A bit of background: DH has CFS/ME and stays home with DD, while also starting up a business part-time (this is to explain why he can't just cook himself and DD lunch). I also have CFS/ME, but not as severely, and work full time (although compressed into 4.5 days a week). I'm also currently having health issues where I can't eat in the evening, so I don't have dinner (which makes this whole thing very weird).
I try to meal plan such that I leave DH and DD leftovers every weekday for lunch (4 meals, as I'm home for a late lunch on one day), and also provide dinners. I cook and eat lunch on the weekends, sometimes a dinner (but don't eat it), as well as dinner 1-3 times a week. This means I work to make sure DH has 7-9 meals worth of leftovers a week, and 4 for me to bring into work. Because of my current health issues, and because DH and DD share a meal (she's just 3), it means the meals I leave for DH are much larger than mine, so I can't easily just eat the ones I leave for him.
This weekend I had to throw out two moldy meals that DH had not eaten. This annoys me, as it seems like while he'll eat whatever I serve when I cook it right then, he picks and chooses the left-overs such that he'll go for the fresh-made meal from yesterday instead of the one from two days ago that needs to be eaten. And then he waits so long they go bad. Food waste just gives me the rage, and also I'm trying to economise by doing things like using less meats, etc, in a dish, and I find he is wasting entire meals!
Back before my health issues worsened, I used to stick meals I saw getting old in the freezer and take them in with me for lunch. But now they are so big they make me sick. Plus, even back then I'd have a terrible back-log, since I use less leftovers than him.
AIBU to expect DH to eat the food I leave for him? He does in fact want leftovers - if they're not there, I'll come home to find he's struggled to get food: he'll manage to get enough random items together to make a reasonable meal for DD (a banana and some bread plus some ham, cheese and yoghurt, etc.) but doesn't eat much himself.
Although now that I've written this, I'm being to feel like IABU. 7-9 left-over meals out of 14 is a lot in a week. Perhaps I should be cooking more single-serving items for dinner, as I currently usually make meals that have left-overs in order to produce the amount we need (which is made larger than it needs to be because of DH wasting them, argh!).
AIBU?
To be annoyed at DH's (non-)usage of leftovers?
murmuration · 12/10/2015 09:28
ijustwant - at least DH does like the meals he cooks leftover! He does the same thing, too, he'll make his special meal and it serves something like 12. But he goes through the leftovers no problem. I have to admit that I have deliberately avoided learning how to make 'his' meals, so that he actually has to cook to get them. Actually, I'm sure I could, but I simply act like I don't know -- this started as when we were first dating, he made me spagetti bolognese, a meal I had never before prepared (just had marina, as not as much of a meat eater). Fast foward a few years and we're living together, and I find him asking me how to make it! I was flabbergasted, and reminded him he had taught it to me. So definitely not learning his one remaining specialty, even though it is quite tasty.
playmobil - He sort of described it ("It's got mince, and vegetables, and mash on top, sometimes cheese too...") and I recognised it ("Oh, you mean cottage pie?"). I've made it before, but because he's allergic to the standard flavouring (Worchestershire sauce), I've had to experiment and it's either come out tasting wrong and/or too liquidy or too dry. This time I finally hit on the right combination, had the thought to write it down before I forgot what I put in, so I can make it again.
puntastic - I've learned recently that difficulty decision-making is actually a symptom of CFS/ME, as I'd posted in AIBU complaining about his lack of ability in this area generally and was later accused of drip-feeding as I hadn't mentioned the CFS/ME! I had no idea they were connected. But it does make things make more sense to realise it's a symptom. I can make sure to not try to ask for decisions when he's in a slump, be more forgiving then, etc. Also realising that just deciding for him about warming up leftovers will just make it easier for both of us.
breaking - my soups sometimes sit frozen for 6 months or more 
. I remember using the last of my Xmas carcass soup (my, that sounds appetizing...) one July. But that's because DH won't eat soup, and given the overflow of leftovers we have, I don't get to my special foods very often.
Thanks for the continued comments. Actually checking in as I've taken some steps: DH has been away this weekend, and I bought a fridge whiteboard that was delivered Sat. Last week I told him I was trying to plan meals AND leftovers for him, and trying to do it a few weeks ahead so that if I get behind we're not suddenly making the same thing all the time again. He said he expected it to last about a week, but as I've gotten three weeks planned already, it should last at least three :)
When I included his leftovers in the planning (e.g., trying to keep him from eating the same thing too many times in a row, and also trying to make sure he wasn't faced with 'second tier' foods too much), I found it quite difficult to make it all work. So it did make me think that I was probably a bit U about wanting him to just eat what was there. I also got some parameters from him, that he's willing to have a leftover from from a 'second tier' food "maybe once". I'm working that in, and planning to immediately freeze servings for me later.
So he's knows the planning was happening, and the whiteboard should just be a natural extension. I've put up on the whiteboard: the upcoming dinners for week, including a note to myself about when I need to make sure I have a grocery order delivered for the ingredients; a fridge section with leftovers and tags about who they're for and a suggestion of day; a freezer section with leftovers and tags (all me, of course). I've also included cooking ingredients (like I pre-chopped pizza toppings today and put them in the fridge for tomorrow) in the fridge/freezer sections, too. I'm hoping that this will (in addition to being actually useful for me!) make it seem like something for both of us, and not just a pointed "Eat, this, you!" notice.
He'll be home late tonight, so I'll see tomorrow how it goes over. And I suppose a week or so as to how it all works. Wish me luck!
You're doing very well to get three such detailed sections on an A4 white board. I do meal plan but this seems hideously complicated as I just note down what I'm doing on my phone and cook it. I don't have it written down in any public area. I understand why you need to but I still just cannot get my head round someone being left in sole charge of a toddler and who can go out to work dos and restaurants but they can't make themselves a sandwich or a piece of toast. I feel this is a huge burden for you and I'm 
at making him a breakfast platter. Again, there just seems to be such a dichotomy between his capabities.
I agree with not calling the meals leftovers - I think that's a really good idea. Further to that, does your DH have any suggestions as to how to manage this?
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