of curry, chillies & pasta. All GF as DH/DS are intolerant. Sometimes chicken or fish with plenty of veg. DH and I normally have a yoghurt after dinner and there's always fruit on offer.

DS snacks on crisps, nuts and chocolate. Occasionally toast. Sound unhealthy but he's supposed to be gaining weight and we made the decision that anything goes as long as he's eating!

Cereal for breakfast because who can be bothered with cooking things on a normal morning. On a weekend we might have a mid morning snack of a pastry in a coffee shop.

Lunch is some form of sandwich more often than not, a toastie, a bagel etc with fruit and yoghurt for toddler.

Toddler then probably has a biscuit and some raisins or fruit in the afternoon.

Dinner is something like risotto, salmon pasta, chilli with toppings or a roast chicken with veg. Toddler just has the same, maybe with an extra portion of peas and broccoli or something.

Sweets or chocolate with a glass of wine after DD is in bed!

We all eat the same I've 4 children between 2 & 8
Today was
Jam on toast
Banana for mid morning snack
Jacket potato with cheese and beans and crunchy salad for lunch
Apple & nut butter for after noon snack
Beef ragu for dinner
Grapes and strawberries for afters
Yogurt and mixed berries for supper
They mainly drink water or milk with the odd cup of juice

Breakfast varies depending on hunger/weather/time available: cereal, toast and peanut butter and banana, sometimes scrambled egg on toast, less frequently bacon and toast, more rarely pancakes
Lunch: school dinners or cheese or ham or sometimes smoked salmon sandwich, apple or other fruit, snacky
thing like soreen or KitKat or peperami or crisps.

Dinner: nothing exciting usually, typical meals chicken thighs and potatoes and veg, sausages and rice and veg, fajitas, pasta and sauce and bacon or meatballs or chicken, fishcakes, stir fry etc.

Am following this thread for inspiration really. I bought a soup maker with good intentions last weekend but haven't used it yet

Typical day

Breakfast-
Porrdige/toast/fruit

Lunch-
Sandwich/home made soup/scrambled eggs

Dinner-
Chilli or curry with rice and bread

We don't do puddings but snacks are fruit crisps, crackers usually
No juice just water to drink

Weekends usually involve a roast dinner and a bottle of red wine

What my 2.5 year old twins had today:

Breakfast: porridge with mashed banana and strawberries mixed in. A banana. Two strawberries. A small amount of AllBran with milk.

Lunch: roast chicken breast, mashed potato, gravy, peas, carrots, sweet corn.
Desert: an orange. More milk.

Dinner: scrambled eggs on toast. Cheese, cherry tomatoes, cucumber, ham slices, olives, avocado, nut butter.

No snacks today, but often they'll have a punnet of blueberries/raspberries or mango /apple/kiwi in the afternoon.

Thank you all, lots of ideas there 🍲