I live in a very small house, so I'm limited as to where I can put my
litterboxes.  Thus said, I chose to put both under a table in the kitchen.
My kids eat and drink probably 3 feet from the boxes and they don't care a
whit.

Maybe it has something to do with how often you clean the boxes?

kili

Their food is in the downstairs kitchen and the litterbox is in an
upstairs room, so they are very far apart. I don't know if it would bother
them otherwise; they usually are blessed with very hearty appetites and
don't seem fussy about their food at all.

Rusty has his own small room. His litter box, his dishes, his carrier are
all in there.
He doesn't seem to mind eating in the same room as his box. I do put his
dishes further away from the litter box.
When he was at Humane where I adopted him, his litter tray and food dishes
are practically next
to each other. Same thing when he stayed at TED, though the cage at TED is
bigger.

Winnie

When I lived with my brother and his dog, I kept both litterbox and
Oscar's food and water in the bathroom.  It was a fairly small space.
She didn't seem to mind; then again, I think I put the food and water
up on the sink, with the litterbox below.

If you were asking me I'd probably not put my cat's food dishes near their
litterbox as I wouldn't like to eat next to a toilet myself.  It doesn't
apply here as I feed them in the kitchen and there is no litterbox in the
house anyway.  Toilet duties are done in the big outside.
If I did have a litterbox in the house I don't think I'd feed the cats near
it.

Tweed

Our litter boxes are under the bathroom sink and in the bottom of the
hallway closet.

Our food dishes are in the kitchen and in the bedroom.

We used to just feed in the kitchen, but with 4 cats and a narrow
kitchen, the vet said Kumani's lack of eating and vomiting might be
made worse by feeling that there is too much bustle in the kitchen.  We
fed her in the bedroom and it turns out she much prefers to eat in
there so now we feed dry food only in the bedroom, while water, soft
food and one bowl of dry are in the kitchen.  The bedroom has a rug so
we don't want anything too messy in there.

--Fil

Nina and Francesca and formerly Panther get fed in the kitchen and
that's where I keep their full waterbowl all day. I have one litterbox
in the living room, and another in my bathroom.  Everyone seems pretty
calm about the eating arrangements, but if they were hungry enough, I
suspect both cats would willingly eat near the litter box.  I do scoop
the solids out of the litterbox daily to make sure it doesn't get too
smelly by hoomin standards.

Melissa

I have TuTu's kibble dish on a mat in the computer room  The litter box is
in the shower room off the computer room.  I feed her wet food on a mat in
the kitchen.  She has water pans in the shower, in the main bath tub and a
Petsmate fountain on the main bath counter.

I have one litterbox in a small bedroom that has been converted to
"multi-purpose" use (everything "except" a bedroom -- the room where I do
oil painting, have a piece of exercise equipment, and a TV).  The other
litterbox is in a large walk-in closet inside the computer room.  Food
dishes and one water bowl are in the kitchen.  The second water bowl is in
the computer room (where I spent a great deal of my time, and the cats are
almost always in there with me).

MaryL

Ripley and Cav eat together, they have a couple of dishes and a water bowl
near the back door in the kitchen. If I start dishing up dinner when Ripley
is asleep, Cav runs around the house looking for him, vocalising loudly, to
tell him that the food is out.

Jeanette

I've never thought about it, just instinctively put the litterboxes as
far away from the food as possible. In this flat, I've made the sauna
into the cats' room - the litterboxes are there, and Miranda's bed that
she got for Xmas from my niece, and the cats like to just lounge on the
wooden benches. Right outside the sauna is the bathroom, where I have a
big bowl of water on the floor for them.

I have to feed them in different places; Caliban eats on the floor in
the hallway while Miranda gets her food by special delivery on top of a
cupboard. Special delivery means I can't leave it out, or Caliban scarfs
it down. I have to lift the plate on top of the fridge when Miranda
isn't eating. When she wants a nibble, she jumps onto the cupboard, and
if I don't notice her immediately, she tells me in no uncertain terms,
'I WANT FOOD NOW, SLAVE!'

Persia only cares about WHEN :)  Her food bowl is in the kitchen entry way
and her fountain is in my bedroom.  Her litter box is at the end of the hall
by the 2nd bathroom, no where near either food or water.

Jill

Oh well... I HAD to put the litterbox in there because I sure didn't
want it in the livingroom or the bedroom, and they're big
litter-scratchers so when the box was in our bathroom they left bits
of feline pine underfoot. Owie. And I do NOT want to feed them in the
kitchen - they're not supposed to be in the kitchen AT ALL, it's the
only rule that I strictly enforce - our kitchen is far too small and
the last thing I want is to trip over them while I'm carrying a
hot/full pan of food. It would be a disaster for all parties. And I
don't want to feed them in the bedroom becuase they make too much mess
(not to mention coming in and making a huge racket at three in the
morning when they want a snack!) So there isn't anywhere else TO feed
them in the apartment... they don't seem to mind.