Is it unreasonable to be frustrated by a guest who says they eat anything when they actually don’t?

[funinthesun22]

My MIL is staying with us over the bank holiday. When I asked in advance what she’d like to eat, she said she eats anything and was happy to have whatever we usually have.

Friday dinner was a vegetable and chickpea but apparently she hates chickpeas and dried fruit in savoury food. Saturday breakfast (yogurt, granola, fruit) didn’t go down well either. I took her to M&S so she could pick things she’d enjoy, but she kept insisting she was fine and didn’t add anything to the basket until I said we’d planned tacos for dinner she said she didn’t know what that was and didn’t sound keen, so we bought an alternative dinner for her.

At lunch I made a salad with homemade dressing. She didn’t like the sound of the dressing and asked for salad cream which we didn’t have. I offered vinaigrette, olive oil, or mayo as alternatives but she turned them all down and had a plain salad. She also asked for a few additions we didn’t have, despite us having been in M&S two hours earlier offering to buy food. We’ve got a BBQ planned today and I’m hopeful now that I know more of her dislikes but still not entirely sure.

AIBU to find this frustrating? I genuinely don’t mind catering to a picky eater. I just need to know what she actually likes. But every time I ask, I get “I’ll eat whatever you’re having” when that’s clearly not the case.

My MIL is the size of a small whale but apparently doesn't eat, ever. I'm sure she's on MN, too!!!!

I think it’s really easy to think of everything you eat as “normal” and actually forget about all of the things you don’t eat. Plus, if your MIL has been on an allergy testing regime for years and had a restricted diet as a result, she might feel that, now she is eating anything she wants again, she is able to eat anything.
I have had various experiences over the years with relatives and friends of all ages telling me that eat “anything” and then having clear preferences that I now tend to send an outline of what food we’ll be having when and, if it’s something like a chickpea curry, explain what the key ingredients will be. Plus, if someone is coming to stay for a few days, I’ll ask what their preferred condiments are. So I now have salad cream for MIL, some sort of hot sauce for a SIL, decaf coffee for my mum, get blue milk in for my dad, Diet Coke for one friend and lemon squash for another.
Where does your MIL shop? Going back 20yrs or so now and the parents of a boyfriend I had then were completely overwhelmed that most of the food I had bought for a visit from them
was from M&S. For me, it was because there was one by the station so easy to collect bits on the way home from work plus much of it was pre-prepared to an extent at least so less for me to do. They, though, saw it as very posh and expensive and had never been in there to buy food. This also meant that they were less familiar with the foods you could buy in there. I think that, if I had taken them in with me, there’s no way that they would have suggested anything as they would have been worried about the cost. If I’d taken them to Safeway (as it was then), they might have been happier to suggest things.

I totally used to be this person 🫣 when you mostly cook for yourself/eat out or are spending time with people who know you it's very easy to think of yourself (or your kids) as unfussy and your food/meal preferences as normal.

Honestly it's not until I started spending time visiting others that I realised I am/we are actually pretty particular, and through having guests myself I've learned it is actually more helpful to be honest about likes and dislikes rather than saying 'anything is fine' and going back on it later. I am way more open about stuff now.

Perhaps she's just ignorant and trying to be polite? Appreciate this doesn't help you. Hoping she's more flexible/open to change than my parents who seem incapable of any level of self reflection or behavioural adaptation and it improves for the next visit!

It is common, and it's therefore essential as well as obvious common sense that if somebody says 'Is there anything you can't eat?' that the sufferer tells them!

My mother was very good at trying new foods. My dad - the first time (it was the late 70s and he was a coal miner in a traditional Yorkshire village) she offered him a pizza - asked where the gravy was.

Boomer here. Salad cream is the generation before us!

I'm under 50 and I'm afraid I had to look up what tacos are. If they are the same as a tortilla wrap then I've probably had them, but really not often.
Having said that, it looks like a bread type thing that I would imagine people who eat bread can eat

I had a taco once in the 80s and I'm sure it was crispy. Maybe a false memory though. I had it in the US. I think I got it all down my front because it leaked at the edges.

I thought she was going to be in her 90s!

My take on this is that she is desperately trying to be no trouble and failing badly. Anything that would genuinely make her ill she should have made you aware of.
I fear she will dread the next visit now. Perhaps you could try to let her know in advance what meals you are planning and try to keep it traditional?

I am old but eat a varied diet. There are a few things I don't like but would be polite if served them and I would eat them and say nothing. TBH I love chick peas but no-one in my family likes them, not even DS and his partner who are vegetarian. Although they will eat houmus.

A tagine might be bog standard for you, not necessarily for some others.

Tbf, my Mum would have gagged at anything vegetable and Chickpeas - and she loved food.

Oh yeah, I think you are right as it was my parents who had it in the cupboard and they'd be mid to late 90s if still with us.

I can't eat it as it's very mustard based and I'm allergic. I do remember an attempt at making it fashionable again about 15 years ago

Sounds a lot like my ILs. They didn't consider themselves fussy because they'd never considered different types of food. My parents, the same age, were much less meat and two veg types. Although after MIL died and FIL became too unwell to prepare his own food, it turned out he really would eat anything, so long as it was tasty. Poor bugger had been eating bland food his whole life.

I'm the same age as your MIL and a reasonable adventurous eater but chick peas and dried fruit for dinner is a choice. As are tacos. Maybe shepherd's pie but cook the onions off really well?

Why isn't your DH sorting out food for her to eat?

I, too, am shocked at the ageism on this thread.
I’m 62 and genuinely will eat anything: I’m certainly no stranger to a chick pea.

I'm going to sneak in and say (from the grand old age of 70!) that I think your Mil is indeed being very awkward and that is due to her personality not her age!
You have told us why you don't know what she usually eats as she has been regularly testing for allergies. This says to me that she has some concerns about how food affects her and that even though she's having a break she is still worried about it.
As someone who ended up in hospital for a week after trying to eat a healthy diet packed with salads and raw vegetables I do have some sympathy!!
however, your MiL should have told you and her son of her concerns and been prepared to choose some things from M&S. I refuse to believe that there wasn't one thing there that she would have eaten.
I can't eat gluten or chili anymore so might seem just like your MiL. However, when I visit people I speak up and explain and offer to bring things to make life easy.
I love M&S Food Hall as there are so many choices. We love simple meals like salmon with new potatoes, green beans, purple sprouting broccoli when these vegetables are in season but also fajitas, curries, chickpea strew, pizza, pasta etc etc.

What has DH's sister said about this carry on?

Good luck with the BBQ! We are having salmon, haloumi, stuffed peppers, sweetcorn and veggie sausages on ours! Back in the day my parents would have insisted on full on Sunday roast dinner whatever the weather, just be glad MiL didn't ask for that!

I wouldn't invite her to stay until she can be more realistic about her food choices, you can't cater for someone who won't say they don't eat something until it turns up. Send her a rough idea of what you will be eating before she stays, if she says that's all fine youthen don't have to change anything, it's lovely you want to please her but you can't read minds, so she has to say.

I was born in 1957 and my mother was influenced by Elizabeth David and then Jane Grigson. Being a picky eater or having limited tastes, ignorance of variety and inability to cook are not a generational thing.

Personally North African flavours, especially including dried fruit are probably my least favourite. My menu this week includes a Niçoise salad with asparagus instead of beans, pink roast sirloin with jersey royals in a mustardy dressing with charred tenderstem and a shaved fennel salad, souvlaki with flatbreads and a Greek salad, cowboy butter roasted cod loins with peppers, tomatoes and giant butter beans…despite being over state pension age.

Yes, I'm finding this confusing too.

My DM is a great grandmother, and just shy of 80. She was coming of age and setting up her own house in the era of Jane Grigson, Elizabeth David, Madhur Jaffrey and the rise of the mass market overseas package holiday. When every local cinema ran terrible home-made ads for the Chinese and Indian restaurants 'just 50 yards from this cinema', and dinner parties regularly featured a fondue. Admittedly I don't think she's ever had a taco but she's certainly no stranger to a chickpea or a tagine, and loads of her regular savoury dishes feature fruit. She found yoghurt a little strange when she first tried it - but that was 60 years ago, and she's been eating it regularly for breakfast since the 80s. She makes curries from scratch - no jarred sauces - having been taught by her mother, who was born before the First World War. When I was at school in the 70s, one of the dishes on the weekly school lunch rotation was goulash.

I know there are still people who've not really encountered foreign food, but I don't know how. They must work bloody hard at avoiding it

It is but also very indicative of 70s cooking over here. Ive eaten north african cooking made in the traditional style which was delicious but there is something english cooks do that just make it taste like fruit bunged in english style food.

as has been fequently said, its not generational. I am 10 years older than them!

I have sometimes ordered this kind of thing out and sometimes enjoyed them as they were not overwhelming but other times I’ve not liked them. Bought a fancy M & S ready meal the other day and it was horrendous. So much garlic and chilli despite it being a fairly normal lasagna. I can cope with the odd bit but it was just awful. Hubby and I have noticed over recent years that some foods seem way spicier than previously. He eats chickpeas btw lol.

Yep, my dad is in his late eighties and love chickpeas. He might have eaten meat, potatoes and two-veg type meals growing up, but that doesn't mean that he is limited to those foods now. He happily eats pretty much everything that we ever put in front of him.

This was my dad. He said he wasn't fussy but what he meant was that he wasn't fussy as long as I made meat potatoes and veg.

When he visited I would do a 3 course meal and I tried introducing him to new things, with limited success.

Sainsbury's limoncello pudding was a hit, tapa not so much.

He did enjoy 'picky bits' so I thought taps was similar.

When my mum was terminally ill the hospice ran a cooking course for men of a certain age who may or may not be used to cooking. From that he would make himself garlic bread with ratatouille.

its not just North african cooking or 70's though....redcurrant jelly, apple sauce, orange sauce, cranberry sauce.....just off the top of my head.
I make cous cous the way I like it and am not bothered whether its authentic or not. I do rehydrate it with strong stock though so you get a definite sweet/sharp/salty vibe.