My family’s was close to Cunctator’s:
Hey, that’s the one listed in Wikipedia. Who’s been in our house? 
At home we still say the one the kids first learned:
God is great, God is good, Let us thank Him for this food.
Sometimes the extended family used to use this:
Come, Lord Jesus, be our guest, and let this food to us be blessed
(which can extend into: Our hands we fold, our heads we bow, for food and drink we thank Thee now.)
That’s also the one the kids learned in Lutheran school.
So it kind of depends on where we are and who we’re with.
That’s what we all do too. Except we’re weird and study Latin, so sometimes we do the Latin grace quoted above. But for the most part, yeah, we just say something different every time.
My 8yo likes to say “and please bless these yummy quesadillas” (or whatever else we’re having).
Fuck yeah, nachos! (May be modified for wings or mozzarela sticks)
we would follow that one by
“By your hand, may all be fed. Give to us our daily bread.”
Mahaloth,
for my family, there were times for both types of grace. Sometimes, like your family, we’d pray whatever we were thinking or feeling that was relevant. On the other hand, sometimes you simply aren’t thinking or feeling anything relevant or you are thinking or feeling something relevant, but you don’t necessarily want share with everyone who happens to be sitting at the table. For those types of situations, a standardized, recited grace can be useful.
And for those in large families:
“Father, Son and Holy Ghost; the first one here gets the most.”
I seem to recall this from the Song of Bernadette, but I could be mistaken.
The Capuchino version, second verse more or less optional (involving a lot of arm swinging, be careful you don’t do it with a wet spoon in your hand)
Por este pan, por este don,
te alabamos, te alabamos,
por este pan, por este don,
te alabamos Señor.
Se estira la mano, mano, mano, (stretch hand out in front of you)
se encoge el codo, codo, codo, (fold arm, downward swing)
se estira la mano, mano, mano, (sideways swing)
y queda bendecido todo.
For this bread, for this gift,
we hail thee, we hail Thee,
for this bread, for this gift,
we hail Thee Lord.
Stretch your hand, hand, hand,
pull in your elbow, elbow, elbow,
stretch your hand, hand, hand,
and all is blessed.
Dad’s favourite, PC version (I’m not going into the explanation required for the non-PC, XIX-century-Spanish-politics related version):
El niño Jesús
nacido en Belén
bendiga la mesa
y a nosotros también.
May Jesus child
who was born in Bethlehem
bless this table
and bless us as well.
I know half a dozen other ways.
Quakers (at least the brand I tend to associate with) don’t say anything; we just have a moment of silence before digging in. IME
We had a dead short college grace at uni… “Benedictus benedicat” at the start of the meal, and then “Benedicto benedicatur” at the end.
I’m learning a lot from people here. So much, in fact, that I’ll add another question.
Does reciting a repeated “grace” tend to lose meaning for you? Having been raised in a house where we just “talked” to God openly and about anything before eating, I wonder what impact reciting a prayer would have.
Does it become more of a ritual, or are you able to maintain meaning with it?
I am extremely biased (reasons specified in OP) in this answer: But it never ever had meaning for me. It was just something we habitually droned out before eating our din dins.
I was always compelled to thank the person who made the meal afterwards if that person was a family member. (Can’t thank the makers of my school dinner, because I never saw them)
Some of both.
I grew up with “God is Great, God is Good, Let us thank him for our food, Amen”
Later we embellished it with “and everything living and non-living”
Later still we made more modifications.
I love a sung grace at group/church events–Johnny Appleseed is popular, as is another one whose name I don’t know. Gives everyone a chance to be involved.
And at some level, if what you are praying remains the same in meaning, why should your words to describe it change all that much? But I do think that setting children a good example of blending ritual and personality is useful, and I’m not sure I got as much non-ritual prayer time with my parents as I would try to give my own children, if I have them.
At camp we’d sing and pray. Sing was things like Johnny Appleseed, the Doxology, Hark to the Chimes and a few others.
Generally I’ve always considered grace to just be a free-form prayer, in silence if you’re in public, and hopefully not too long.
Ran out of time to edit: I seldom say grace if not eating with other people.
Beat me to it.
My cousin said this in front of my very religious grandmother one time, causing me to do an honest to Og spit-take. My cousin was going to hell for his sacrelige, and I was going with him because I thought it was funny.
He and I still laugh about it 25 years later.
Given that we live so blessedly,
House and home and food and such,
Let us say like Elvis Pressely,
“Thank you, Thank you very much.”
My parents say the same one as Kat but Mom substitutes “goodness” for “bounty” because bounty reminds her of paper towels. Followed by the sign of the Cross.
When I am asked to say it at my friends’ house, they laugh at how quickly I rattle it off: “Again, and slower this time?”
Theirs is
For food and health and happiness,
>something about gratefulness<
In serving others, Lord,
May we repay our debt of love to Thee.
Don’t forget ‘God’s neat, lets eat’
On a more serious note, we say:
’ As we eat, let us be mindful of the plants and the animals of the earth, and the earth, that sustain us - amen."
Then we usually make jokes about how we’re only thankful for the lettuce (let us).
In answer to the obvious question -Buddhist.
The amen makes grandma happy, and helps to identify the end of grace.
If the relationships were a bit different, I’d think we were related. The first Thanksgiving after my grandfather died, my very religious grandmother got up before the meal and gave a very long heartfelt speech about loved ones watching over us, etc.
Then my irreverent Uncle Dave got up and said, “Rub-a-dub-dub, etc.” and we all cracked up. Except Grandma, who was Not Amused.
And yeah, this was about 25 years ago.
For the Catholic part of my family that actually cared:
Sign of the cross before and after.
When things weren’t serious (which was most of the time):
Grace being my paternal grandmother’s name and all. …