The pandemic has shifted our habits, and that could be a good thing. We’re now more likely to eat when we’re hungry and to listen to our bodies. And that includes when we eat dinner.
There is no one-size-fits-all answer to the question of when is the best time to eat dinner. The ideal time for you will depend on your individual circadian rhythm, or whether you’re an early bird or a night owl.
If you’re an early bird, you should eat dinner earlier, around 6 p.m. This will give your body enough time to digest before you hit the hay around 10 or 11 p.m.
If you’re a night owl, you can eat dinner later, around 8 p.m. This will help you avoid mindless snacking, empty calories, and unnecessary munching late at night.
No matter what time you eat dinner, it’s important to avoid eating too close to bedtime. Eating too close to bedtime can decrease the quality of your sleep, increase inflammation, and make weight management more difficult.
If you find yourself eating dinner late, try to have a balanced snack in the afternoon. This will help you avoid going into dinner famished, so you are less likely to overeat.
The ideal dinnertime will also differ based on your lunch time. The later you eat lunch, the later your body will be ready for dinner. The earlier you eat lunch, the earlier your body will be expecting dinner.
If you find yourself eating lunch at 11 a.m., one easy solution to avoiding a 4 p.m. dinner is throwing in a balanced snack. This in-between snack will also prevent you from going into dinner famished, so you are less likely to unexpectedly overeat. The snack will allow you to make a rational and balanced dinner decision because you will be making a choice with a fed and satisfied brain rather than a hangry, impulsive, or fatigued brain.
It’s no secret that hormones affect just about everything, and that includes our eating habits. For women of reproductive age, being flexible might be more beneficial than being rigid with their mealtimes.
Women in their reproductive years, especially during the luteal phase of their cycle (the phase after ovulation, or about two weeks in), need more calories and more slow-burning macros (nutrients like protein, carbs, and fat) to keep blood sugar stable, keep PMS at bay, maintain a healthy weight, and to have quality sleep. This means women should work on listening to their bodies when deciding what time to eat dinner, and even how much they eat.
It’s important for men to listen to their bodies, too, but their hormones fluctuate less, making this less of a necessity.
Men don’t have an infradian rhythm, so they can stick to their same meal timing every 24 hours, referring to the menstrual cycle, which is the most common type of infradian rhythm.
At the end of the day, what time you eat dinner really comes down to what works best for you. People should eat at a time that is realistic for their lifestyles and sleep habits. That may mean eating a later lunch during the day if you know you won’t sit down for dinner until 9 p.m., which is totally OK!
