Learn Hardcore Japanese: syuumatu no tanosimi ha kazoku to issyo ni bangohan wo taberukoto desu. - My pleasure on the weekend is eating dinner together with my family.

Literally: 週末の楽しみ = “the enjoyment/pleasure of the weekend” or “weekend enjoyment / what I look forward to on weekends.”
の here is a general “linking” or “possessive-like” particle. It often translates as of, but not always literally.

It does not directly mean “on weekends.” If you wanted to say “on weekends” as a time expression, you would normally use 週末に.

So:

週末の楽しみは… = “(My) weekend pleasure is …”
週末に家族と一緒に晩ご飯を食べます。 = “I eat dinner with my family on weekends.”

In the given sentence, の makes 週末の楽しみ one noun phrase meaning “weekend pleasure,” which then becomes the topic.

Why is it 週末の楽しみは… instead of something like 週末は…? What’s the difference in nuance?

Both are possible, but they have different structures and emphasis.

週末の楽しみは家族と一緒に晩ご飯を食べることです。
- Structure:
  - Topic: 週末の楽しみ (“the thing I enjoy on weekends / my weekend pleasure”)
  - Comment: 家族と一緒に晩ご飯を食べることです
- Nuance: You’re defining what your “weekend pleasure” is. The focus is on what the pleasure is.
週末は家族と一緒に晩ご飯を食べるのが楽しみです。 (a natural alternative)
- Topic: 週末は (“as for weekends”)
- Comment: 家族と一緒に晩ご飯を食べるのが楽しみです (“eating dinner with my family is enjoyable / my pleasure”)
- Nuance: You’re talking about weekends and saying that, on weekends, eating dinner with your family is something you look forward to.

So:

週末の楽しみは… = “My weekend pleasure is …” (defining the pleasure)
週末は…楽しみです。 = “As for weekends, … is enjoyable.” (describing weekends themselves)

What is the difference between 楽しみ and 楽しい, and why do we use 楽しみ here?

楽しい is an i-adjective meaning “fun, enjoyable” (describes how something feels).
- Example: このパーティーは楽しい。 = “This party is fun.”
楽しみ is a noun meaning:
- “pleasure,” “enjoyment”
- “something to look forward to,” “treat”

In the sentence:

週末の楽しみは … です。

We need a noun for this pattern: X は Y です, where X is a noun (topic) and Y is a noun or noun-like phrase. 楽しみ works perfectly as a noun: “(my) pleasure / treat.”

If you wanted to use 楽しい, you’d change the structure, for example:

週末は家族と一緒に晩ご飯を食べるのが楽しいです。
“On weekends, eating dinner with my family is fun/enjoyable.”

Here 楽しい is an adjective describing 食べるの.

Why is there は after 楽しみ: 週末の楽しみは…? Could you use が instead?

は marks the topic of the sentence: what you are talking about.

週末の楽しみは … = “As for my weekend pleasure, …”

Using が here would sound unnatural, because:

が usually marks the subject, especially when introducing something new or when you’re focusing/contrasting it.
However, in a definition-style sentence like this, Japanese almost always uses は to introduce the thing being defined:
- 趣味は読書です。 = “My hobby is reading.”
- 夢は医者になることです。 = “My dream is to become a doctor.”

So 週末の楽しみは…です fits that same “X is Y” pattern. 週末の楽しみが…です is grammatically possible but sounds off and would only appear in quite specific contrastive contexts.

There is no “I” or “my” in the Japanese sentence. How do we know it means my weekend pleasure?

Japanese often omits pronouns like “I,” “you,” “my,” etc. They are inferred from context.

In this sentence:

週末の楽しみ literally just says “weekend pleasure.”
In a normal conversation where you’re talking about your own routines, the default assumption is that you are talking about your enjoyment, unless context clearly points to someone else.

If you really needed to say “my weekend pleasure” explicitly, you could say:

私の週末の楽しみは家族と一緒に晩ご飯を食べることです。

But in natural Japanese, 私の is usually dropped when it’s obvious from context, as it is here.

Why do we say 家族と一緒に instead of just 家族と? What’s the nuance of 一緒に?

家族と alone means “with (my) family,” but it doesn’t explicitly say “together.”
一緒に means “together (with).”

家族と一緒に is a very natural set phrase meaning:

“together with my family / with my family together”

Nuance:

家族と晩ご飯を食べる。
“I eat dinner with my family.” (neutral)
家族と一緒に晩ご飯を食べる。
“I eat dinner together with my family.” (slightly more emphasis on doing it as a group; sounds a bit warmer/more “shared.”)

In many contexts, 家族と alone would be understood as “together,” but adding 一緒に makes it explicit and is very natural in this sentence.

Why is there a に after 一緒, making 一緒に? What is に doing here?

一緒に is basically a set expression meaning “together.”

Grammatically, 一緒 is a noun (“togetherness / same place”), and に turns it into an adverbial phrase:

一緒に = “in a together way” → “together”

So in the sentence:

家族と一緒に晩ご飯を食べる
→ “eat dinner together with (my) family.”

You rarely see 一緒 used on its own in this adverbial sense; you almost always use the full 一緒に.

What is the role of を in 晩ご飯を食べる?

を marks the direct object of a verb: the thing that an action is done to.

晩ご飯 = dinner
食べる = to eat
晩ご飯を食べる = “to eat dinner” (literally, “to eat dinner”)

Pattern:

Noun + を + verb = “to [verb] [noun]”
- 水を飲む = drink water
- 本を読む = read a book
- 音楽を聞く = listen to music

So 晩ご飯を食べる follows that same pattern.

What does こと do in 食べることです? Why not just say 食べます or 食べる?

こと is a nominalizer: it turns a verb phrase into a noun-like phrase.

食べる = to eat
食べること = “eating” (the act of eating)

In the sentence:

家族と一緒に晩ご飯を食べること
= “eating dinner together with my family” (as a noun phrase)
週末の楽しみは … 食べることです。
= “My weekend pleasure is eating dinner together with my family.”

If you just said:

週末の楽しみは家族と一緒に晩ご飯を食べます。

this would be ungrammatical, because after は, you need something that can be the predicate (“X is Y”). A finite verb like 食べます makes a separate sentence, not a noun phrase to define 週末の楽しみ.

Common alternatives:

食べることです。 (polite, standard)
食べるのです。 (also nominalizes; a bit softer/colloquial in feeling)
Casual: …食べること。 or …食べるの。 without です.

Could you also say 週末は家族と一緒に晩ご飯を食べるのが楽しみです? How is that different from the original?

Yes, that sentence is very natural:

週末は家族と一緒に晩ご飯を食べるのが楽しみです。
“On weekends, eating dinner together with my family is something I look forward to.”

Comparison:

週末の楽しみは家族と一緒に晩ご飯を食べることです。
- Topic: 週末の楽しみ (“my weekend pleasure”)
- Predicate: …食べることです (“is eating dinner with my family”)
- Focus: defining what your “weekend pleasure” is.
週末は家族と一緒に晩ご飯を食べるのが楽しみです。
- Topic: 週末は (“as for weekends”)
- Subject (with が): 家族と一緒に晩ご飯を食べるの
- Predicate: 楽しみです (“is enjoyable / what I look forward to”)
- Focus: talking about weekends and describing what is enjoyable during that time.

Meaning-wise, they’re extremely close; the difference is mostly in which part is made the topic. Both are very natural.

Are there other common words for “dinner” in Japanese besides 晩ご飯? Do they sound different in nuance?

Yes, very common alternatives include:

晩ご飯（ばんごはん）
- Very common, everyday, slightly casual.
夕ご飯（ゆうごはん）
- Also everyday; “evening meal.” Similar feel to 晩ご飯.
夕飯（ゆうはん）
- Common in speech; everyday/family setting.
夕食（ゆうしょく）
- More formal or written, or in set phrases (hotel plans, hospitals, etc.).

In your sentence, you could say:

家族と一緒に晩ご飯を食べることです。 (as given)
家族と一緒に夕ご飯を食べることです。
家族と一緒に夕飯を食べることです。

All would sound natural for everyday conversation.
夕食 would be a bit more formal: 家族と一緒に夕食を食べることです。

Can the word order around 一緒に and 晩ご飯 change? For example, is 家族と晩ご飯を一緒に食べること okay?

Yes, Japanese word order within the phrase is fairly flexible as long as the relationships are clear.

All of these are grammatically acceptable:

家族と一緒に晩ご飯を食べること
家族と晩ご飯を一緒に食べること
晩ご飯を家族と一緒に食べること

Nuance:

The original 家族と一緒に晩ご飯を食べること is very natural and straightforward.
Moving 一緒に later (e.g., 晩ご飯を一緒に食べる) can shift a tiny bit of emphasis to the idea of “eating together,” but in everyday speech the difference is minimal.

You cannot move を away from 晩ご飯 or split 家族と unnaturally; but within those basic blocks, there is flexibility.