AIBU to not want to decide what’s for sodding dinner?

[MellowPinkDeer]

By far, the worst bit of being an adult is decided what’s for dinner. Ask the kids ‘ I don’t mind’ when they do, because they are pretty fussy. Ask DH he ‘isn’t bothered’ but of course SOMEONE has to be bothered or no one is eating anything??

I’m so over being the only person who has to think about this daily nonsense - are these responses from others just purely laziness?

AIBU to just serve up toast every night?!

This video probably sums it up -

We do a menu at the start of the week I will never fill in all the blanks and if they don’t, I put a name to the blank

it’s only me and DH now but he still choses over half the dinners

and it also means that in the day it’s already decided so no last minute panic

First thing I’m doing when I win the lottery is to employ a butler. They can meal plan, cook, dish up and clean up after. People keep saying being rich doesn’t make you happy. They’re fools - I’d be bloody ecstatic if I didn’t have to do this every day!

It should be shared as you have a partner. Keep it simple, jacket potatoes etc

I'd just cook whatever I fancy and anyone who doesn't want it knows where the weetabix is.

I just decide now and make what I want as I'm so over the "don't mind, whatever" responses. Then when DH or DS screw their face up at their plates, I tell them it's tough shit as they apparently "didn't mind".

Love it when adult DD is home though as she has really similar taste in food to me and when asked what she wants, she'll reply with one of the things I cook that she (and I) both love.

I hate this. My kids are both ND with food issues, I’m a lone vegetarian and my husband doesn’t seem to ever know what he wants to eat ever. DS happy eating same 3 meals on repeat but DD seems permanently annoyed at dinner choice (despite never suggesting ideas, offering to help cook, or actually eating the things she claims to want).

Yes, it’s unbearable. Finding things that all four of us will eat is nearly impossible. So sick of the same old things on repeat.

Oh god I agree. Worst of all, if I ask my husband he usually says “I don’t mind - just something light.” And I’m like FFS I wish I never asked. Now I still have to think of something myself but now it can’t even be something nice - it has to be a bit shit!!

This is the main reason why we get a green chef box delivered every week. Each of the four of us picks a meal and cooks it. Takeaway on a Friday night. Makes my life so much easier and I’m only having to cook once midweek.

When the children were very young and I worked part time, I meal planned and for a while just had 14 meals rotating - money was tighter then and it helped with shopping too.

When the children were young teenagers and pre teen and I worked shifts I did all the shopping and put the meal and what shift I was working on the family calendar and if shirts meant I wasn't going to be home before 6pm whoever was had to cook the meal on the calendar. DH never cooked but he did all the laundry and the children cooked once each per week on average, and me the days I was on earlies or off.

I never managed not to be the one deciding what was for dinner, only managed to do it in advance and have someone else cook!

Only now the kids are grown up and nearly grown up, but some still living at home and one back most weekends, do they sometimes suggest what we could have for dinner and very, very occasionally cook for everyone spontaneously even though I'll be home at a reasonable hour without me saying what should be cooked or asking.

It's definitely mental load stuff - even though it's much better with older teens I am still aware that the only healthy meal a couple of the teenagers eat is the family evening meal, and on the occasional days I just say I'm not organising what the meal is and they should sort themselves out, no vegetables will pass their lips all day. Bit of a fail there despite well over a decade and a half of modelling healthy dinners... Only my eldest (who lives away Monday to Friday) spontaneously plans and cooks healthy, balanced meals.

YANBU

A yes this is a pet hate of mine too - it's better not to ask people who answer like that! My mother says "nothing heavy, I'd be happy with a few picky bits 🤢 which not only sounds revolting but leaves me completely unable to meet her vague requirements without going back out to the shops to buy a wider range of ingredients for tapas/ buffet style light options.

My husband will also unhelpfully suggest we eat the leftovers from last night which are invariably enough for a small portion for one or two people when there are going to be five or six adults and adult sozed teens at dinner (and which he could have eaten for lunch instead of making himself something else as he does home office).

I don't ask.....it would be horrendous! I have a list of foods that most people will eat and it's on rotation. Sometimes I declare a toast night or DIY night.

I have a list for the week so just pick off there , i don’t ask ds and dh what they want .

I’d do a full week of different things on toast 😂

Oh I hear you OP! I don't mind drives me mad, I tell them to stop pretending to be so easy going because we all know it's bullshit. I absolutely refuse to cook multiple dinners so it's one thing, and that means someone is always disappointed. I've tried to get them to put a meal plan together, not even weekly, but more like sit down once a year or season and list the things you can all have and I'll work on a rotation. It didn't happen.

What did help was a monthly wall chart where I write dinner every day for the month of September. Monday: stir fry Tuesday spaghetti bol etc. New wall chart for October etc. No more questions, I just point to the wall chart or tell them look it up themselves. It also manages disappointment and stops people passing remarks.

After 20 years of menu planning & cooking I am just so completely fed up with it. Left alone (rarely) I just eat wholemeal pitta & tomatoes & cottage cheese nowadays.

Women are sold this whole ‘o the joy of cooking for your family!’ bullshit- ‘o how fulfilling it is!’- but combining menu planning & cooking every day with FULL-TIME WORK, looking after kids, looking after elderly relatives, shopping, housework, laundry and family administration is not a fulfilling joy, it’s an exhausting misery.

Ties in with lots of bigger issues about how feminism has been hijacked by economic interests, not to liberate women, but to make them into exhausted, burnt out servants.

I share the weekly meal plan on the family WhatsApp so no more “What’s for dinner?”. No more grazing from the fridge as most things have been bought for a purpose. Snacks are crackers or fruit.

Obviously it’s flexible and at the end of the week my plan looks like a Snakes and Ladders board. But not having a plan gives much more mental load.

DH would be an "I don't mind" but genuinely is happy with 99.9% of food as long as I swerve a few consistent things like fish or cabbage. He's not the problem and would eat pretty much anything I'd fancy for myself.

The DCs... they can't think of anything productive other than wedges, cheese & bacon, but are quick to have an opinion if it doesn't suit... then they'll leave it and get hangry. Being ND does not help.

All the "easy" fall back options suggested on threads make me laugh... the toast, beans, eggs, baked potatoes, soups, cereal... every single one vetoed by DS1 🤬
He's a bloody nightmare. And DS2 can be fickle too. He won't eat DS1's staple of pesto pasta with olives. 🙄

Goes and slams head in fridge door

It sucks any pleasure from cooking.
I had 20 years of that with DC at home. It's easier now it's just two of us.
I eventually had a system where I wrote a weekly list which was not set in stone There was nothing on there I knew the DC disliked .
They actually really liked it and it definitely helped me.

Here’s a meal plan from 02/06/2025. Nothing more than 30 minutes hands-on time. And at least half the meals can be cooked by anyone in the house at the time.
Monday: Rotisserie chicken, potatoes and salad.
Tuesday: Salmon and broccoli. Banana bread (also does breakfast).
Wednesday: Bacon and white cabbage Irish style. Fruit cobbler.
Thursday: Lemon chicken and chickpea/minted couscous salad.
Friday (hosting, not sure of time or numbers): Cold veal slices with tuna/boiled egg/caper cream (Vitello tonnato). Lightly pickled cucumber salad. Fresh fruit custard tart.
Saturday lunch: egg fried rice. Dinner out.
Sunday lunch:G.Rana Ravioli, charcuterie and 3 bean salad.
Dinner: Frozen pizza or leftovers.
Fresh fruit and vegetables every day.

This is why I only cook for myself! You can all fend for yourselves!

I agree, it’s the worst household chore in my opinion!

I’ve started doing what my grandmother always did - cooking a big roast on Sunday and using that as the basis for a couple of meals during the week. I find it gives a bit of much-needed structure!
So we cycle through roast chicken, beef, pork and gammon, or very occasionally lamb.
And we have a set of meals that use each type of leftover meat as their base, so we choose from those - things like risotto, pasta, curry, salad, pie, etc.
So that covers three meals.
Then we often tend to make a spaghetti Bolognese on Saturdays, and use the other half of the sauce in a lasagne on a Monday, so that’s another two meals.
Then the other two days tend to be quick and easy because of work and school schedules - pizza usually, or something you can stick in the oven straight from the freezer.
But I still often come unstuck for weekend lunches! I always forget to plan for those.

I hate it too, OP.
I’m veggie but DH and DC eat meat, so some nights I’m having to choose two different meals.
I ask DH ‘what meat do you want’ before I go shopping. Always the response is ‘I don’t mind.’ Or ‘I don’t know.’ Why do I have to choose the meat when I don’t even eat it??!!!
I just do the same meals over and over and it’s soooo boring. I don’t have the energy to try and come up with something different.

It’s always been the bane of my life, esp when I had kids at home. Could guarantee what was one person’s favourite was another’s nemesis.

I made a list on my iPad of all the family meals I could think of, then at the start of each week I’d pick 7 meals - X’s favourite one day, Y’s favourite the next, etc. If I’d been trying to decide day to day I’d have driven myself mad.