…to expect my husband to check the cupboards and fridge before shopping for food?

[Nettletheelf]

DH and I operate a weekly rota for shopping and cooking: one week on, one week off.

I get annoyed when he buys stuff that we already have. I've raised it with him (gently) several times. He prefers to order stuff from Ocado rather than visiting supermarkets, so he orders food from our house.

When he says, "is there anything particular you want?", I reply, "yes, I'd like you to check the fridge, freezer and cupboard before you do the Ocado order".

He never does it. Never. It drives me insane. The Ocado order he put in yesterday just arrived. He has ordered stuff we already had in abundance. We now have:

• 3 large bags of penne pasta.

• 16 eggs.

• 4 boxes of cherry tomatoes.

• 3 bunches of asparagus.

• 3 bags of red chillies.

• 3 bags of ginger root.

• 8 chicken breasts.

• 6 lemons

• 18 onions.

It's just me and him - there are no children living with us. We're not skint or anything, but I can't stand waste.

He also leaves stuff he buys on 'his' weeks lying in the fridge and never thinks to get rid of them, so I'm always throwing out manky e.g. creme fraiche that's ten days over its use by date and has been shoved to the back of the fridge by DH.

Some stuff I can freeze, but that's hardly the point. He thinks that life is too short to spend two minutes checking what food we already have. On 'his' shopping weeks, we often run out of bread. He works from home, I don't. He is five minutes' walk from a supermarket. I'll often get home from work late to find that there's no bread for the morning. Hs response: "I'm too busy". This has also happened when I've returned late from a few nights away. I think that he's being selfish.

Should I just suck it up? He acts as if I'm unreasonable but I think that household chores, like making sure that we have enough food, should be shared.

He's crap around the house. Untidy, a hoarder, and disinclined to clean.

That's why we have a cleaner. I was doing everything, and resenting it.

The issue is not lack of funds or storage space. It's his lack of consideration, and refusal to comply with what we've established is quite a reasonable request (check the fridge/cupboards before shopping). He works from home; he can be in the kitchen in ten seconds.

This would drive me mad but I do think its not the most shareable of chores. In our family I do the meal plan and online shop because I have to plan my work hours too so I do it all at the same time. Whoever is at home at the best time does unpacking/cooking/clearing up/making packed lunches/kitchen type jobs. Then we both keep a vague running check on levels of bread and milk.

Actually, I have a better solution than killing him. Let's organise a spouse swap. My wife has lower standards than me, he can have her, you can have me instead. (I'm a crap cook, but I can work on that, and I don't make a cup of coffee without leaving the kitchen cleaner than I find it. Something that's only possible because DW can't make a cup of coffee without leaving it in more of a mess than she found it.)

No, you shouldn't just suck it up but you need to both acknowledge that your system isn't working & set up a new one.

Do you have a running shopping list that you both add to when things run out (or nearly run out)? Why not do this then add the items needed for the week's recipes to it.

I wouldn't worry about storecupboard food (pasta) or freezable food (chicken) but I woud be bothered about the stuff that goes off.

I think your DH is treating you with contempt OP. He's quietly telling you that food shopping is beneath him but not beneath you - subtext - he's more important than you.

It seems like this is just the tip of the iceberg. DP is rubbish when it comes to shopping - he forgets what he needs or buys totally random ingredients, BUT he's good with the rest of the chores so I don't mind taking over the shopping as it means I can get him to do the cat litter

If he's generally rubbish around the house you probably need to sit down and organise a rota. Although a PP is right that you can't make someone clean to your own standards.

Oh blimey, cross posted with your post about him being slovenly. Yup he's a manchild who thinks that menial shitwork is beneath him.

OP what would happen if you went away for a few wks or was in hospital, what would he do?

X posted with your update - well if he is generally crap that's another matter. I don't mind doing the whole of the food shopping chore as DH does plenty of other chores.

I'm sorry your DH is selfish.

Yes, he is a man-child around the house. He's generally a good husband. Although he never explicitly says so, I think he feels it's unfair that he, a man, should be expected to do domestic chores. His mother did everything when he was a kid.

Ha ha - I could have written much of your post except DH is not a slob, loves to cook and is a good one. He does most of it now so I'm v lucky in that respect.

On the rare occasion that he does the Ocado shop - he'll stand at the kitchen computer while I am cooking and ask me if we need various things. Drives me ffing interstellar ! "Open the fffing cupboard and LOOK you git!!"

Or he'll plan and cook a lovely meal and we'll get right to the point of serving it all and discover that there's no mint sauce or whatever, and that will be ALL MY FAULT just because .................. Gah !

Is he just clicking 'suggested order' every time he shops?

I have done that a few times to save the delivery time - if you forget to go back and edit you generally get more of what you bought on your last order.

you need to thrash this out, I don't know if it's on the cards but I wouldn't have children with someone like this, if he thinks housework is a woman's job you can bet your bottom dollar he thinks the same of childcare. But - you can afford a cleaner so that sorts that one out. You could just take over the shopping so that's sorted. What about gardening? DIY? Driving? My Dh does most of the garden and DIY and virtually all long-distance driving which I would hate to do. Overall, is there a balance or not?

(One point though - please do not assume that someone who works from home can just do a few chores about the place while they're at it. During work hours he is working. You demean his work by assuming that as his workspace is in the home he can just do a few bits around the house. My dad worked from home for years and got absolutely fed up of people not taking his work seriously because of this (I should add that my mum wasn't one of those people).)

Sebsmummy,it works for us (for the most part!). It made me chuckle when DH started doing a menu plan. I missed the post from OP about men pretending to be the next celebrity chef- that's DH! He likes to follow recipes. He is also shite at cleaning the hob top and sauce pans, and I always find disgusting wet cloths in the sink full of rancid water.

Nowadays, if I find a sink full of water, I leave it. I am happy to do all of the house cleaning because it doesn't bother anyone else. DD now does the ironing as she wanted extra pocket money. The knock on effect of that has been her keeping her bedroom tidier.

I have my faults too so DH has to put up with them :)

Yes, he is a man-child around the house. He's generally a good husband. Although he never explicitly says so, I think he feels it's unfair that he, a man, should be expected to do domestic chores. His mother did everything when he was a kid.
Doesn't sound like a generally good husband to me...

Glad to see there's more than one wannabe celebrity chef!

He doesn't do 'suggested order'. He downloads recipes and orders the ingredients. Irrespective of whether we already have them. Latest discovery: 3 x boxes of palm sugar and 3 x bottles of fish sauce, for a Thai recipe he cooks about once a month.

Oh yes, Gibble, the wet cloths in the sink. I know them well.

BTW, I don't assume that DH's working from home leaves him available for chores in working time. However, since he's in and out of the kitchen (and the fridge, and the cupboards) all day, because he's a grazer, I don't think it's too much to ask for him to think, "Oh, I've finished up the bread and Nettle won't haven any left for toast tomorrow morning. I know, it's my shopping week so I'll spend ten minutes of my lunch break, that I would otherwise have used to play guitar, to go to the supermarket down the road and get some more." Or even, "I think I'll chuck away that bag of mouldy salad leaves STARING ME IN THE FACE instead of waiting for my wife to come home from work and do it".

DH got a bit better when I did a rough calculation of how much money had been spent unnecessarily. Added to uneaten food thrown out and extrapolated out over a month / year it could be a fairly shocking number.

Do you have decent freezer space? It's worth buying multiple loaves and just freezing them sliced. You always have bread then. provide some fecker doesn't leave the knobbers in there for the fairies to eat, filling up the whole drawer

I could try, but he's one of those 'why try to save money on the small things? Why not just enjoy life to the full?' types. So I think that if I showed him an estimate of wasted food costs he'd just mock me for being 'careful'.

He wants to buy all food and groceries at Waitrose or M&S. If I go to e.g. Tesco on my shopping week, he moans that the quality isn't good enough (or expresses surprise when the food quality meets his expectations). As for Aldi…if I go there, it gives him a fit of the vapours!

…but I will take you up on the frozen bread suggestion, thanks!

That would drive me mad. Especially buying loads of asparagus and fresh ginger but not potatoes, carrots, cabbage, garlic, onions or frozen peas.

I do all the food shopping and cooking because of time and because I enjoy it and am good at it and good at planning.

DH pulls his weight in other ways. He does all the washing, ironing, DIY and heavy gardening. We share the cleaning.

DH is much better than I am at Sunday morning fry-ups but that's about it for cooking. Otherwise he's far too experimental - cinnamon powder in bolognaise sauce - or wasteful over leftovers.

Our first Christmas he insisted on buying a free range Bronze turkey. The smallest one was about 8lb and cost about £50. He ate it on xmas day and then on Boxing Day in sandwiches and bubble and squeak but insisted on binning it afterwards citing food poisoning.

I wasn't going to insist we ate it when it was green, but it could have gone for another two days, though it would have been dry.

In reality, the food poisoning excuse is a cover for being bored. I now refuse to buy turkeys because they are just too big for two people and I don't enjoy munching through dry meat either.

So at xmas we buy things that can be done in two days.

I can afford to throw it out but that's not the point.

haha yeah mine used to be like that. We are no longer together but thats another story altogether! Men just don't do lists i'm affraid

I couldn't be doing with that.

TBH it doesn't sound as though your system is working. What works for us is to do joint meal planning and food ordering- we decide together what meals we'll have, then both do the Ocado order. This means that I get to sit down and do the order, and send DH to check what we do and don't have.

I'd also do the fridge clearout togther, or offer him the option of doing either the fridge clean or the bathroom clean (say) while you do the other.

Yes - I've got one of those. He'll sit in traffic for half an hour to go to Waitrose rather than Sainsbury's which are two mins away. So I use Ocado as I can't be doing with either frankly and there's way more choice. Anyway I digress.
Does he consider himself "green" / ecologically aware? Could you tempt him into better habits that way?
Anyway that much wastage pays for a lot of Bolly

If I were you OP, I would completely take over the shopping as your current arrangement isn't working. Then you can buy exactly what you want and he can tell you if he particularly wants something. Then, you can put him in complete charge of another chore (preferably one that you hate). All sorted.

Yes, I think I might have to take over the shopping. He can still plan his fancy menus but at least I can check to see what we've got.

It feels a bit painful letting him off the hook, though. As if his plan (I'll do this job really badly so that she'll stop asking me) has worked, which means that he might try it again.

I can't easily substitute another job because we have a cleaner who does the bathrooms, floors etc., and I don't trust him to do another job (clearing out of date food from the fridge, etc).

He doesn't consider himself green, BTW. He has both taps gushing full blast whilst he cleans his teeth. When I object, on the grounds that it's wasteful, he says that we're not short of water in Britain. We're not, but that doesn't mean that it's OK to waste it.

I do the online shop for me, the kids and general household. I then give him an hour to add anything he thinks we need/want, then send. As a compromise, can he just do his masterchef stuff at weekends? Anyway, I totally get you...