Dinner time with seven year old son

Happy birthday nicholeen!!! Hope you are having a wonderful week of celebration!!

My question is about dinner time. We usually eat at 5:00-:530. My son finds it hard to stay seated at the table and focus eating. He wants to talk and be a part of our conversation with us and our international students. I worry that he doesn’t eat enough so sometimes I feed him a few spoonfuls. In the Asian culture this is quite normal but I understand it’s considered pampering in the American culture. I remember it to be a sweet memory to be fed by my mom so I sometimes struggle with not giving him that memory. We Asians show love to our children and family through food and feeding. If I cook his favorite noodle soup, fried rice or bacon, he would eat it all by himself. But when I give him other kinds of food, I have to keep prompting him to eat and when time is running short I then feed him a couple spoonfuls in between sentences. When we remember to give him instructions or no answers we find our selves doing so many extra chores in the middle of dinner instead of quietly chatting with each other.  My husband wants me to just let him be and let him be hungry. When that happens, bedtime gets harder because he wants a snack. Or gets up in the middle of the night for food. We would appreciate your ideas!