Can't be bothered to cook for son

Tell him that the £400 covers accommodation and bills and that cooking, laundry and cleaning are not part of the deal.

Op referred to him in the title post as her son and in another post where she explains that's he's her step son but she considers him her own.
So why would you take rent from your child grown up or not.
Fair enough if he's able to cook and look after himself he should do it but to say you can't be bothered to do it is just ridiculous.
Toughen up and clear the fridge out of the beer and junk, then there will be space for food.
How bloody ridiculous for a 'family' to behave that way with eachother.
I think another poster is correct that this is wind up because who would behave like that.

A 17 page thread on MN about fridge space? Wow.

Well said @jaimelesoleil i totally agree,

So you and your husband take £400 of this lad and neither of you can be bothered to cook him a proper meal when he gets home...pretty shoddy parenting in my opinion.
I never took any money of my children and still provided them with a cooked meal when they got home after a long day working and commuting. They inturn would cook for us at weekends.

Is your dh planning on taking up less room in the fridge for his beer when your baby needs feeding? Os he planning on feeding his next child better than his son?

My mum was exactly like you in that she didn't really eat proper meals once I got to a teenager and she deemed me able to cook for myself. She hated cooking and there was never a proper dinner on the table unless I made it.

Fine, she can eat what she wants and I was happy to cook for myself, but the issue was there was never any food I could actually cook and I didn't have any money to buy it myself.

Whenever she went shopping, she bought what she felt was enough and didn't think about the fact I actually wanted to eat proper meals, and not survive of her rations. She would buy one pizza and think that was enough to feed her and two teenagers for dinner. There was never any ingredients to make an actual meal.

I was constantly starving and saying I was hungry - she'd tell me to eat some crackers and butter.

I don't know why you are stressing about this everyday, it's easy to start doing a weekly shop for dinners for him (either you or him can do this), and then tell them the beer needs to go from the fridge to make room for the food. They can buy a mini fridge if it's that much of an issue.

Do online shopping, he can add to the basket, set a delivery once a week - he cooks for himself. assume he's an adult?

Just buy a bigger fridge if the one you have isn't big enough for 3 people. Then stop taking his money for food you aren't buying and get him to shop and cook for himself. Your whole fridge clearly isn't full to the brim with 'snacks and beer'. What a pointless thread so easily resolved with some common sense.

You clearly couldn’t give a damn about your son - stop creaming off his contribution if you and your husband are not allowing him space.

and your husband eats lunch and dinner at work seven days a week ?

We have a little fridge in his room for soft drinks. They are not great but we picked this one up off facebook for £10. So it does. Wouldn't trust it an inch for food or milk!

I am so late to this thread that probably all questions have been answered. Sorry. But my DS (age 19) also has a different schedule to my household. He is starting to contribute to the household budget from 1st Sept. £100 pcm. He also stays with his dad so this seemed a fair start. That covers food, bills, council tax. He is a student but has a part-time job. I organise the food shop, but he also wants to eat in the evening whereas I don't. So he cooks for him - gosh the difference in quality! If I cook - fresh, lots of veg. If he cooks bare minimum. I have taught him a few basic meals. But it is worrying - these young people need to cook healthy meals - know what that is - and be able to clean up.

‘You need to sort your own dinners son. You can use as much of the fridge as you need but I need room for my food. If you also want cold beer on tap maybe buy a little fridge for your room.’ There. Sorted.

What I can't see is that three adults in a house can't talk about what needs to be done and sort it out between them.

So, what do YOU want him to do?

I think if he brought home something each evening to make then he'd be doing exactly what I'm doing for him but that doesn't seem right

Why not right, OP?

She isn’t fully causing the situation on her own , no! But she is most definitely contributing to it.

She charges the DS £400 a month which includes food, but begrudges providing that food / begrudges letting him bring his own food into the house to store it - because he DH has also just as equally filled up the fridge with beer! Her only option is to then go to the shop when he returns to work to buy him food (which he’s given her money for from the £400) she is charging him which she is now complaining about having to do! Yet doesn’t want him going to the shop to buy his own food because there is apparently no space in the fridge!

So in reality she is charging DS for something she is unable to provide- which is food (or storage of food). As I said, it isn’t just the DS who is stocking up on beer!

She may not moan about the DH, he may go and buy his own food and cook it himself who knows! But it makes no difference in this situation as she is basically moaning about the DS needing to eat!

Utterly ridiculous. He's giving you £400 a month and you can't be bothered to buy him food??

Get bread, eggs, beans, some fresh salad veg, tins of beans etc.

There's something very wrong with your life if all your fridge contains is beer and snacks.

Is this your way of driving him out? Let him have space in the fridge and freezer and cook for himself. You can store your salad stuff in a smaller container

He can stop storing his beers in the fridge and he can ask his Dad to make room for his food over dads beers!

The OP is not taking any fridge space.

It's up to her DH and HIS son (who fill the fridge with THEIR BEERS) to sort something out. Not the OP.

Can you really not see this?

This is crazy. You’re not eating because it’s too hot? Bloody hell. I’m completely in the wrong as I’ve just put jacket potatoes in the oven (yes I’m gonna get flamed as we won’t eat until 1030!) and last week I used the slow cooker!

Yes he’d pay £400 in a house share, but in a house share he’d have his own room in the fridge/freezer and cupboards.

YABVU.

We don't actually know how old he is.

£400pcm is about what you'd pay around here for a house share before buying and cooking your own food.

As he's family, why can't he share the cooking? Presumably he's a healthy young man. He's deffo way too old to mother.

Are you crazy.. the beers are the husbands , as if in the real world some beers wouldn't be pushed to the side to get some food bits in. The op contradicts herself.. claims she don't eat don't cook but there's no room for the fruit she wants to get. The boy pays them. They have a fridge and freezer!! Put some bloody food in it. This is a total non event as you ppl say.