to ask what you all eat as a family?

[OhTheConfusion]

We had friends over for dinner tonight and DH cooked as I was working till 5.30 and he is a lucky so and so who is still on his summer holidays!

DH made us all (4 adults and 5 children... aged, 10, 9, 7, 6 and 11mths) chickpea, roast pepper, tomato and cumin stew with sliced rump of beef. Our three tucked in (including baby as made with no salt... only adult beef seasoned) whilst the others kind of poked their food and looked at us .

DH asked if they were ok and they replied 'we don't eat healthy food'. I was so flustered I didn't know what to say.

Please tell me not everyone eats pizza and chips seven nights a week?!? (this is what I dug out the freezer for them).

Wouldn't it have been a. good manners and b. emminently sensible to check beforehand what food their DC ate.

Wouldn't it have been good manners and sensible for the guests to eat what was put before them?

Am aghast at the number of posters who think it is you that was rude or thoughtless not to run your meal choices past guests! I was raised that it was impolite to insult a hosts' food, and - short of food allergies or ethical abstentions (about which a thoughtful guest should inform a host ahead of time, all the while protesting of course that the host shouldn't go to any trouble to accomodate those!) - one should at least make an effort to eat and feign enjoyment of the meal.

I'd be really pissed off if my dinner guests insulted my (or my DH's) efforts like that.

To answer your OP, though - we eat frozen pizzas/ready meals a couple of night a week (when DSCs cook) and wholesome-with-veg-and-fresh-ingredients-but-not-overly-healthy meals the other nights. We only eat red meat once a week, if at all. I think we are pretty middle-of-the-road, really.

I can't abide chickpeas so couldn't have eaten it, the dc would have given it a go though. By experience, lots of dc are unadventurous eaters. I have had playdates round who have only eaten plain pasta before so the idea of giving them cumin stew would be right out.

If I didn't know the dc I would do homemade wedges, sweet corn and homemade breaded chicken strips, if I knew they weren't veggie/halal of course.

brdgrl I would check with my guests because I would never want people to feel they had to eat something I cooked that they hated. There are 4 of us in our house and none of us are fussy eaters particularly but we all have things we really don't like. I wouldn;t make my own family eat something that they didn't want to so why would I make someone elses?

I hate the "you have to eat because its polite" thing - I'm not eating onions or peppers for anyone! But there is also no need to be rude, i simply say I am really sorry but I don't like *whatever".

Not a bit try hard at all, he made it because its all cooked in 30min and to the poster who said a bit heavy for Aug... it has piddled down here for two days :(

Well I guess you learn each day, in future I will go for a 'safe' option.

Wow OP! Your children are amazing eaters, and you are so healthy and middle class and cosmopolitan and adventurous and everything!

And you are not smug at all.

We would all have eaten it sounds yummy. to answer your question we eat similar stuff really stews, salads, risotto, pasta soups etc. I generally cook from scratch both dd and ds will eat anything. Tbh I may have cooked a simpler less adventurous meal like lasagne and salad or something of we had guests with children but I would be mortified of my children ever refused to eat what they were given when we were guests.

Its been raining here too, but it's still August and temperatures are fairly high and it's humid. I just think its an odd choice, when there are so many simple tasty dishes which could be chucked together with salads in half an hour

DD's favourite meals are pepperoni pizza (I make it but only cos it's cheaper!), chicken korma and homemade steak pie. She'll also eat sausages/toad in the hole, meatballs and pasta with tomato sauce (but not spag bol ), roast dinners, pork stir fry with hoi sin or sweet 'n' sour sauce, burgers, chicken in most forms, most veg and loves salad, so all in all not bad although it drives me mental that having loved all sorts of fish and shepherds pie as a baby/toddler, she now point blank refuses to touch either.

I think it's odd that the adults you had round were so fussy, but I wouldn't have attempted to give that meal to kids tbh.

Default setting at our house for visiting children is pizza, chips/wedges and beans or salad, or toad-in-the-hole, rapid roastinis, carrots and peas.

I don't even know what cumin is

And I've never tasted a chickpea. I hate tomato in all forms, try to avoid red meat and don't like pepper. Having said that, I'd have eaten it because I'm actually a huge believer of the 'it's polite to eat what your hosts give you' school of thought. I'd have really really struggled though.

My children wouldn't have touched it. And I don't think you can put the same societal expectations on children as adults. I'd have apologised on their behalf but wouldn't have tried to make them eat something like that.

I'm sure it was lovely but it's not really normal family food is it?

At home we mainly eat very plain food - chicken, fish, fruit, vegetables, noodles, potatoes, wraps, yogurt and eggs. That's about it.

We eat lots of different stuff, don't often have "freezer food" though. We all eat the same meal and there will be days when one or other of the kids doesn't like what I serve up (despite eating it many times before!) but normally will eat part of the meal - the rice for example.

Kids can be funny my ds1 (5) went to tea at a friends and the mum asked me if he likes pasta and pesto - yes says I he lovesit we have it all the time. Except once there he decided he didn't like it!!!! We had my friends kids for tea and I made pizza (home made) and he wouldn't eat it even though we ha had homemade pizza at his house a week before!! Go figure

Your meal sounds great, Confusion, DH & me & DS1 would tuck in, my others would poke around at best (and DS2 would screech "What is this rubbish!?" on a bad day).

Proudnscary

WTF? Sounds like a lovely dinner OP, but then we also eat real food in our house, not factory-made shite. Chick-peas and beef tomatoey stew is lovely. However, I would have put some salt in it for more flavour.
No wonder people are so unhealthy if they eat factory-made packaged stuff all the time. It's not hard to cook something like that and a damn sight cheaper than takeaway pizzas all round.

You are right freshletticia it does sound lovely - but only if you like it! I would have eaten it as I said and we dont eat factory made shite in our house (well hardly ever :))

Just because people dont like chickpeas and/or tomatoes etc doesn't mean they eat rubbish at home!

I'm quite amazed how many adults on this forum don't like or have never tried chick peas. They are such a fantastically cheap, tasty and healthy food, that can be added to lots of meals for a decent protein boost. I'm such a huge fan of peas / beans / pulses.

This week we've eaten moroccan stew with couscous, ham and pea tagliatelle, toad in the hole, homemade pizza with salad and courgette and chickpea filo pie. However if I were cooking for friends (and their children) I'd probably make a simple roast, spagheti bolognaise, pasta bake or something similar.

*spaghetti

The things is, if you happen not to like/eat beef (many people don't) or chickpeas (quite a few people don't) then there's really not a meal there for you. So quite risky. Also a bit heavy for August - I saw you post that it's been raining but it also has here and it's been very humid! Good on you for cooking from scratch but maybe this time it just didn't suit the guests. I also believe in being polite and eating what you're given, but then if you really don't like one of the main components of a meal it's quite hard.

That is a bit of a strange choice to serve anyway - We don't exist on junk food, but my kids wouldn't have eaten that either...and to be honest, I'd have forced it down but wouldn't have enjoyed it either.

I'm sure it was a throw-away comment anyway, my kids would say the don't eat vegetables, they do, but just not every vegetable, the standard peas/sweetcorn/carrots/broccoli will get eaten but faced with a mixed veg stew they wouldn't touch it. They will also eat any fruit presented to them.

Family meals tend to be reasonably safe - spag bol, mild chilli, roast dinners, spicy chicken breasts or thighs, pasta, macaroni cheese, home made pizza, meatballs, omelets, chops, toad in the hole, risotto, cottage pie, chicken wraps, stir fry etc. I don't insist that everyone eats the same, My Oh and No1 son love fish in all ways, me and No2 not that keen, No1 loves curry , No2 likes plain food and No1 wont eat potatoes in any form. As long as everyone is eating an overall healthy diet, I see no need to ram chickpeas etc into them ....or other peoples kids. I always give other peoples kids a choice when they are at my house - I would never see a child leave my table hungry......there is no need, even if all they have is bread and butter/jam. They are not your kids.

You can't say it's not "normal family food" though - it's just a stew! I think the cumin is making people imagine something crazily exotic instead of mildly spiced! It would be a normal sort of thing for us - we like tasty things you bung in a pot like that. I made a chorizo and cannelini bean stew the other day and DH and I were silent (as in "can't talk, eating") and the baby was cramming it into his mouth with both hands. We also eat fish fingers and potato waffles but it's normal for us to eat food like that.

oh, and No1 son gets freaked out by chunks of tomatoes - all tomatoes have to be blended so would probably have ran screaming from the table :o

Quite Dildo, it's frickin amazing that people have different tastes and likes.

My dh and I are not British and we would both have found it very odd to be served your DH stew. Nothing to do with healthy or not healthy, just looks a very odd combination of things to us. Doubt we would have liked it, probably just nibbled it a bit and then made our excuses asap so we could feed the kids.

I think it sounds delicious. Regular meals here which my kids (7, 5 and 2) all love:

Chicken, chorizo and butter bean stew
Coq au reisling (nigella)
Chilli con carne
Spaghetti bolognese
Tomato based pasta sauce
Butternut squash, chorizo & veg soup
Ham, egg and chips
Teriyaki salmon, stir fried veg and rice/noodles
Chicken dippers, veg and mash
Salmon dippers, veg and wedges
dab fillets / plaice floured and fried, veg
Quiche and salad
Beef casserole

We had someone stay for impromptu kids tea once, I was short of ingredients so suggested quick and easy pasta and pesto. They'd never heard of it and bought I was being flash

The last time another couple and their kids came, other than BBQing or a curry takeaway, I made chilli and rice and served it with lots of garlic bread. I made it without many chilli spices (just a tsp of mild chilli powder) and had a bowl of chopped chillies, a bottle of hot pepper sauce and a jar of chilli flakes on the table for the adults to spice it up themselves....there were no leftovers!

I like the sound of your beef and chickpea stew but at least one of my DCs wouldn't have that and hubby would only eat it out of politeness. I'd like to try making it but every time I stew beef with tomatoes and herbs it tastes sickly to me, even though I like them in theory.