Nanny - Cant cook, wont cook!!

of course not, nannystar...thats what I said!

Its cool your nanny cooks your children international cuisine fistfulofnappies...do you have a problem with it?

lol after I posted my earlier entry on this thread, our new au pair turned up her nose at frozen pizza. It isnt healthy enough for her tastes, and she cooks traditional Polish food for the children. I am aux anges

Sausages are easiest cooked in the oven. No turning and you can't mess it up.

Meat balls - just form the mince into balls and put anything else you want (onions) into the sauce instead.

From reading other threads not only will nannies in 15 years time be unable to cook, but they won't be able to pick up toys or clothes either!

Spatula! Oh thank you! Hate it when I can't think of the words of things anymore. Onset of senility I think.

Rolling sausages.... It's easy to do two of the sides but the other two require you standing there, clamping them down in place, whilst they spit fat all over your hand. Haven't found the answer to that one yet.

Floating, use two tablespoons to turn them instead of a flipper thing (what are they called?!). Don't move them about too much and chop the onion finely.

Have problems keeping potato cakes together, they seem to scramble all over the place, I kind of scoop them back into form before serving. Don't know if it's too much egg or the breadcrumbs or what.

at not knowing how to cook sausages. I just don;t understand, how can you possibly reach adulthood without working that out!

As posted elsewhere, mine confessed to not knowing how to cook sausages last night (and couldn't work out from first principles given that I had left instructions on how to operate the grill and where to find the tin foil to put under the wire grid...). Working on how to teach her to cook from a distance

oops crossed wires. Sounds like I was criticising nanny's recipe but we just posted at the same time. Hadn't read hers first!

Meatballs
--
these are really yummy thanks to the apple and not heavy (no breadcrumbs, egg etc) gleaned from somewhere and adapted but no idea now what the source was:

500g mincemeat (I use a half beef, half pork packet)
1 onion, chopped
1 chicken stock cube dissolved in 2 tbsp hot water
1 apple (peeled and grated) and then chopped a bit so balls don't fray and fall apart when you cook them
1/2 tsp Worcestershire sauce
pinch of sugar
pepper
3 or 4 tablespoons of dried herbs (I always have dried parsley and chives at home but you can use fresh too of course)

Mix everything in a mixing bowl. Roll into little balls. Form a circle with your thumb and index finger - about that size. Roll in flour

Warm vegetable oil in a big pan or pot, fry over a high heat for about 3 minutes, turning over to fry all sides. Then lower the heat. Put the lid on and cook for about 12 minutes, turning.

They're nice hot or cold.

Tips: Don't add much to it!

Finely mince the meat
Finely chop onion
mix the two together
If adding breadcrumbs to make it go further, add a well beaten egg, to help it still be moist.
Shape, cover then put in fridge for a while (ideally an hour or so) prior to cooking.

I've always thought being a good nanny is knowing and caring about nutrition. The kids i look after are a delight to feed (i caught them young) . I cook from scratch but maybe once a week use something like organic sausages or fish fingers at a push.

I'm lucky i really enjoy cooking so don't see it as a chore but at the end of the day a nanny should be trying to feed the children healthy meals. I would buy her a very simple cook book that has the basics like a meat sauce for pasta, or if you have a griddle it's a easy to cook salmon or chicken. Roasted vegetables always go down well and are easy to prepare and pop in the oven and forget about which is good for me as i have 3 kids to look after. I always try to include a green veg at dinner and if i don't have much time we'll have salad or raw veg instead of cooking veg which is nice for variety and i don't overload on the carbs because we eat quite late and usually fruit and yoghurt for desert. Water or milk, they maybe have fruit juice once or twice a week. God i could go on i'm quite passionate about this subject as i can always see the change in behaviour when they eat different food which they do but just once in a while.

Agree with everyone else. You don't want them eating junk and drinking coke, so you need to say so explicitly. Think you like her so you don't want to be heavy handed but you have to begin the way you mean to continue I suppose.

Like Jura I think you need to set a weekly menu, she's a nanny not a cook, maybe hates cooking (I can sympathise with that) and is no good at it, so the simpler the better. Type up the recipes, slip them in folio covers and put them in a binder. If she can vary or do it better, great. Otherwise just make it idiot-proof for the beginning. Thinking along these lines:

Monday - vegetable soup with a loaf of brown bread; fruit salad; juice or water
Tuesday - spaghetti bolonaise; small pot of yoghurt with fruit
Wednesday - fish fingers, mashed potatoes, steamed peas; strawberries
Thursday - meatballs, rice, tomato sauce; caramel pudding
Friday - star shaped pasta in a tuna sauce; ice cream

That kind of very basic sort of thing. Even if she just has 3-4 weekly menus, it'll be varied enough for the kids to cope with. Maybe a couple of things frozen like lasagne or lamb stew that she just has to reheat. We don't have desserts usually, just fruit

When our nanny started I gave her 'welcome pack' which had amongst other stuff, a list of 'stuff we like to eat', 'stuff we eat sometimes'ie. chips, 'stuff we never eat/drink ie. fizzy drinks, McD's

Also pointed out our 'easy veggie kids cook book' (left it out on kitchen counter rather than shelf).
And I fill freezer with packs of veg ready to be added to pasta/rice meals with no prep.

ooooooooooooohhhhh..... I'd be having a serious talk with my nanny. Let's see if I can recall the eating rules off the top of my head:

Salmon once a week.
Eggs (w/ chopped spinach) twice a week.
At least one veg and one fruit every day.
No cookies/treats until after lunch has been eaten.
Dinner must contain a veg.
Whole meal bread / brown rice / not "manky white bread"
Nutrasweet is off limits (must read labels)
Juice, water, and milk are accceptable drinks.

I am the biggest Diet Coke addict there ever was, but if I caught my kids drinking coke I'd be very unhappy.

ziopin, can only suggest that you seek relatively healthy meals that are very easy to prepare. This is what I generally do. I leave frozen fish fingers and peas for one day, mince / salad to make spag bog for another day, eggs etc to make pancakes for another day. I make up the veg in the evenings. Also, I sometimes cook a stew in the evenings and leave it for her to heat up the next day.
I leave loads of fruit, and never have crisps or coke or sweets in stock in the house.
I would definitely ask her straight out, not to buy coke or pasties from the bakery, they are sooo unhealthy, I put on a couple of stone when I was eating them for my lunch!
My children's diet could be healthier, but this is a realistic solution for busy parents and a carer who is a novice cook.

should add - I'm really impressed and pleased with how our nanny took to acheiving the types of food I'd always aimed for: she really took to heart my feelings on this. When I've taken my children to places they usually go to with her, the staff have commented "we know - they always have milk to drink and a banana snack". So thank you to her!