Does you cook with wine for your toddler?

[missladybird]

Slightly panicking about dd having beef gravy with red wine yesterday. I have bad anxiety and alcohol is a massive trigger due to my childhood and living with an alcoholic. I would never ever serve food cooked in wine but didn't realise yesterday until it was too late.

Am I overreacting or would you freak out too?

I'm sure I'm not the only parent to not be ok with their child having food with alcohol in it?

Have you read the replies on this thread? The answer to this question is there.

OP, I do really feel for you. Can you take a deep breath and try to articulate what it is that you’re so upset about?

You never wanted to give her any food with any trace of alcohol in it. That’s fine, that’s your choice and your preference and no one is saying you’re wrong to feel like that.

But now it’s happened, completely by accident. So what now? You say to yourself ‘oh dear, I didn’t realise, I’ll check more carefully next time we have gravy’. That’s all you need to do.

What’s stopping you from just telling yourself the above and moving on? What are you actually afraid might have happened from her eating the gravy?

You need to contact your GP about your anxiety not being under control. ASAP.

You need to appreciate you have an unhealthy relationship with alcohol too.

One day your child will drink, and I'd be fearful that with such an overbearingly anxious mother about it they won't be able to use sound judgment when the time comes.

Plenty of people have already done the maths and shown you that the alcohol content of whatever your daughter consumed is so negligible as to be totally irrelevant. That doesn’t seem to be reassuring you, though. Why do you think that is?

Luna has explained it better than I can. It's about responsibility and the thought of being irresponsible with regards to alcohol makes me physically sick. It's my biggest fear and I feel like I was careless by not asking about the ingredients. I feel like I've failed dd and have broken one of the most important 'rules' in my head that she shouldn't touch a drop of alcohol.

I'm not concerned that she's been physically harmed by it. It's all about the above. I know it's fucked up but that's OCD. People think OCD is being tidy and excessive hand washing - this really upsets me because it's so much worse than that. It ruins lives. My mum died due to her addiction to alcohol and I fucking hate it.

To be fair, if you'd said that at the start instead of just ignoring the question people probably wouldn't have gone on about it.

It was proven a relatively long time a go that a significant proportion of alcohol does not "cook off" unless heated to a very high temperature for several hours. Nonetheless, your daughter will be fine. Even fruit juice contains several % ABV.

Proven by who though?

Nobody will have added extra wine to make it more alcoholic.
As a PP said, it's produced in a factory to a recipe.
I spend a lot of time in good factories. I promise you that alcohol is kept locked up when not in use ( to stop the staff pinching it) and is measured out using weighing scales to ensure exactly the right amount is used in each batch.
Most factories also have CCTV so that they can keep an eye on things.
Many also have weighing systems that will not allow the operative to move on to the next ingredient unless the exact amount has been weighed.
Additionally alcohol in factories is normally bonded, i.e. no tax has been paid so they have to keep accurate records and do daily stock takes. If any went missing it would be seen as tax evasion, so they have extremely strict controls.
The most useful rule you could set for your child is a promise that you, as her mother will try, with the help of professionals, to get your anxiety under control.

Gravy made in a factory HAS been heated to a very high temperature for a significant period of time. It's been batch pasteurised in a pressurised, steam jacketed vessel, it's not like making gravy at home.

I don't mean in the factories I mean in the house when cooking the dinner. What if they added more wine to it?

Do you have something like surgical spirit or methylated spirits at home?
Put a small amount in a saucer and put a match to it.
Watch what happens.
These are both forms of alcohol ( not the form you drink, but chemically will act in the same way with heat).

Why would they? A person who buys ready made gravy buys it for convenience. If they wanted a custom made sauce they'd make it themselves.

True. God I'm so sick of this. I could cry

You wouldn't believe that I'm actually quite intelligent would you?

Just called the Sainsbury's customer care line and asked if it's safe for children to eat and he said that any alcohol in food is cooked out.

I have always used wine in cooking from when mine started solids. Obviously not every meal they have but here and there - white wine in risotto, red wine in spaghetti bowl, red wine in sauce for lamb shanks etc, rice wine in red meat stir fry. It burns off. Never hurt anyone.

Mine are now teens and they continue to eat my cooking and neither has the slightest interest in alcohol, both claim they will never drink due to health aspects associated with it. So far so good but we’ll see. None refuses my cooking though and both accept the alcohol burns off.

The exception is trifle. Every Xmas a trifle is made with cake base soaked in sherry. When toddlers and kids it didn’t matter as they only had a spoon or two and it was from top/middle, not with cake base on bottom/edges. Now they have same portion size as everyone else and get the cake bits like everyone else. Happens once a year and none has developed a sherry drinking habit to date.

Honestly I don’t think the odd ingredient you don’t like is going to effect your child but your anxiety might. I say that as someone who suffers with it also. I know it’s hard but try and persevere, I went through a few meds until I found one that was right for me and assisted.

spaghetti bol

That's not the phone call you need to make. Call your GP. Address the anxiety.

I have OCD so I understand what you and feeling.
You have done nothing wrong.
I'm certain lots of others have done the same.
My SIL adds wine to sauces like Bolognese and gives to my 2yr old DN. The alcohol is cooked off when the food is cooked so it's just flavour. Not alcohol.
As some others have mentioned, the content in the gravy is minimal anyway and would have been cooked off so your toddler won't have had any alcohol at all.
Please don't worry about it. You have not done anything wrong.
You are not irresponsible.
You are a fantastic caring parent. Don't let your OCD tell you otherwise.

Ocd is a bitch.
When my OCD (called it norbert) gets out of hand I have a quiet word with him and tell him that im in control. Not him. I feel like I have done -- wrong but I know I have not because ----. Norbert you need to sod off. I'm not letting you ruin my day!

Unfortunately, I don't think the OP is going to be reassured even by the call to the Sainsbury's helpline. You really do need help with your anxiety,

I know Its not much help OP but Im also the child of an Alcoholic.

I even posted a thread on here 2 days ago, as DD had a Limoncello Mousse with alcohol in it & I wondered if she would be ok. She was fine.

I want DD to not drink behind my back when shes older, I envisage her having a drink at Xmas as a teenager with me. I envisage us at our local beach bar having a beer when shes older, laughing and chatting.

I dont see the abuse we suffered as children.

Think of the bigger picture, shes safe. You care about her & would never hurt her.

I feel like I've failed dd and have broken one of the most important 'rules' in my head that she shouldn't touch a drop of alcohol.

I understand, OP, I really do. My dad has severe OCD and I’ve definitely inherited some of those tendencies too. I frequently set ‘rules’ for myself and then beat myself up mercilessly when I don’t stick to them. The thing I have to remember, though, is that those rules are only important in my head and they don’t actually affect anyone else in any way.

You’ve already said that you aren’t worried about your daughter actually being physically harmed by the alcohol. So now you just need to keep reminding yourself that this ‘rule’ you’ve broken is yours, and yours alone. It is of no ‘real’ consequence and means nothing to anyone else, including your daughter.

Imagine someone was raising their child vegan and then they accidentally gave them something with a trace of milk power in it. They might be annoyed with themselves, of course, but then they’d just make a note not to buy that product again. It would be totally pointless to get themselves worked up about it.

I know it’s so, so hard but please try to take a step back and a deep breath, and get some perspective on this. You haven’t fucked up, except by the very high standards that you, and you alone, have imposed on yourself. Try to forgive yourself and focus on more important things, like the love and care you show your daughter every day.