As I said in the previous post, I really enjoyed Pollan's
use of the academic research in his book. He found some gems. Steve and I liked this:
In fact, most American families today report eating dinner together three to four nights a week, but even those meals bear only the faintest resemblance to the Norman Rockwell ideal. If you install video cameras in the kitchen and dining room ceilings about typical American families, as marketers for the major food companies have done, you'll quickly discover that the reality of the family dinner has diverged substantially from our image of it. Mom might still cook something for herself and sit at the table for a while, but she'll be alone for much of that time. That's because dad and each of the kids are likely to prepare an entirely different entree for themselves, "preparing" in this case being a synonym for microwaving a package. Each family member might then join mom at the able for as long as it takes to eat, but not necessarily all at the same time. Technically, this kind of feeding counts as a family diner in the survey results, though it's hard to believe it performs all the customary functions of a shared meal. (p.189-190)
Apt. 11d 
On the other hand, how many 50s dinners consisted of mom serving dinner and spending the whole time bringing things in and out of the kitchen?
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That really is hard to believe (although I don’t doubt it). I think everyone we know has family dinner every night, with the exception of the retirees… All the elderly couples we know eat separately, for some reason.
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“All the elderly couples we know eat separately, for some reason.”
Dentures? Run out of conversation topics?
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This doesn’t surprise me at all actually. I don’t know a single family that sits down to nightly family dinners. And we’re all solidly middle class, read obsessively to your kids, grow your own organic tomatoes kind of people too. maybe it’s because most of my friends have very young kids who need to eat by 6 at the latest. I just can’t sit down for dinner at 6 and my husband hasn’t made it home from work in time for dinner in months. Dinner is usually me flinting back and forth between 20 month old in booster seat and doing dishes, prepping lunches for next day etc.
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Yes, auburn, that sounded like us until very recently. Finally, the kids are old enough to put off dinner until 6:30 or 7 and Steve is getting home at 6:30 now. Well, soccer season is going to screw it up again soon.
But what Pollan is describing is a different scene from our homes. All members of the house seem to be at home at the same time, but they are eating different microwavable meals and at different times. I actually haven’t seen that before.
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Wow, that’s a completely different scene from our household – thank goodness!
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@MH: From what I can tell, the retiree position is basically “I spent 50 years eating what you want, and now I’m gonna eat what I want. And when I want it.”
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Speaking of being married for years, I just found out that the tenth anniversary being the ‘tin’ anniversary really doesn’t cut it anymore.
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I think ten years is now the “iPhone” anniversary. Yeah, my husband didn’t get the memo either.
I get freaked out by those old couples who go to the early bird specials with the all you can eat salad buffets and then just sit there chewing. They don’t talk to each other. This is why I quit smoking? So, I can quietly eat salad in my golden years? Get me a pack of smokes already.
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iPhone. Thanks. That’s an idea.
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Wait, what?
Honestly, growing up, we always ate dinner together (unless Dad had a dinner meeting or late meeting, in which case he might have yogurt or a sandwich when he got home). As in, meat or main, veggie (usually frozen), and side grain. And everyone else I knew the dining habits of had the same. The variation was whether you served yourself at the stove or the table (we were declasse and left the dishes on the stove). This wasn’t ages and ages ago: I’m 32!
Is this a non-small city thing? Is there a social strata and geographical area where this is the norm?
(I didn’t get the despair over loss of cooking skills in that earlier NYTimes Magazine either. But at least that one I could sort of see….)
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Those stats blow my mind.
I confess to messing with the family dinner when Spouse is out of town, by sitting at the head of the table reading aloud from our latest family book instead of having “family conversation,” as we normally do. But anything less than a real meal for me (which typically means main dish and two sides, although at least one side is usually a heated frozen veggie) triggers a whole host of personal issues related to the way our lives changed after my parents divorced. Totally not their fault, but I actually get anxious/depressed when we don’t have a family dinner. To the point where I don’t know how families who skip it, manage to function.
Of course, I’d also offload dinner planning, prep, and cleanup to someone else in a millisecond, were I to come into fabulous wealth.
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