I'd like to see the "preparing meal" cycle tightened up a bit.

1. When one family member is preparing a meal, others may heat up food, look for snacks, etc. They should wait til the meal is ready.

2. Children should be called and parents should sit down to eat as soon as the meal is ready. Often there is a delay between meal preparation and eating, to the point that sometimes the children have already eaten by the time the parents call them to eat, forcing them to come eat a second time. This should not happen.

3. The meal should be cleared away as soon as all have finished eating.

Here's how I handle these issues.

1. If the other family member is 14 years old or older, I have them also prepare a meal. It doesn't use up any extra food and it keeps them busy while the first person finishes. I've also discovered that some family members prepare meals faster than others. If the family member is a younger child, I try to keep them busy with either playing or, if all else fails, watering the flowers. That keeps them out of the kitchen long enough for the meal to be prepared.

2. Personally, I don't mind dragging my peeps to the table to eat, and I often make them eat twice in a row to completely fill up their food bar. I usually keep the parents busy after they've all eaten so they don't have much of a chance to call the kids to eat again.

3. I'm very much the opposite on this one! I do everything I can to stop them from clearing the table! That way the food is always ready so I don't have to go through the lengthy process of waiting for someone to prepare a meal. Instead, I can just drag everyone to the table to eat! I'm always disappointed when one of my little peeps clears the table without me stopping them.

I did not realize that two preparing a meal uses up no additional food. Good to know! I also try to keep the peeps occupied by showering, playing with toys, watching TV, etc. until the meal is ready. I make them eat repeatedly until the meter is full too, and also leave the food once I saw that groceries could be placed on a table full of food.

Praising them a few different times for sitting down at a meal has resulted in my peeps going to the table ON THEIR OWN, which is very nice, indeed.

Yeah, I tested it out when I first tried having more than one peep prepare a meal. The groceries are deducted only when a peep actually eats, not when the meal is prepared. So you can have several people prepare the meal without losing anything.

However, it is costing double to have them eat twice in a row. That little extra boost you get at the end costs just as much as the first eating did. I think it's 10 or maybe 20 grocery points each time (I can't remember how much now). I figure groceries are cheap so I don't mind using up the little extra, but it's important to at least know what it's costing you to feed them twice in a row like that.

I think snacking costs 1 grocery point each time so I prefer to fill them up to prevent them from snacking. I haven't done anything to see if snacking vs. prepared food has any affect on their lifespan. It may or may not have an affect.

I just think it takes waaay too long to prepare a meal. I timed the last one to 2:40, which wouldn't be a problem except if I don't sit and wait for them to finish they start doing something else on return (return from, say, having to unlock my phone, or switching back from another app after more than a few seconds). Nearly three minutes is a trivially small amount of time usually, but an eternity in app-game time. When I have just started a new family is the worst, because it has to be just three minutes of watching the single person slowly inch across the kitchen while I tap the screen occasionally to prevent the phone from going to lockscreen. (Changing my power saving phone settings would make this no less boring.) Three minutes of no-tapping in a game like this is so annoying, and because they are perpetually hungry is by necessity the most repetitive part of the game. Next update forego the nice cooking animation sequence for convenience? Pretty please?

I agree about it taking too long! I tend to leave my phone in the app, go make a drink or a sandwich or something and come back and they have USUALLY prepared a meal - not always though, which is crazy! CP