To not make Christmas dinner dairy free??

[Bellyblueboy]

Very early I know! I cater Christmas dinner every year for my family. I am single and child free but I host for my parents, brother, sister and their families. My parents stay with me for a few nights. It’s a lot of work.

My nine year old nephew was diagnosed as lactose intolerant this year. So of course I will be researching this and making sure his starter, main and desert is lactose free. I even thought of putting little flags in bowls that are lactose free. I was going to order little flags with a picture of a cow crossed out! Make it fun.

my SIL has said it will be unfair if there is food on the table that he can’t eat so the whole meal has to be dairy free.

I order Black Forest gateau every year - my parents love it. Apparently no. He never eats it - I get kid friendly deserts for the four children.

I am a lazy cook - I get the whole meal from marks and Spencer! Prepared mash the lot. I am now told I can’t do this as there are milk products in the mashed and roast potatoes. It would be a huge amount of work to do everything from scratch, I don’t want that to be my Christmas Day and my cooking skills aren’t up to it.

I have said no - this is what I am doing. My brother is now annoyed that i won’t bend to his wife’s demands and have ruined Christmas. I had said he is welcome to come to my house and do the cooking, or host. Or eat at his house then come for coffee and presents. He has told on me! My mum is upset that she won’t have all her family round her at Christmas - dad was ill this year and they have been looking forward to a relaxing Christmas! Agh. It’s only September.

rant over. But honestly give it to me straight am I a selfish child hating spinster! Would you all accommodate this???

The OP is not ‘set in her ways ‘ good god.

@Bellyblueboy is the host, she can do what she wants and after years of doing this has a tried and tested way of delivering Christmas to her family pretty much single-handedly. On this occasion she has offered to provide ANOTHER menu option for her nephew - ie MORE WORK for her and this has been essentially refused as she has been told that she has to cook the same ( non dairy) for everyone.

Not a chance in hell I’d be doing that - I like my mash with butter and milk and butter based turkey and Black Forrest gateau and cheese and Irish coffees etc etc

Yes, even though OP could get the stuff all dairy free for everyone she isn’t.
OP is going to do what she normally does with a few extra options.

My family come to me for Christmas , I’d of course offer alternatives if I needed to for people who needed it, but I do Christmas my way of if I’m cooking (and prepping and shopping and paying for it. )

OP, I have read your posts and agree with you completely.

You are generously offering to give him food free of dairy but there is no way I would entertain a full dairy free situation.

Your brother needs to eat at home, and pay for it and I think you should tell your mother that she is welcome to go to her golden boys house too.

They both sound like CF's and you have tolerated them far too much.

Mean and demanding is too much, let your brother stay at home.

I think this is one of those situations where when you give too much it is COMPLETELY taken for granted.

Have Christmas with your sister and tell the rest you will see them for coffee.

Knock the three day entertaining on the head too for those who think so little of your effort.

My advice is hard passive aggressive push back.

"I understand that things have changed for you and having Christmas at home yourselves makes sense going forward"...

AKA...f off.

Same to your mother.

Stop being a scapegoat, you deserve much better.

Enjoy your sisters family on the day.

Of course him and Amy will think about it until they realise they would have to put their hands in their own pockets for food and drink.

@Bellyblueboy
He will have roast potatoes and mashed potatoes and vegetables and Turkey and gravy
it just won’t all be from the same serving dishes as everyone else because the other stuff contains some dairy and his will be made specially for him without dairy.
the stuff he can’t eat at all is the stuff he doesn’t like - Black Forest gateau and cauliflower cheese.
Ah ok, to be fair you do sound lovely and as if you are trying to accommodate him so he can have a lovely Christmas dinner.
I may have been projecting a bit as know how crap it is when you can't even have a potato 😭😁
I'd just bring my own dessert in that case, love the rise of vegan foods now as some amazing dairy free desserts everywhere.

Why can’t your sil bring her own dairy free mash

I have a houseful here today so this might be a bit disjointed.

It's a bit shit to be the kid that has to read labels, check with a grown-up, avoid foods at every occasion. Milk is really hard - at every party he won't be able to eat the cake, or the chocolate, and quite possibly the nuggets or chips.

It's also very new to him, and he's adjusting to every meal having to be checked, and likely different to the foods he's used to that the rest of the family he gets to eat.

At a normal Friday night pizza or whatever, I would be fine with my DD not being able to eat everything, she's used to that. I also wouldn't expect to be able to eat everything at Christmas dinner if I had an allergy because I'm a grown-up and I understand.

But, a child at Christmas should IMO be able to sit down to dinner with everyone and eat whatever they want, the same as everyone else. Certainly not a chicken fillet. One celebratory meal where they're not different or sick or having to skip the tasty looking roasties.

I'd be quite upset if my family needed that to be spelled out.

Having said all that, I do think you're absolutely mad to have hosted solo for so long and it would be fair enough to step back. Just don't make it about a child with a chronic health condition.

I’m finding it difficult to see how your DB and SIL and now your DM can’t see how unreasonable they are being. There seems to be absolutely no gratitude and awareness of how much effort you are putting into catering and hosting Christmas each year. Let alone the expense of it all.

You are proposing perfectly reasonable adjustments with food to suit everyone so what on earth is the problem?

Out of interest if one of your nieces or nephews announces in the future that they are now vegan would there be an expectation that Christmas is exclusively vegan ?

You are hosting in your home and including food suitable for a lactose intolerance but this doesn’t mean that all foods need to meet this standard.
Some people within your family sound as though they need to learn some manners and be grateful they are being hosted at Christmas.

No they're being dicks.

Also if he's suddenly lactose free at 9 - presumably he's not deathly allergic to lactose is he? So surely they can't even be concerned about cross contamination in the kitchen. I know my friend has to use an entirely separate oven for her GF daughter, which does make her visiting others tricky!

Could you have perhaps given off a shitty vibe or something and that's what they've reacted to instead?

This thread is gaining so many comments there won’t be room for @Bellyblueboy update it on Boxing Day letting us all know how the meal went.

Also an excellent response to your PITA mother.

It's much politer than I would be innthis situation.

Why have you tolerated your brother's meanness?

@BonjourCrisette

I am lactose intolerant. Butter contains barely any lactose and is fine. Milk and cream are obviously different but as you are doing him milk-free potatoes I think he should be perfectly OK with the butter-basted turkey and his own side dishes.
Just because you personally are "perfectly OK" with butter basted turkey doesn't mean others automatically would be.
I'd have severe stomach cramps and sickness if anyone pulled that on me " thinking "you'll be fine as I am" 🙄
That's not a call for anyone else to make.
Risky game that.

You sound like a fab Auntie ❤️ the making memories with your nieces and nephews with fireworks sounds amazing and I bet they'll always remember it ❤️

I'm with the other sensible posters
You've offered fair options which cover everybody's food requirements/prefs, that's that. I'd wager brother will eventually concede, reluctantly, and after using any and all pressure points he can, and with some arsey comment as the Christmas you provide just sounds amazing! Who would give that up?!

A PP spotted it and I think are completely right - they want dairy free for all so they don't have to parent and check what their son eats....

Your brother and all the people on this thread who would insist on everyone's meal being lactose-free despite being given there own lactose-free alterative are amazingly entitled... If your intolerances are being catered for and you are not missing out (she is not proposing to give the poor kid some plan pasta or a ham sandwich is she) then why on earth would you get to dictate what anyone else is eating? Staggeringly self-centered, I mean just unbelievably narcissistic. I like cream and such like at Xmas, I'm sorry you can't eat it but you've been given a nice alternative.

You sound like such a lovely and generous host. I'm not sure they fully appreciate you! His parents should bring the few dairy free elements. You have enough going on.

I think you’ve done more than your fair share now and GoldenBalls Brother and Dear Amy should take over catering family celebrations from this point onwards.

My OH is lactose intolerant and I just buy lactose free milk and cream and crack on as normal. He eats pretty much the same as the rest of us, substituting other sweet treats for milk chocolate or eating v dark choc sans dairy.

Your brother and wife sound like entitled pains in the arse so please don’t listen to anyone on this thread who sees fit to make you out to be the bad person. You’re not!

I have mixed feelings about this.

Essentially, you’re buying pre-prepared processed ready meals for your family. Fair enough they’re “M&S quality” (which imo has gone downhill…) Regardless, I don’t see why you can’t just buy dairy free versions of your pre packaged meals if making things from scratch is too time consuming? It doesn’t have to be vegan. It just doesn’t have to include dairy, which is not a substantial difference to the taste.

Secondly, if you’re willing to spend thousands on hosting, why don’t you just get the meal catered and order it in?

The problem with making separate meals is whether you’re catering to him enough. If he eats his plate of dinner, do you have enough for him to have seconds later? A big part of Xmas dinner is it being a grazing feast with leftovers etc. Which leads on to the issue of cross contamination: kids being kids are likely to find it hard to follow rules on which plate is safe. Then you’ve got drunk adults in the mix etc.

I am absolutely on your side about this - having a huge influx of family is lovely but an enormous strain when you're used to living alone. And even pre-prepared food from M&S needs logistics to have it all ready at the right time, which is a big change from just slinging an egg on to boil if that's all you feel like. You've found something that works for you, so do stick with it.
I hope your nieces and nephews will always remember their great times with you - you sound wonderful, and far too nice for a lot of your family..

You mean gasp actually contribute something to the elaborate meal? But they've never brought a thing!

They are cheeky fuckers and I wouldn't be entertaining them this year.

Your family are blowing this way out of proportion and being totally unreasonable. My DD is lactose free for IBS. Neither she or I would expect her to be able to eat everything on the table in the situation you are describing. A reasonable range of food she can eat - good. Access to some treats - fab. Vegan ice cream in the freezer - bloody marvelous and the kindness remembered for years.

Your plan is both generous and thoughtful - not to mention totally reasonable.

You sound amazing, OP, and you’ve already gone above and beyond. I truly don’t like your brother & SIL, and I think this has really illustrated that it’s time for you to talk or message him with some home truths.

He’s very comfortable guilting you and making demands: I’d let him know that you notice that he contributes exactly zero to the holiday each year (unless he counts nasty comments…) and if they demand concessions they themselves don’t even make, then they need to contribute for the first time.

Anyone who cared about their kid more than a sibling powerplay would have planned on doing that already, and I think it’s overdue for the golden child and his sour wife to feel embarrassed about their lazy entitlement. He’s testing you as well: They know very well that they don’t want to take on the work or expense and that their aunt is beloved by the kids, so they’re hoping you’ll relent because there’s no way they’re skipping these gatherings.

All this can be relayed cheerfully with plenty of concern, which tends to humiliate this kind as that’s a popular manipulation tactic for users that I’m sure they’re familiar with utilizing.

A comment about pitching in to the alcohol pot that “he so clearly enjoys” wouldn’t be misplaced either, but that’s just wishful thinking on my part!

I think this is one of those situations where when you give too much it is COMPLETELY taken for granted.

I agree with @billy1966 here.

One celebratory meal where they're not different or sick or having to skip the tasty looking roasties.

Oh for crying out loud, he's getting all that. Roast potatoes done in oil. Milk/butter-free mash. Turkey basted in its own juices. It isn't going to scar him for life to have a few things out of a separate dish.

An intolerance to a certain food group is hardly a chronic health complaint or 'sick'. Plenty of people avoid certain foods, either out of choice or necessity and you know what? They just get on with it.

You sound amazing OP and your brother is a CF along with his wife. Can't believe they don't contribute any money, booze or food and then bitch about their DS and his needs.
Stay strong - do it your way and it's their choice - of course they'll come. God forbid your brother has to actually do something and pay for it!

I think you're making absolutely fine adjustments for him. I'm dairy free too and if someone said: listen, I'll make sure there's stuff you can eat- I'd be happy. He's also a kid so likely that most of it will beige Anyway?

You're a Great auntie and I think your bro and mum are silly

It's quite tricky tbh. I can see that it's a faff when you have a routine that works for you.
But since my DC have allergies, I can also see how frustrating it is to have to constantly police what is suitable and what isn't. It isn't relaxing at all and it's not just about the DC remembering, it's about everyone else there remembering not to slip them something they can't eat. I do find there are always certain family members who don't take allergies seriously so would happily give DC something that would make them ill. They don't see the aftermath so it's not real to them.
Because we have allergies and wider family members who are vegan, I'm used to cooking food that caters to everyone. I tend to cook from scratch but there is lots of pre-made food that is lactose-free. But even if you decide to make the entire meal one that your nephew can eat, be clear that you're not taking responsibility for providing a lactose-free environment. It's in lots of items that others might bring eg sweets. It's not your responsibility if your nephew has a reaction.