To refuse to cook for my 14 year old?

[NC30112021]

I'm sick of the meals that I make being snarled at. DD is 14 and is basically only happy to eat cereal, sweets, pizza and pasta without moaning. It's just the 2 of us in the house and I'm fed up of making separate meals for us.

I like a variety of stuff, and make things like cottage pie, roast dinners, chicken casserole, all of which she has eaten in the past... now, she's just being objectionable and refusing.

She's perfectly capable of making pasta for herself, but cos she's a lazy moo, prefers me to do it.

AIBU to refuse to cook for her, unless she eats what I'm making for myself too?

Take turns in leading the cooking and choosing. She wants more freedom, it probably comes with responsibility but you could cook together and could provide time to talk about the day and help her learn a life skill.

bbcgoodfood website has lots of easy recipes she might find inspiration for quick and healthy food for two.

Ds went through that stage at around the same age as your dd.
I knew what foods he really didnt like so didnt use them but cooked him a portion if he was having a stop and didnt want what I made I saved it for lunch but I wouldnt buy junk food.
He soon got bored.
Funny enough he always managed to find something he liked when we ate out at places that didnt serve pizza and the like!

How do you serve meals? If you serve meals family style so she can take what she wants, leave what she doesn't then make herself something if she wants to afterwards, that seems the best compromise. I'd try to make sure there's something that she will generally eat if possible.

At 14 as well, I think she's old enough to start preparing a family meal one night per week. In my house growing up it was from 16, and I had to plan the meal, make sure all ingredients were on the shopping list in time for the shop, and prepare the meal for the family. Useful skills to have, and prepares her for living independently which she could be doing in just a few years.

Maybe I'm barking up the tree here, but if she's recently started refusing food she used to eat happily, then maybe there's a root cause somewhere.

I would cook for two, if she doesn't want it than freeze her half. You can still make a nice pasta with lots of healthy stuff in it from time to time.

It’s simple, if she doesn’t like what’s on the menu she can make her own food. She won’t starve. Make something you know she will eat every second day & let her get her own dinner on the alternate days.
buy her a cookbook or look up pasta recipes on the internet.

Mum to two teenage boys......had the exact same thing with my two. Now if they don't like what I cook they have to make their own. They can do bacon sandwiches, toasties and the eldest is a dab hand with the air fryer. I also started sitting down with them and asking what meals we could cook together.....its helped a lot. Good luck x

Biggest problem is that she's 14. 14 amounts to trying to be the biggest pain in your mother's life. I honestly thought all kids did this food thing. It's all to do with showing she can be independent as in, not like the same food as you and have her own ideas about what she wants. If, and only IF, you like pizza or pasta then doing those once a week seems sensible but for all the other days, let her look after herself. You can even compliment her on taking work off your shoulders !

There is a difference between not liking something and just not fancying it. She can sort herself out if she wants to be picky.