"At home I always cook dinner."

Translation: Я дома всегда готовлю ужин.

[Parchessey]

My answer of "Дома я всегда готовлю ужин" was accepted but I'm wondering if the suggested answer "Я дома всегда готовлю ужин." is more correct or if there is any difference between those answers. Is one more formal or less, etc.

[Shady_arc]

They are alsmost equivalent. The sentence is not particularly interesting anyway. With this word order it means that cooking dinner is what you always do at home (well, not always, but every day or every time someone has to come up with a meal).

Я всегда готовлю ужин дома in its neutral interpretation means that you cook it at home rather than anywhere else.

Дома всегда я готовлю ужин, Дома всегда готовлю ужин я,Дома ужин всегда готовлю я, or Дома ужин готовлю всегда я, or even more colloquial Дома ужин всегда я готовлю — all most likely mean that it is you, the speaker, who cooks dinner at your house (not your brother, your kids, your mom etc.).

[elsantodel90]

"Дома всегда я готовлю ужин." was marked wrong, I guess this word order is not acceptable. Must the subject always be at the start of the sentence like this? (Well except for patterns like "у меня ..." "мне нравится" ... "мне надо ..." )

[Shady_arc]

Actually, «Дома всегда я готовлю ужин» is a grammatically correct sentence, however, assuming the neutral intonation (and most plausible emphatic intonations as well) it explicitly means "It is me who always cooks at my home".

[Subalito]

should "у дома, ...." be accepted as a plausible answer?

[olimo]

No. You should remember these expressions:

• at home = дома
• (go) home = домой

[Bobboski]

But in the other cases like "at school" or "at the disco" would you need the "У"?

[olimo]

At school = в школе, at the disco = на дискотеке. "У" used with places (у дома, у леса, у дороги) means "near". "У" with people (у меня, у папы, у Маши) can mean possession or being at someone's place.

[Bobboski]

Thank you!