To be in a bad mood because of food?!

[MoiraRoseIsMyQueen]

So, staying with the in-laws (a bit of a trial in itself), and I’m feeling really grumpy this morning (although smiling and being happy outwardly). I always feel this way when I’m here, and having thought about it a lot, I think it’s to do with not being able to eat what and when I want. Which I know sounds ridiculous, but I really struggle with having to eat the food I’m given by MIL - which is okay, not always delicious, and not what I’d choose to eat, but fine - and not being able to control what I’m eating. I’m finding myself getting anxious already about lunch and dinner, what we’ll eat, what it will be, etched I don’t have food issues otherwise, so AIBU to let this get to me?!

*They're weird about that too. hmm "Again?!" It's not unusual to poo every day is it? And when there are 5 of you and one loo it can take a while. grin"I don't know how you people ever GO anywhere!. Such a waste of the day." >jangles car keys, taps foot, sighs

I once stayed in a holiday let with friends who only ate once a day, at lunchtime. No breakfast, no dinner. I kept masses of snacks and cheese to tide me over the evening.

roarfeck I think most of us who have these feeling agree it’s strange too!

I think for me when I’m sitting at the table with the whole family and I watch the food bring portioned out and I know it’s been calculated to the number of people with no second helpings I just feel anxious. I know it’s my issue. They also have enormous dinner plates which I also find oddly stressful!

I find it utterly peculiar:

My mother’s: food on tap and super family meals. Probably not set tables for breakfast but bacon butties as we appear. Or toast or fruit or cereal.

MILs - there is a long breakfast from about 9 until lunchtime. It’s a very lazy way of doing nothing before 2pm. But lunch is at 1 and sandwiches. Supper - if we are there we go out, including her because she is averse to cooking —and counts the potatoes and isn’t above putting the saucepans on the table and it makes my teeth itch— We get up at 6 and have breakfast. (Toast, tea, cereal).

Mine: I will make what people want for breakfast pre 9.30 - after that they make there own

Lunch: depending on the company and if it’s Sunday: cold meat, quiche, antipasti, salad.

Supper: hot meal from simple pasta and salad all the way up to three courses, depending on the occasion.

I’d be really unhappy if people felt uncomfortable about food in our home.

You serve food, people are hungry, they eat. They are not, they take little. I never understand why anyone would limit their kids meal to a small range, whilst you can just prepare normal meals. If they don't like them, they don't eat much and will eat more at the next meal.

That's a ridiculously simplistic view silly to assume that fussy eaters are always created by 'drowning in snacks' and by parents imposing a limited, beige diet on their children. Dh and I are good, fairly adventurous cooks who will eat almost anything. We tried to feed our dc what we ate, but they were fussy nevertheless. Dd in particular would rather not eat than eat something she disliked. Small children are difficult when they haven't eaten enough. Dd is now 14 and eats most things.

And it's not just a recent phenomenon. Age 4-6 I would only eat about 5 different foods. I grew out of it.

And I always say - if it suits, please help yourself. The kettle’s that way. After 30 years MIL hasn’t found the chuffing kettle and when he was alive, I’d get home from work, dropping off infants, etc to “FIL is very thirsty, we usually have tea at 4pm”. Oh dear, I’d say. “now FIL come to the kitchen with me and I’ll show you where everything is so you never have to wait again and he’d follow like a little lamb (catbum emoticon) because facilitating FIL was a micro-aggression to me.

Same here. When I've had to stay with my in laws this has been the thing that made me most anxious. I ended up buying stuff I enjoy even though my mum in law thought it rude. Better that than to be utterly miserable though, and dreading meals.

What’s baffling to me isn’t the fact that so many posters prefer control over what and when they eat.

As I have said upthread - I am very controlling!

What is baffling is how... passive so many are. Squirrelling away snacks, being starving because 10 hour gaps between meals or feeling like too much food being thrust on them.

Assert yourself. Politely, thoughtfully and articulately!

As for not accommodating my young children’s need for regular meals at regular times - totally alien to me. If they weeent accommodated, i would bring l food and I would simply say at the appropriate time - “excuse me, just off to starting prepping lunch for the children”

I wouldn’t expect people to get in the food I like over what they’d planned to serve. Nor would I expect them to serve food precisely when suited me.

But I’d sort myself out and my children. Simple as that.

And I did just that at my ex In laws

I feel your pain!!!

My PIL's are lovely people but food isn't one of their strong points.

They absolutely make an effort but the biggest issue how much they pfaff around.

If we have dinner in the evening they spend ages bringing the food to the table and the MIL usually finds something else to pfaff about and every time, by the point we actually get to eat it's all cold.

I get that horrible nails down the blackboard feeling every time as I see the food just sitting on the table as MIL dashes off to get different napkins or some other "emergency".

I've tried to help to speed things up but it's impossible.

I'm so relived when they actually serve a dish that's meant to be consumed cold!

Trust me, cold roast lamb with congealed cold gravy is a friend to nobody however much mint sauce you put on it....

I suppose the rigidness regarding timing of meals comes from being conditioned to eat at set times from childhood. Breakfast before school/work. Lunch 12-1. Evening meal after school/work.
Of course we can all train ourselves to eat at different times but in families it still might not fit in with each other.

@DeRigueurMortis oh gosh yes! MIL will often serve up food and then go and clear up/wash up, while it’s slowly getting colder, absolutely does for me!

My MIL does the clearing up as she goes too. I'm apparently a slow eater and have had my plate whipped away from me before I've finished before. Only happened once, and I was so shocked that it was scraped into the bin before I could speak. I went to the chippy down the road half an hour later, and when she bumped her gums, husband reminded her she'd thrown of half my dinner.

Take some nice snacks in your bags 🤷‍♀️

In my case OP is that its not helped than my DM has an almost pathological aversion to food being left to go cold .

She wouldn't dream of serving dinner on plates she hasn't warmed and when she says "dinners ready" we've got a 30 second window to get to the table!!!

She's a brilliant cook and taught me (so I think I'm pretty good too!).

I think it's such a shame in that PIL aren't (mostly) serving awful food.

It's just that it's always at least an hour later than planned with another 30 mins cooling pfaff time on top!

It always feels like a waste of their effort.

We try and mitigate this as much as we can by offering to take them out for dinner as a thanks for hosting us and I nearly always take a "cold" dish that we can eat (so something like a homemade quiche and salads that's good at room temperature) so we know that for a least a few meals we will get something served at the appropriate temperature (doesn't seem to negate the pfaffing though even when they are not cooking anything!).

I don't like staying with other people except my parents for this reason. I can cope so it doesn't stop me staying with people but I do feel the same as many pp's.

Faffing doesn't have a p on the beginning
Just saying

Just to add I asked DH if they were always like this - apparently yes.

He said it was only when we moved in together that he realised he actually liked a lot more food that he'd previously thought because he was experiencing eating at the right temperature for the first time, roast lamb being a classic example but lots of other things like various vegetables and side dishes like cauliflower cheese.

His biggest revelation was that he loved steak when he understood it doesn't have to be both cold and cremated simultaneously .

@CodenameVillanelle you can spell it both ways. en.wiktionary.org/wiki/pfaff

He said it was only when we moved in together that he realised he actually liked a lot more food that he'd previously thought because he was experiencing eating at the right temperature for the first time, roast lamb being a classic example but lots of other things like various vegetables and side dishes like cauliflower cheese.

My MIL, God rest her, was a fabulous woman but an awful bloody cook! DH spent years telling me that he hated leeks - which always struck me as odd because he adores onions and spring onions. One day I tested the theory and gave him leeks in cheese sauce as a side for a roast we were having. It turned out that he did like them, and that actually MIL used to cook leeks until they were the wrong side of grey.

Code

It's a perfectly acceptable alternative spelling of the word.

By all means use Faff if preferred but it's not incorrect to use pfaff.

pfaff (English)
Verb
pfaff (third-person singular simple present pfaffs, present participle pfaffing, simple past and past participle pfaffed)
1 British slangng - Alternative spelling of^ fafff
▪ 2004, Chris Ward, The controversial Sämisch King's Indian, p81
▪ By my own admission I pfaffed around a bit here but I'm going to claim that I was merely enjoying the moment!
▪ 26 Sep 2005 -- BBC News, England Atlantic slow row coming to end
▪ Mr Hicks wrote on his website: "At dusk the rudder cable broke
▪ At dusk the rudder cable broke. "Six hours pfaffing about in the dark and heaving sea saw a fairly unsatisfactory makeshift steering system into place"

@Tappering

He said it was only when we moved in together that he realised he actually liked a lot more food that he'd previously thought because he was experiencing eating at the right temperature for the first time, roast lamb being a classic example but lots of other things like various vegetables and side dishes like cauliflower cheese.

My MIL, God rest her, was a fabulous woman but an awful bloody cook! DH spent years telling me that he hated leeks - which always struck me as odd because he adores onions and spring onions. One day I tested the theory and gave him leeks in cheese sauce as a side for a roast we were having. It turned out that he did like them, and that actually MIL used to cook leeks until they were the wrong side of grey.

That's so funny!

My paternal GM was like this!

When we visited she used to "boil" a roast.

Now I'm all for braised/stewed food but we are talking 5 hours plus of a perfectly lovely piece of meat in nothing but unseasoned water.

It was done when it was "grey" as you put it. My DM's and my favourite game was "guess the animal" because by the time it was served you had absolutely no idea what you were eating....

The concept of "crisp" vegetables or that they should have any texture at all other than "mush" was abhorrent .

Lovely lady but goodness me she could not cook whatsoever!

I like food. I enjoy eating. But it's not the biggest deal in my life
I don't have to eat my favourite food all the time because I 'm not a child. I don't gauge the success of an event by !y enjoyment of the good. Enjoyment of the company is way more important.
It's a meal. One of many. Get on with it. The next one is coming soon and you might like it.

OP, I am really curious what sort of food she makes / how it is very different to what you make yourself? I agree with the pp, stash some food in your room and feign a sore tummy or allergy if it stresses you

This makes me so glad that despite differences I have had with my PILs over the years, they cook nice meals at sensible times and wouldn't dream of leaving hangry children without food for hours

Tbf they have got better; when I was first dating DH I was much younger and a bit of a pickier eater tbh and I would often visit on a Sunday. It always seemed to be an enormous portion of really bland roast including fatty meat and I used to feel really stressed about it, especially as they had then all eaten so much that they didn't bother with any more food that day while I would start to get hungry again. Their roasts seem to have improved over the years.