To get a teensy bit annoyed at visiting relative’s ever changing dietary restrictions?

Serve up meat and potatoes, spag bol and very mild curries for a couple of weeks, and next time round, DON'T ASK HER what she wants. If she has any genuine allergies, accommodate that obviously, but otherwise just cook what you're cooking, maybe just dialling down the spiciness a bit, and don't worry about it. If she moans tell her where the bread and sandwich fillings are. She sounds infuriating.

Alternatively, maybe tell her she's welcome to cook?

I once had my cousin and her partner round for dinner and accommodated her no onion, no tomato, no chilli etc. diet. Only for her to sit eating onion bhajis!

I have an ileostomy and an extremely limited diet. Wherever I go I just organise my own food.

Because that wasn’t the AIBU? Maybe he brings other strengths to the table? DIY, car maintenance, school pick ups/drop offs, taxiing teens around 🤷‍♀️ Equal doesn’t mean 50% of every chore.

Why is no one challenged the OP on the fact that her husband seems to be unable to do basic cooking?

imagine a woman saying that

😀 You sound like such a lovely dil op! Kind, generous and diplomatic. Sorry to hear your mil is genuinely ill. I hope you can work out the dietary issues and yes a fortnight is quite long enough for hosting, even when your guests are very gracious, so YANBU at all!

I had the opposite sitution. A friend coming to stay with dietarty restrictions - we spend ages emailing back and forth about things I planned to cook and how I could adjust them. I was all set, food planned, shopping done. Then when she arrived she said she'd decided to go on a cleansing diet and would only be eating fruit and water all week.

I let it go on day one, and she had fruit and water, then in the evening she went to the pub and had beer and crisps. I was quite blunt, and said if you're not sticking to fruit then I'm going to serve you the meals I have planned and prepared. She ate them all, but I've not invited her again.

Sounds like you can dig out the cookbooks on day 2 and ask for suggestions of what to eat, tweaking recipes to make it work.

My intolerances drive me mad but with someone cooking from scratch it's much easier to tweak recipes and leave out what I can't eat.

She hates yr cooking and enjoys making it life hell. Let her cook her own food.

I completely understand this frustration.

It does sound like your MIL might have some general stomach issues and is scared, so tells you the most restrictive versio of her diet in advance as a pre-emptive measure, but then, over time, starts to feel a bit more confident about a bit of this or a bit of that. I think this is quite common - my mother could also have a reaction to spices etc, but would cook with them herself where she knew exactly what she was having, and how much. But it was endlessly frustrating to have her be so prescriptive and then see her happily tucking into something when we were out and about.

I did click on this thread thinking you were goign to talk about someone like one of DH's friends who announced, the day before they arrived for a long-planned celebratory dinner that actually, he's lactose free. Cue me scrambling around to change the menu (I'd planned roast chicken, served on risotto, and I forget what dessert was goign to be, but it definitly had dairy!) and am emergency run to waitrose.

Lovely new menu, including a selection of vegan ice cream. Only to find him tucking into the bar of milk chocolate I'd put out for the DC. To which is long suffering wife said, "oh, he just thinks he's got a diary allergy but doesn't seem to bother him when it's chocolate or things he likes."

I had to leave the table and go into another room for a minute.

I wish you lived near me , OP. You sound really kind ( and a good cook).

Has MIL seen a doctor about her health, though?. Because if she is a pleasant person, and not just winding you up, it sounds as if she has problems with her digestion but she doesn’t know what is causing it. So she ‘blames’ things she has eaten when she has an upset , but they might not be the cause, so if she does have them, the next time she doesn’t have the reaction. I haven’t explained that very well but I expect you can understand what I mean.

She is obviously frail ( can’t lift heavy pans, stopped cooking), but the odd food behaviour and the feeling cold would bear proper investigation.

Sounds like my DH. Quickly learned to stop telling him what he was eating as the list of things he didn’t eat was so long!

DM made us traipse around town to meet her requirements one visit, turning everywhere down till I was ready to eat her! That evening when I’d cooked her a ‘dairy free, oil free, something else free’ meal, she helped herself to some of ours that had cheese sprinkled in and left us short.

some people are just rude! 🤣

Plain rice. Plain naan. Dhal with the bare minimum of spices.

Just had a friend visit who said no chocolate she didn't want for example pain au chocolate so I got her crossaints. The first thing she said when she sat down to breakfast was 'Do you have any Nutella?'
People are just nuts

I eat quite a plain diet by choice. Just give her pan fried chicken/fish with veg or salad. Job done.

I would hand over cooking responsibilities to the guest for a few days.
Particularly as her restrictions keep changing.
It would be interesting to see if she adds any of these no go foods but maybe just a little bit items when she's doing her own cooking, as I think she's taking advantage.

My DF wouldn't eat anything with garlic or onions in. In his latter years, he and DM mainly ate M&S ready meals. After DF died, I was at DMs house. She put one of their regular ready meals in the oven to cook. I popped out to get something for me, DH & DB to eat. Upon my return I'll never forget the smell of garlic in the porch which was emanating from the ready meal in the oven. I still chuckle about it 10 years on.
I'm always happy to cater for allergies and intolerances and even make an effort for 'fussy' eaters but in my experience, adding a drop of lemon juice, a clove of garlic, a splash of vinegar into the cooking, is unlikely to cause any issues for the 'fussy' group and they won't even know it's there.

I would of made her beans on toast all week.

So a bit of an 'aha' moment - you say your MIL is always cold and has a dodgy tum - could she be undiagnosed hypothyroid? Those are both symptoms. There are a lot more of course. Low stomach acid is common which makes digesting food difficult.

I'm hypothyroid and have various food intolerances, plus developed a bad gluten reaction last year so now have to be scrupulously gluten free. I would dread going to eat at someone's house, in fact I'd take my own food, I think!

Why don't you just ask her what she eats at home, suggest she cooks a couple of nights as well so she's got dishes she is comfortable with - she could make extra portions.

Perfect illustration of why not to have house guests.

I just read your Title and immediately thought of Davey in The Pursuit of Love:)