Jeg tilbereder aftensmad, mens jeg står på foden.

It can mean both.

Danish present tense often covers both the English simple present and present progressive:

• Jeg tilbereder aftensmad = I prepare dinner / I am preparing dinner

If the context is happening right now, English usually prefers I am preparing dinner, but Danish does not need a special -ing form.

Tilbereder means prepare in the sense of getting food ready.

So:

• Jeg tilbereder aftensmad = I prepare/am preparing dinner

It is correct, but it sounds a bit more formal or deliberate than what many people would say in everyday speech. In conversation, Danes very often use laver:

• Jeg laver aftensmad = I’m making dinner

So tilbereder is fine, but laver is more common in casual everyday Danish.

Because Danish very often forms nouns as compounds.

Here:

• aften = evening
• mad = food

Together:

• aftensmad = evening meal / dinner

This is very normal in Danish. English often writes similar ideas as two words, but Danish usually joins them into one.

Because meal words are often used without an article when speaking generally.

So Danish commonly says:

• spise morgenmad = eat breakfast
• lave frokost = make lunch
• lave aftensmad = make dinner

That is why aftensmad appears without en or noget here.

Mens means while.

It introduces a subordinate clause:

• Jeg tilbereder aftensmad, mens jeg står ...
• I’m preparing dinner while I stand / while I’m standing ...

The word order here is normal. With mens, you still have:

• jeg = subject
• står = verb

So mens jeg står is exactly what you would expect.

A useful extra point: if there were an adverb like ikke, Danish subordinate clause word order would show up more clearly:

• mens jeg ikke står ... = while I am not standing ...

Because mens starts a subordinate clause, and many Danish writers put a comma before that clause.

So:

• Jeg tilbereder aftensmad, mens jeg står ...

is completely normal.

You may also see sentences without that comma in modern Danish, depending on the comma system being used. But the version with the comma is very common and not something you need to worry about.

Danish often uses the definite form with body parts when it is already obvious whose body part it is.

So Danish may prefer:

• Jeg vasker hænderne = I wash my hands
• Han brækkede armen = He broke his arm

In the same way, foden literally means the foot, but it can imply my foot if the context makes that clear.

So grammatically, foden itself is not strange.

Not really. This is the part of the sentence that sounds unusual.

Står på foden is grammatically understandable, but a native speaker would usually choose a different expression depending on the intended meaning.

Possible intended meanings:

• If you mean standing on one foot, Danish would more naturally say står på ét ben.
• If you mean standing up / being upright, just står may be enough.
• If you mean being on your feet, Danish often says er på benene.
• If you mean on foot as in not using a vehicle, Danish says til fods, not på foden.

So this sentence is understandable, but the last part is not idiomatic in most situations.

The most natural version would usually be:

• Jeg tilbereder aftensmad, mens jeg står på ét ben.

That means I prepare/am preparing dinner while standing on one foot.

If you want a more everyday-sounding sentence overall, many Danes would probably say:

• Jeg laver aftensmad, mens jeg står på ét ben.

So the main improvement is replacing på foden with på ét ben.