Step-MIL and her obsession with me not cooking!

[TiffanyAtBreakfast]

Background: DH is a really good cook, and enjoys the whole process from start to finish. In contrast, I'm just an okay cook. We each do about 50/50 during the week, but when we are having a party or people over for a meal, DH likes to do it. I help with chopping / prep and things but that's about it. This is a pattern we've fallen into naturally and are both happy with it.

We hosted a meal over the weekend with both sets of parents. As usual from the moment they sit down I had comments from Step-MIL about the fact that DH has cooked. She will laugh, "Oh, what a surprise that you've not cooked Tiffany!" looking sideways at FIL. "Why is DH stuck in the kitchen again Tiffany?" , and this weekend, "Do you ever cook?".

Every time this happens DH jumps in and explains yet again that he is just the better cook and that he enjoys it, but Step-MIL really seems to judge me for not being the main chef in our household. It seems that she upholds the outdated idea of the woman belonging in the kitchen.

To prepare for having our parents over, I cleaned and tidied the house top to bottom, put away laundry, bought the dinner ingredients from the supermarket, laid the table, made a playlist of music and did most of the conversation-holding -- While DH cooked. In my opinion I did my fair share of hosting, am I missing something?

AIBU to think that we are even partners, regardless of who has done the actual cooking, and I am not the lazy slattern Step-MIL likes to make me out to be?! How does everyone else do it in their homes?

Tell her if she doesn't STFU she wont be invited again.

Anyone who gets invited for a meal and makes ANY complaint doesn't deserve it frankly

If your DH likes cooking, why shouldn't be cook?! As charming as she sounds, I'd try not to take it too personally. You haven't said how old you are, but I'm assuming she's from a generation of women who did 'women's work' eg all of the home stuff while the men went and earnt a living because women shouldn't go out to work, we should all stay at home having babies and cooking and cleaning and sewing and looking pretty or some other bollocks.

Could you try cooking really badly next time she comes over, on purpose? I bet she'd never ask you why you don't cook again

tell her that DH grips the frying pan so well with his penis that it would be a shame to stop him.

Why do you even justify yourself in response to her unpleasantness? How dare she behave like that towards you in your own home?

Either out her back in her box properly, ignore it or just don't invite them over. Or a bit of all three.

My pil have some old fashioned sexist and twatty ideas. I just ignore it by pretending I don't understand what they're getting at as if what they are suggesting is just so ludicrous that they must be joking/have me confused with a door mat/surrendered wife someone else. But I don't see mine often and it keeps the peace.

You know you're not unreasonable.

She is old fashioned and rude.

My DH cooks every Sunday and every time we have guests. My MIL has never passed comment about this. I don't think it would even enter her head.

Do the same when you're over there for dinner. Oh, MIL, stuck in the kitchen again? So you cooked again, MIL - what a surprise.

I think Oldraver has covered things very well!

Thanks for the replies! I like the idea of cooking something horrible and then saying "MIL, are you happy I cooked this time?"

I'm 27 and DH is 28.

Make beans on toast next time.

Rude person that she is.
What difference does it make who cooked?!!

I think the only way to deal with this is scarcism. Say that you are a princess who does not work or housework at all and DH had to do it all. Smile and drink more wine.

My DH does 80% of the cooking. He's good at it and enjoys it. I cook when he's working a late shift. I can cook reasonably well but we generally split it along similar lines to you and your DH. I do all the laundry and food shopping. We share the cleaning. Works for us and it's no - one's business but yours. But my MIL makes similar noises, particularly if DH mentions having done some cleaning. We both work full - time and have 3 kids so as far as I'm concerned everything should be shared and DH agrees.

DH brothers could be like that - thank goodness we're not in contact with them any more! When we were I was still working so the domestic stuff was a bit more evenly shared and they'd make sarky comments about DH using the vacuum cleaner. Aparently it was "womens work".
The first time I was forced to spend an evening with the brothers the wives vanished off to the kitchen to cook and I remained with my DH. They spent the whole time glaring at me! I realised later that they thought I should have been in the kitchen with the other wives.

Some people just can't handle the fact that others don't follow their own very narrow rules about how to live. Ignore her, she sounds like too much hard work to me!

Thanks poshfrock, good to hear from someone in the same boat and that we are not as abnormal as MIL seems to believe.

My OH does most of the cooking here (he works shifts so is home for dinner 3 or 4 days a week), sometimes it's a joint effort, rarely do I cook. We just fell into the routine when I was stuck to the sofa breastfeeding and haven't gone back. He loves cooking, is good at it and even meal plans and does the food shopping. His nan sometimes throws me a funny look when we discuss it but I just ignore it really.

tell the old dear that my dad is 79 and does all the shopping and cooking as his wife hates it.

you need to fight fire with fire

"yes of course in YOUR day cooking was women's work, you'll be well used to being cast in the housekeeper rules what with YOUR generation. It's a shame YOUR dh is so stuck in stereotypical wife/husband roles"

see how she likes them apples.

I like both SunnyBaudelaire's plan and HazleNutt's plan.

I find that people (mostly female ime) who judge and criticise a womans 'wife work' skills seem to be insecure and entrenched in keeping up the patriarchy for their own sort of self validation.
I have one such person in my family and it used to grate on me. Now I feel a bit sorry for her.
I get through the visits by playing up my Dhs unnatural ability to cook and care for dc from time to time

You just have to tell her to stfu or let it go I'm afraid.

I have this with my MIL. I cook every meal in this house. Even breakfast is prepared by me 6 days out of 7. No problem with it whatsoever. But on Sundays my DH gives me a break. We don't have a Sunday roast (shock! Horror!) if we go round to pil on a Saturday or Sunday, she finds it soooo amusing to ask me if I'm cooking a dinner. It used to grate, now I just laugh because her obsession with this subject is so weird and pathetic.

I had a comment like that from an ex's dad. We were staying at his parents for a month until a flat I was buying went through. I was working two jobs, my ex was unemployed, I was buying everything. My ex used to cook. My ex's dad once sneered "don't you even cook?". I just sneered right back at him "no I'm the breadwinner". I should have left then, the ex was a waste of space, just like his dad!

Ps, if I had a MIL throwing comments like this, I'd just laugh and say"you're so behind the times, aren't you" back at her.

My dad did most of the cooking when we were growing up (a long time ago!) as my mum worked shifts, so he was home first. Common sense I think! She is an idiot and should be more grateful for your hospitality. Are you saying your parents were there too? Did they stand up for you? Did she raise DH? If not, I would be saying how lucky you feel that dh has been raised to be so willing to engage with family life etc, modern man blah blah.

I'd be tempted to let DH cook as usual and serve up nice food to everyone else while she gets a plate of something you cooked and just heated up in the microwave.

My pil are funny about me working. I know Conversations go like this:

fil: so MOUMOO, you must like being at home with dd because ladies love babies don't they? Not men though, nooooo.
Me: well it's ok so I'm grateful for the time she's in nursery.
Fil: aaah, so is that when you go out with your lady friends?
Mil: or is that when you do your ironing?
Me: No, it's when I work. In my job.
Fil: It must be nice to go out to lunch and talk about the babies.
Me: well I really wouldnt know, because I'm at work which I have to because we don't have spare cash to blow on nursery feed at £70 a day.
Mil: oh do you have a little job now? That's nice.
Me: no it's the same one as before. Working for myself.
Both: that's nice dear.
Me: oh it is! The money is fabulous, it's not a difficult job but it does use my professional qualifications so that's good.
Fil: oh but you must miss being with the children?
Me: Do I miss them for the two days I'm at work? I spend most days with them so i don't really get the chance. Dh, do you miss the dc while you are at work?

That is so irritating & rude!
Your MIL sounds stuck in the 1950s or something.

That's pretty much the set up in our household. OH loves cooking so I let him get on with it, I do cook as well but not nearly as often.

If we have friends over he will do the main cooking- he really enjoys it.

It it so rude of her, in your own home, you were hosting the parents- what's her problem?!