I'd find that pretty offensive.
sometimes it would bug me, and if he would have requested that I cook something else, I'd be pissed - but since he was suggesting we go out to eat, I wouldn't get too upset about it. We have several decent restaurants within a couple blocks of home, so it wasn't a big production or anything like that. And typically it would get me off the hook for dinner the next day.
I need your advice on this: I get up at 6-6:30 and get home between 7:20 and 8. I usually don't want to eat dinner but my wife is insistent on cooking. I literally had to tell her over the phone at least 500 times over the years that I don't care what she cooks and if she had no ideas or didn't want to then don't worry about it. It started annoying the hell out of me on the drive home, you know those phone calls that begin with a sigh, have a nagging-depressing tone to them inquiring what I want her to cook me for dinner, empty spaces for moments when she wouldn't respond when I didn't tell her what she wanted to hear, then an angry tone that I wanted to get off the phone and drive if she wasn't going to keep the conversation fluid. How could I get this threw her head I kept thinking, and finally told her about 30 times in 30 days to never ever cook me anything for dinner. Cook what she wants and make plenty. If I'm hungry then I'll eat it and if not I'll take leftovers.
I don't get it. Is this something I'm insulting her with? She always acted like it was work for her and made it sound as if she was doing me a favor (I don't buy that one bit, but whatever I'm sure she wanted the gratitude if she was going to cook anyway).
Well, I would say perhaps she needs to find something to keep her busy that will make her feel she'd rather be doing that than cooking. (kids activities, a hobby, a club, volunteer work, whatever it would be)
For us, often times my husband would either not eat a thing during the day and come home starving - or there'd be a party or some event at work and he'd have eaten a lot and not be hungry at all. So if he'd tell me ahead of time, I'd know what to expect. Maybe you could work something out like that, where she knows (or at least thinks...) you'll be having a big lunch at work and she won't expect you to be hungry when you come home.
Do you have kids, so she has to have supper for them anyhow? That could be a factor.
Would she be adverse to the idea of you bringing something home for supper? There are tons of choices, restaurant carry-out or a rotisserie chicken and salad from the grocery store, or sub sandwiches, Chipotle, chinese carry-out or pizza, etc. though with your hours, that might be too late if your kids go to bed early.
But in general, it sounds as though she thinks of this as a way for her to feel useful and productive, so I'd consider my first comment as a place to begin. But that's just from my own personal experience since if I wasn't so busy with other things I wanted to do, I might have felt more that I was obligated to cook dinner for the family.