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Dinner with Dad: How I Found My Way Back to the Family Table

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Workaholic attorney Cameron Stracher braves a mega-commute in the New York area to only wonder, "Is that all there is?" Determined to better his life and reconnect with his two kids and wife, he resolves to dial back his work devotion to fixing dinner for his family.

He finds this is almost as much of a challenge as practicing law. This first-person memoir is touching and absorbing as Stracher details the emotional and financial tradeoffs that bedevil us as we strive to find more balance in our lives.

A very good read!!!!

Cameron Stracher's "Dinner with Dad: How I Found My Way Back to the Family Table" chronicled the author's attempt and journey to be a good dad by having dinner with his two kids. Cameron lives in Westport, Connecticut but works as a law professor in New York City and he typically spends two hours travelling to work each way everyday. In addition, he also works as legal counsel for an organization out in Kansas City. Needless to say, he hardly shares a meal with his family at dinnertime. One night, he made a decision to be at home for dinner during his kids's new school year and he would even cook at least half the time. This decision proved to be a lot harder especially since he had to leave work early and at the same time get his work done. Cooking at home proved to be even more of a challenge especially since his kids refused to eat most of what he cooked and they had developed weird eating habits. It became a personal challenge to Cameron to make sure his kids share his love for diverse and ethnic food.

This was a great read for me as it was fun and witty and the writing was very conversational. The author provided valuable insights into family life and how the simple of act of eating dinner with family made a difference. Many would be able to identify with Cameron's situation and how the pursue of wealth had replaced the importance of spending quality time with one's family. Highly recommended!

When I first heard of this book,the concept was not all that unusual.It was something I was familiar with, raising kids,putting together meals,what I did not expect was the candid honesty and humor that made this book a great read.It should be required reading for those of us who try to balance work and family and end up with less of each

I don't quite know what to make of this book. The author, Cameron Stracher, is obviously a bright guy. He graduated from Harvard Law School and has written two previous books. He's a graduate of the Iowa Writers workshop and has written articles for The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and other major papers and magazines.

Cameron has a lovely wife, two great children, a nice home and a good job as a successful lawyer. Like many folks who make tradeoffs with their family in order to work enough hours to justify a well-to-do lifestyle, Cameron spends little time with his wife and kids and too much time at the office.

So one day, he decides he's had enough.

He begins an experiment where for the next year, he'll be home by 6:00 p.m. at least five days a week to sit down with his family for dinner - and he'll even help cook the meal himself. He imagines it will be an Ozzie and Harriet type of existence where his (vegetarian) wife, 9-year old son, and 6-year old daughter will be delighted at his newfound ability to be home. Naïve? You bet.

The difficulty I have with this book is the way that Cameron keeps insisting on making food that his children don't like. His daughter prefers plain pasta and his son like hot dogs. So what does Cameron prepare?

How about things like: cassoulet, garlic shrimp, spicy peanut noodles, falafel, tofu with edamame, shrimp and black bean fajitas, couscous, penne with pesto, and risotto? His children, quite naturally, often fail to eat what he cooks. He often gets angry and they often are set to bed. Why?

It's no mystery that many children are fussy eaters. Oh, I know not all of them - but many are. Yet Cameron keeps making these elaborate meals with food his children have never tried before and he continues to fume and pout when they refuse to eat what he cooks.

Other than this jarring nod to reality that Cameron is intent on ignoring, the rest of the book is quite charming. Full of touching family moments and witty observations on life, this book has an enduring message: being close to your family is worth all the effort.

I was intrigued by the title and sure it would be on my reading list before I ever checked reviews or sales rankings for Dinner with Dad by Cameron Stracher. A lawyer, professor and author in New York, Stracher tells the story of his hurried life, saying:

"As my salary increased, my appetite grew, until I needed every dollar I was making and lived from paycheck to paycheck. I was trapped in a cycle of my own making from which the chances of escape appeared dim. But I could stop the carousel if I wanted. I could get off."

The author is caught up like so many in chasing success and avoiding life but eventually promises to turn it all around. With his wife and two young children at home, he deeply desires to return not only to his family, but to his favorite pastime: cooking. The book is framed through the story of planning for, preparing and cooking dinner, and then sharing meals together at least five nights a week including weekends, for one year.

I thought he presented the experiment beautifully, even without possessing a basic appreciation for the Zen of cooking myself. I underlined several well-told lessons that I found intermittently woven throughout his story. He tells of the inescapable trade-off between family and work, later alluding to Eugene O'Kelly's Chasing Daylight (another one that I'd recommend), and speaking of the inability to control the future or the outcome of one's own dreams. He describes his role as father: "Who [my children] were what they would become, [was] a function of who and what I was and how I lived."

At times the book takes long stretches to describe the process of preparing meals with detailed descriptions and list of ingredients that I've never heard of, and also at times feels like grandstanding for his recent noble efforts, sometimes minimizing his wife's attempts to contribute to family meals, and making sure to describe the newfound admiration he receives from others. But if the reader shares Stracher's passion for cooking and his promise to be a better family man, then the book might be a most inspiring.

Here's the best excerpt for making the correlation between cooking and working:

"Unlike my jobs, which nourish my family in their own way, putting a plate before my children is direct, visible, and tangible. The results are immediate and clear. Working is abstract and conceptual, while cooking is concrete and corporeal. Work takes me away; cooking brings me home. The former is necessary but not sufficient, the latter essential and primordial. One is absence, the other presence. On his deathbed, no one has ever prayed for more work. Plenty have died from hunger, however."

This was a great book. Funny and thought provoking.

I recomment this to any dad anywhere.