To expect kids to eat bbq food?

[whynowe]

DH has invited his uni mates for a bbq at our house tonight. it was planned a few weeks ago.
However yesterday a few have asked if their wives and DC can come too. Of course we said yes.

We had plenty of food for everyone. Beef burgers/ chicken burgers/ chicken drums/ sausages & halloumi on the bbq + quite a few salads/ potato salad/ fries/ pasta salads etc

So I assumed the 3 DC (aged 5-12) would eat the same food as us

two wives( mothers of the children) got all emotional on me as I didn’t have anything “acceptable” for their children to eat. “Oh they can’t eat any of this!! “
They said next time I should ask before having children over .. but they will forgive me because I’m not a mum yet (I’m 32 weeks pregnant with our first)

Anyway the 2 wives left early and will HAVE to stop at McDonald’s on the way home as the children are starving. We had burgers too not McDonald’s ones though 😂

I said to DH I don’t want to ever see them again. He agrees they were rude to me and kept using “you’re still young, we will forgive you on this occasion”
I’m a little younger than any of them in this group.
AIBU to have expected the kids to eat same as the rest or should I have asked in advance? I thought there was plenty of choice between meats/ cheeses/ veg/ breads/ potatoes/ pasta etc 😅 not sure what else I could’ve done.

Their behaviour is so odd, I'd say it was deliberate spite. Nothing to do with the food, as no one on earth who ate Macdonalds would say none of that was suitable. Its just too far fetched. My guess is that for some reason they decided to team up to be nasty to you. Maybe they dislike you, resent your age, or that's simply what passes for entertainment in their world, but they were bullying you.
I'd tell your partner they're not welcome again.

Fuck me, I would be very interested to know what they were expecting to be produced for their special little ones.

i don’t know a kid alive that would not manage a burger, sausage (meat or veggie) or a bit of chicken.

Cheeky bitches I would have thrown them out before they had a chance yo leave

DH said to me privately they were extremely rude

What a limp lettuce

What the actual frig?! My 2 year old would happily eat loads of those things - sausages, burger, chicken, fries, potatoes, pasta... they're all perfectly normal foods that even most "fussy" kids will eat.

If their kids are so fussy they won't even eat perfectly normal typical "kid friendly" food then they really need to plan ahead and bring stuff their kids will eat or put in special requests beforehand.

But the scale of the patronising, good Lord! Young? You're 29, you're hardly a teenager! Rude, rude and patronising cows the both of them.

Precious rude entitled witches!
please ignore, you’ve done nothing wrong!

They sound insufferable! Teaching their kids that they have to eat tasteless slop and real food is 'only for grown ups'. My mum was like that. Kids got chicken nuggets and Pepperamis because 'this proper food is for mummies and daddies'.

It would be nice if that shit died out in the 80s but some modern parents just love that their kids won't touch anything that isn't beige and with a cartoon on it. It's because it's cheap and they can cook it at 4.30pm and chuck them in bed by 5. Fish fingers at a BBQ. And even at 12 still eating that baby shit! Ugh. You're well out of it.

Also their condescending tone and insulting you? They can fuck off. I met my husband's uni mates once - literally once. I smiled and said hello, they made nasty jokes about my age and my supposed lack of intellect. My husband was gobsmacked. He'd never seen them act so rude. After a few more comments and rudeness he confronted them and we left and never saw them again.

You know I bet those poor kids could see and smell all that lovely food and were bloody salivating!

But their mothers needed to put on a performance that no one understands their precious poppet's needs like Ronald McDonald.

I wonder if this really was about the food or was just a way to get at you, with all the snide comments about your age,etc. Did your DH have a past relationship or even previous marriage with a friend of theirs who was their age? Do they worry that their husbands are jealous that they have a buddy with a younger much more attractive wife?

Oh all of my kids would have been ALL over everything that your served! Not surprised they were brats with parents like that!

The only issue with that food is that I have to limit halloumi as my 2 would eat every last bit and there would be none left for anyone else!

mine are really picky about salads in that they eat salad components like cucumber, carrot, tomato, etc but mix it together and it’s like an alien food. But that’s for me to manage, I usually extract a cucumber slice or two out of whatever salad i have and get them to eat it as a token green thing. But I don’t expect anyone else to cater for that - if I know they’re going to a bbq then I get some veg into them before we go then let them go for whatever burgers/sausages etc they want there.

From your update it tells me she feels threatened by a younger woman in the friend circle.
Next time she makes a snide remark ask her what her problem is.

so treat her like your nan.....check if she can manage the steps unaided, ask her if she needs the loo and is she sure the food won't make her "little problem" worse...offer her soft food and point out that the drumsticks might be a bit much for her dentures....make sure you face her and enunciate CLEARLY with a huge fake smile.... go on i dare you

NB this is a JOKE I am not suggesting that folk should treat their real beloved grandmothers like this.

Why would they invite themselves to a barbecue if their DC didn't like barbecued food? They were very rude to ask for pizza and fish fingers. You aren't a restaurant.

Oh, also, just to add, when I was a kid if I'd moaned that I didn't like anything at a barbecue when I was a kid, my mum would have hissed at me to behave, stop being silly and just eat something (unless it was genuinely something that I couldn't have been expected to stomach, like idk, asparagus followed by a ridiculously spicy curry). She certainly wouldn't have berated the host for my fussiness. Ridiculous people.

One of mine would have hoovered up platefuls of that.
One of mine has autism so I would have come armed with food and as it happens they'd have eaten the bread and fries and possibly cheese depending on what it was.
You need to have a patronising word with them about planning ahead.

My three year old is too fussy for my liking and he would eat loads from that list. What kind of food would they have liked? If the kids are that fussy they should have brought a packed lunch for them. That's exceptionally rude behaviour!

HA!!! Brilliant!

My 3yo wouldn't currently eat a burger or sausages (although you may get some chicken into her!) The last bbq we went to she just ate the bread rolls and we picked her some pasta out of a pasta salad, but I would never in a million years expect someone to cater differently for her, and usually have some emergency snacks squirrelled away for emergencies.

Fwiw, she would eat McDonald's as she could have nuggets so the burger comparison may not be applicable to them either. It certainly doesn't warrant them being rude... Taking dd out to eat in her current food refusal state is a nightmare but that's my issue to fix not anybody else's!like a pp said it was obvious it was a BBQ so why they would expect anything other than BBQ food I don't know!

Tell them to kindly piss off! Or to bring their own food next time. Bloody rude.
Go to the shop for them? They can go out themselves. Their little precious things can go hungry if the parents don't like it.

Whatever happened to eating what you are damn-well given!? Growing up I was given what I was given and I had to like it. The idea of something not being "appropriate" would have been laughable in my youth.

It was a bbq so not sure what kinds of food they were expecting.

My youngest is fussy and very likely wouldn't have eaten anything, but that's my responsibility and I would have apologised that he wouldn't eat much but I would have brought something for him.

I’m sure it’s not about the food.

She couldn’t eat burgers sausages chicken bread chips 🙄🙄

If their children are that fussy they should have bought foods with them. DS2 has ASD and only eats a handful of foods. They all have to be prepared in a set way.if we ever go out to eat at a bbq I always take foods with us for him that are ready to eat. If its someone I know well then I will ask maybe if its OK if I bung his waffles in the over or boil his pasta. Never would I expect someone to provide a different option for the kids unless they have specifically asked and even then I te nd to say no we will bring anything he needs. They had the cheek to ask to tag along at short notice then they act very rudely. Don't blame you for not wanting to invite them again.

I took my extremely fussy under 2yo to a bbq in South Africa once - she ate the place dry.

Cheeky bitches.