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Definitely. When BF is away on business, I will sometimes eat cereal for dinner if I'm not in the mood to cook. I'll also reheat leftovers and not feel obligated to disguise them.

One time, I wanted carbonara and made it in a small steel mixing bowl - then ate it with a fork, right out of the steel bowl. Ha!

For some reason my girlfriend absolutely hates sloppy joes. I know that they aren't anything to get excited about but when she is out of town the kids go crazy because they know they will get to have sloppy joes and tater tots! Talk about easy to please.

I would go out to eat with my friends alot more when my then husband went out of town.

YES. My bf's job used to have him traveling 50-100% of the time, but since that whole economy collapsing thing recently, clients don't want to pay for him to travel ... but thankfully they are still funding the projects he works on (ah, consulting). Anyways. Sometimes I just get really lazy when he's gone and eat out more than usual. It's much cheaper when it's just me dining out vs. the two of us, and he's much pickier about where we go, so I get to sample places he might normally veto.

But when I do cook for just me, I like to go heavy on the mushrooms since he's not too big of a fan. He eats pretty much anything I make, but I know he doesn't like mushrooms and brussel sprouts, so I like to load up on stuff like that when he's gone so that I'm not forcing stuff he doesn't like on him, and some of my own favorites turn into real treats :P

Very! When OH is out of town, most of my dinners consist of fruit, cheese and wine. It's actually a good time for me to make something cheesy since he's lactose intolerant and I don't normally cook with cheese, something like cheese blintzes or mac & cheese...hmmm, need to remember for next time he's away.

My husband and son always take a two week hiking trip at this time of year. I end up eating a lot of meatless meals and even tofu! Neither of them would touch the stuff. When I'm home alone, I make a lot more soups for supper, too. I made a terrific meatless soup the other day with butternut squash, carrots, potatoes, and green chiles and served it to myself with a lovely cornbread.

Absolutely. It's sad, I do a little "happy dance" when my SO is out of town or otherwise not going to be home for dinner. He's so darn picky! No fish (except fried), mushrooms, tomatoes, onions, broccoli, cauliflower...I could go on for days. So I always try to make something "weird" when he's not here. Like grilled salmon and steamed broccoli. Yeah, living on the edge.

I find this amusing with those who have kids, since my mother and I used to celebrate when my father would go out of town for extended periods on active duty for 2 weeks, business trips, and on month-long vacations w/ his family (his parents, siblings, et al). We'd eat whatever, whenever. My father is NOT a picky eater at all, but when he's gone, my mom often prepared food that *I* wanted to eat and we ate when I wanted to. The plus side of him going on trips was all the gifts from faraway lands when he returned!

I wonder if my parents ever said anything celebratory when I was gone...

My husband is never away and he is the primary cook of the house. I'd probably eat a small bowl of pho on the way home from work...every day.

Totally - my husband works out west for eight to 10 weeks at a time, and then is home (Southern Ontario) for 2 weeks at a time. When he is gone, it is just me, his oldest son, and my daughter. We eat a lot of veggie meals, beans, curry, mexican food. When he is home, hubby's two younger kids are also with us. THEN we become meat and potatoes, Pennsylvania German specialities like pork and sauerkraut, ham and bean soup, and eggs morning, noon, and night. I like the contrast and find that by eating lighter when he is gone, I am losing weight AND enjoying those heavier meals when he is back here much more!

Oh yeah. if it's the hub, the boys and I will do lite fare, or go out for something quick and fun. if it's the kids that are gone, my husband and I might take the opportunity to go out somewhere more than halfway decent, somewhere the kids wouldn't necessarily appreciate.

...and if it'd me that's all alone, it's cereal and tea. I love the simplicity.

Me too! My DH doesn't like dark greens or meatless meals. I load up on the chard, rapini, frittata, lentils etc. when he's gone. In fact, this is a timely topic, as he hasn't been out of town for a while, and I've been missing my sauteed rapini with olive oil and garlic! Time for him to have a client from far far away I'd say! If only I didn't miss him so much other than at dinner time :)

We're not apart very much, happily anymore (my wife and I were bi-coastal for a bit more than a year a few years back). We have dinner together most every night, cook pretty nice though not long cooking things and generally plate it up nicely. She can't eat beef or pork, but happily eats anything and everything else (except our mutual dislikes, celery, green bell pepper and banana...it's good to share dislikes).

She doesn't have any problem with me eating pork or beef but it always seems a bother to cook two different things for dinner. When I'm alone, I tend to eat things like pork with a bunch of barbecue sauce over rice or a steak also with rice. It's partly eating stuff I don't normally and partly that it's super easy. Put the rice in the rice cooker at some point during the day and forget about it. Cut up the pork and saute it on high heat, add the sauce, some lemon juice and Tabasco and it's good to go or sear the steak in the cast iron skillet, then grab a handful of whatever green vegetable we've got and put it in the Tupperware microwave steamer for 90 seconds with some salt and pepper and lemon juice (works for virtually anything) and it's dinner in about 8 minutes of actual effort.

This has been quite fascinating and funny to read. It seems that many of us eat lighter, or change when we're going to eat or indulge in something the other person(s) might not eat. It almost seems like it's a bit of treat take a break and just please ourselves. And it seems that many feel that taking a break makes the food they generally eat when others are home seem better somehow once that person(s) is back in town.
One thing I am going to track while my husband is gone the next 2+ weeks is how much our grocery bill and cost per meal changes. If the cost is noticibly lower, I may persuade my husband to try one or two meals a week on the lighter side. On the other hand--I have a 10 year old son with a healthy appetite and a 14 year old son who's a bottomless pit so eating lighter may mean they just eat more of everything. Wish I had their metabolisms.

Whenever my bf isn't home for dinner, I make roasted brussel sprouts or something with broccoli (his two hated vegetables) and tons and tons of garlic. Once I made my own maki rolls. I experiment a bit with only me as the guinea pig.
When I was little and my mom was away on business trips (and she is a consummate cook), my dad would give us tater tots, chicken nuggets, or some other conveniently frozen thing with ketchup to dip it in. If we were lucky we got to order pizza. But we always had broccoli no matter what - every single night - which I hated. Funny how broccoli is what I sneak-cook these days. Ah adulthood.

The different food is the only nice part of missing him. I made strawberry cake, ate thin crusted pizza, went to a chineses restaurant he doesnt like, made a beans and rice creation. It was kinda fun. I though about getting asparagus, but they looked sad. The previous times he has been gone, I had thai food which he wont eat.