Catering for dietary requirements

[conductable]

I'm 35 weeks pregnant, so I haven't caught anyone in the family by surprise turning up to dinner with a few requirements on what I can and can't eat.

I went round to my in-laws for dinner last night and whilst my BIL and his wife and child all had accommodations made by my MIL for all their dietary preferences (one allergy and 2 preferences) I had to sit there hungry through the starters until the main course was served as there was nothing suitable, they had done parma ham or pate for starter, smoked salmon canapes or goats cheese canapes, when we arrived. Again, then nothing on the cheese course, not even a cheddar, just brie, stilton, and goats.

I dont mind picking around bits, but I was deeply hurt they had gone to great effort for my BIL and family, and I didn't get anything until 8:30 because absolutely everything is on my current no-go list.

I'm sorry, that's so frustrating but would have been best to let them know in advance what you can't eat.
You can eat pate though (to a specific limit 200g weekly, certainly a couple of slices of toast with pate wouldn't exceed it and would fill you up more than jam), midwife even recommended I eat pate to help with my anaemia.

I've had a baby probably more recently than your in-laws, and didn't realise those things were on the banned list.

I'm pretty sure you can eat any of the cheeses and cured meats as long as you heated them through (which would be easy enough for you to do if you really fancied them.)

But you could eat the main course, yes? And the pudding?

I don't think skipping the starter and the cheese is that big of a deal tbh (and you could have heated things through if you really felt you must have parma ham and cheese.)

What? I had my daughter 20+ years ago and we absolutely did have this!

She's said several times that they already know

If you were French and pregnant you would have eaten the lot and had a rare steak as the main course. These are guidelines promulgated without any details of the risk evaluation, lots of "mights" and "coulds", without any real scientific justification.. TBH you are much more at risk driving a car or using an escalator when pregnant.

I didn't get anything until 8:30 because absolutely everything is on my current no-go list.

Did your DP sit and eat nothing as well?

Any food can cause harm if it has listeria or other dangerous bacteria in, its why I stopped eating takeaways (and FIL's BBQ) when pg.
All advice given is just that, its not telling you what to do.
As I said its entirely your decision but you do need to make sure its communicated clearly - either you didn't do that or they did it on purpose.
You should have made yourself some toast

that's not the point though is it. Its her choice to make, and sil. The pil respected sil decision but haven't made the same effort with op.

So many truly terrible hosts on Mumsnet.
Of course it’s rude not to cater for you when they have been told. How difficult is it to provide some cheddar and crackers with the other cheeses? Or get in a suitable canapé?

are you always so rude?

No one is saying you should eat this or that, just that other people can't know what's on your banned list.

I have kids in primary school, so not that old and I haven't got a clue what the current banned list might be.

Some of it most of us do ignore too 😂

Since they knew all the things you couldn't eat, they are unreasonable.

But next time, what about scooping up a bit of the smoked salmon, prosciutto and brie, and ostentatiously microwaving it until it's steaming, chewy, and looks disgusting. Then look at it sadly, and say "Looks awful, but I'm ravenous, and this is the only way I can eat this food." Then gag as you eat it. Might make your point rather more memorably!

Current NHS guidelines say to avoid all types of pate

or just let your DH, the SON communicate with his parents the day before or something and ask them what they planned for the pregnant wife sticking to the restricted list?

Apparently the in-laws knew , fine, did DH ask them what they planned instead?

I think the hosts were rude. It is not hard to look up current guidelines (although they didn’t need to as OP had already told them). The hosts were perfectly capable of catering for their own daughter, but can’t be bothered for their DIL. We all know that when pregnant there are times when food choices may be limited, but it is not unreasonable to expect family to make an effort.

My daughter is over 20 and I can still remember most of the foods to avoid. Yes, there are no banned foods and some people choose to ignore without any consequences, but why risk it?

Are you in the UK? I think the NHS says to avoid all pate.

I am curious OP whether the PIL are closer to his brother than they are to him? often this kind of disparity is linked to favouritism between siblings.

She wasn’t rude. And it’s not ‘her banned list’. It’s a list of foods that the NHS advises pregnant women don’t eat. You’re trying to minimise and make OP sound like she’s just being fussy. She’s not.

My point is that it is that I found it rude to make huge efforts for three of your guests to make sure they could eat and enjoy every course, but not do the same for the forth guest. Either have it so that everyone just has to pick and choose the bits they can eat or put it the same level of care for everyone.

They do know, they have been told several times. It isnt my banned list, it is the standard NHS guidelines, so they have been told, if they weren't sure whether when they were told I couldn't eat blue cheese if that included stilton they could have asked, they could have googled. There's lots of options.

I was rude to you because you are basically doing what I think my MIL has done, I've said I cant eat that, and she's gone well when I was pregnant I ate XYZ and was fine so am just going to ignore what I've been told repeatedly.

No, why on earth would he? It wasn't a hunger strike to make a point.

it IS her banned list, because she's the one she's decided to follow.

Entirely her right, but a bit naive to assume a pregnant woman goes with the NHS list, and not something else.

Personally, I would ask what people can or can't eat. I am not disagreeing with the OP making choices, we all do, I am laughing at her ridiculous attitude.

I’ve seen threads on this subject go the same way before, with posters trying to make out OP is being OTT and just fussy and ‘I ate it so it’s fine’ and ‘In France blah blah blah’….most people on this site aren’t in France and wouldn’t be impressed with some things about French life.

I find it really strange on a parenting site. Most women I know followed the guidelines and those that didn’t, didn’t make out other women were in some way weird to follow guidelines made by the national health service.

Mumsnet is such a shithole at times.

I am not your MIL, I would have done differently anyway.

But if you told them repeatedly , why didn't your DH just check what was planned for you? It's their own son, not that hard.

Bit different when you are a guest at a wedding or a big party, and you just leave most of the food, but why didn't your DH speak with them?

She can't have been that hungry if she refused to consider toast.

Not a great offer or a lot of effort there, I give you that, but if you are hungry, toast work quite well 😂

She ended up eating some, didn't she?

I think the posters point is that guidance change quite regularly, and people cant keep up with all the changes. People are not mind readers and people have better things to do than googling what pregnant women can eat these days. You need to tell them and remind them. Also, when an allergy is involved, depending on how serious the allergy is, cooking can get quite tricky and stressful, as you have to make sure there's no cross contamination etc. Therefore, if you have your own dietry requirements, it is imporant to remind the host of your dietry requirements and not expect hosts to remember previous conversations, or google what you cant eat. How weird and entitled to expect hosts to google what you cant eat, when all you had to do was send a quick message reminding or make a quick telephone call.