Dinner at YVR Landside?
 

Np. Enjoy your time in YVR and hopefully you get a chance to see a bit of the area.

I'd take the Canada Line downtown (20 min) for the best food choices. Depends how old and cranky the kids may be I guess.

IMHO there is nothing landslide at the airport worth staying for unless chain style fast food or the White Spot (think Denny's) is what you are good with.

While a Canadian institution and an OK place, it's a chain. Not that there is necessarily anything wrong with that.

If one could go back a couple of decades, the Cantonese restaurant before the int'l area was actually quite good.

Kinda expensive. $5 + fare each. Might as well take a cab.

Well, I was only trying to answer the OP's question for what it was and it works just as well. It sounded like to me, s/he wanted to land, get a quick inexpensive and not horrible bite to eat with their kids, and then head to the hotel for some rest.

But since this is FT, I guess we can say "why stay in the terminal when you can choose hundreds of restaurants accessible by the Canada Line and walking a bit?" :)

In that case, try out Forage on Robson. Or the original Guu. Or the... blah blah etc.

White spot is not high cuisine but it's not that bad either. OP will be fine.

OP mentioned kids and White Spot is a great place to bring them to. Sometimes you just need to grab the low hanging fruit.

Besides, their burgers are pretty tasty too.

White Spot. Triple O Burgers best in Vancouver and kids meals. Like an Earls without the loud noise and busty waitresses. It is before security perhaps a pickle is a threat.
The skytrain from the airport can take you into Richmond for Chinese food a plenty.

All this talk of light rail ..... OP arrives late, with a family, so that would increase the cost since one pays extra for the last two or so stops to get to YVR.

Looking at Google Maps I have spotted what I consider a good suggestion:

Another Canadian institution, Tim Horton

It sort of looks like it's landside - I am much more familiar with YYJ, where it is most definitely landside. I have purchased many bagels and cups of coffee at YYJ, and while it's not a sit down restaurant, it has good food at good prices and should be kid friendly and would not take up well north of half hour for transport at a late hour @:-)

Yes, Timmie's is in the YVR domestic landside food court. Same with Subway and a few other chains in the food court. That foodcourt is behind the White Spot.
IIRC, there is also another Timmie's behind the domestic luggage area.

A find a lot of people speak highly of White Spot's burgers. I don't know if I'm the oddball but while I think they're decent, I don't see what the fuss is all about. Kind of the same in reverse when I talk about In N Out. :)
One tip I'd like to offer is for their legendary burger. Normally, it's just a pretty basic burger with pickles and Triple O sauce. But you can ask to get lettuce, tomatoes, and onions on it for free. I've had a few family and friends that were puzzled that you had to specifically ask for these basic toppings, not realizing that the Legendary is likely based on the basic burgers Nat Bailey originally sold.