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Food/recipes

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Original poster

Do you prepare a different meal for each child at mealtimes?

114 replies

Upsadaisy · 18/04/2006 18:14

My two are fussy and despite trying to just prepare one meal for us all to eat, I end up preparing several different.

I'm curious to know what everyone else with more than one child does?

OP posts:

Twiglett · 18/04/2006 18:15

no I do not

if they're too fussy they don't eat

they are allowed a piece of bread or piece of fruit after dinner

but I never pander to my kids .. I think, for me, it would be a slippery slope

Feistybird · 18/04/2006 18:17

Make the same for them both always(in fact for all of us when I can) however they're not particularly fussy, but I am of the 'take-it-or there's nothing more' genre.

I honestly believe that you are feeding their fussiness by preparing diff meals.

motherinferior · 18/04/2006 18:17

I tend to work on the basis that if three inhabitants of the Inferiority Complex like it - one of those being me - then all four of us can have it.

cece · 18/04/2006 18:17

No way!

If they don't like it they go hungry! May have a piece of fruit later if they are really hungry...

NotAnOtter · 18/04/2006 18:17

learning quickly not too - they just get fussier. Want to take some lessons from the school of' there is dinner eat...you dont like ....dont eat!'

CHICagoMUM · 18/04/2006 18:17

The only difference I may do is what veggies I serve as they both have differing tastes in those, (and its quite easy to cook them all in the same pan of boiling water). Other than that it is always the same.

motherinferior · 18/04/2006 18:18

If I'm doing their tea, I do avoid things I know one or the other of them absolutely loathes, though. I wouldn't give them scrambled eggs because DD1 hates them.

hulababy · 18/04/2006 18:19

I rarely produce a different meal for DD. She and Dh pretty much always have the same meal. I don't eat meat so often mine will be slightly different. I only have one child, if that makes a difference.

Feistybird · 18/04/2006 18:19

MI agree - scrambled eggs is not on the Feisty menu either

LadySherlockofLGJ · 18/04/2006 18:19

I only have the one, but if I had 101 I would still not prepare more than one meal.

NotAnOtter · 18/04/2006 18:22

nor on the otters!

DumbledoresGirl · 18/04/2006 18:22

No. I only avoid meals that I know one of them doesn't like and even then, sometimes, they have to lump it.

The only pandering to tastes I do is when I make macaroni cheese. Ds2, dd and ds3 love this but ds1 and dh find it a bit cloying so I put tuna in theirs after serving the macaroni cheese to the others. But sometimes, everyone has the tuna even though they might prefer it without - that is just me asserting my authority!

fullmoonfiend · 18/04/2006 18:22

we have the same 'base', ie chicken or fish, but I'm flexible on the veg/pots/pasta rice thing. However, tonight, made omeelette for one (his fave) as the other hates egss with a passion, so made him pasta with sauce (which the other hates with a passion :) )
Wish I had been much stricter, much earlier - the others are right, it is a slippery slope and I have been to the bottom of it. And it takes years to climb back up IME. . .

Mercy · 18/04/2006 18:48

Not for each child. About once a fortnight (usually a Friday when she's very tired) dd just wants a boiled egg and soldiers - which means ds has baked beans and toast. But that's not cooking, just heating up!

Original poster

Upsadaisy · 18/04/2006 18:48

I'm torn as to prepare seperate meals or to just cook one. They both like completely different things and generally loathe what the other likes but am not sure how much of this is my own doing due to giving them seperate meals mainly.

OP posts:

SenoraPostrophe · 18/04/2006 18:52

blimey, are you kidding? extra work aside, I'd never hear the end of the last minute changes of mind from my fickle children.

roisin · 18/04/2006 19:06

No! Mine choose different fillings in sandwiches, and when we have salad ds2 eats all the tomatoes and ds1 eats all the cucumber. But I wouldn't prepare different meals - no way. They eat it or go without; end of story.

GDG · 18/04/2006 19:08

Absolutely not. I know there are certain veggies ds1 and ds2 would not eat but ds3 would but I put them on the plate anyway. Blimey, I don't have time for that!

They do choose their sandwich fillings though which is no big deal imo (jools goes mad - apparently a choice between marmalade and jam on your toast is a big no no! I don't know how I survived, I honestly don't )

frogs · 18/04/2006 19:25

Jesus, Mary and Joseph, not in a million years. Stop right now, you're pandering to them and it will all end in tears.

I used to be sent as a teenager to skivvy for an aunt of mine who had five children under ten. She'd been suckered into doing just exactly what you describe, cooking five separate meals to different specifications. I made a mental note at the age of 14 never to fall into this trap, and I've stuck to it. The policy in the frog pond is that everything I put on the table is perfectly edible, and anyone who chooses not to eat it is welcome to go without.

The result is, pleasingly, that the froglets will eat pretty much anything that crosses their field of vision. They have their preferences, obviously -- ds doesn't really like baked beans, while dd2 went through a phase of being the only child in the country who wouldn't eat pasta. Dd1 actively dislikes aubergines and courgettes. But if they're genuinely hungry, they'll eat enough of it to stave off starvation. If not, they won't waste away before the next meal time.

compo · 18/04/2006 19:30

another no here - too much money to do and to little time to preapre separate meals

charliecat · 18/04/2006 19:30

Yes, I have one vegetarian dd and one not. I am also vegetarian, dp is not. None of us like the same foods.
I cannot eat anything I dont like the taste of so can sympatise with my dds not wanting to eat anything they dont like.

rummum · 18/04/2006 19:42

I do a menu plan fit everyone in with their likes and dislikes.. ie.. son is allergic to dairy, eggs and nuts so some of the things we have he can't.. daughter is being assessed for AS and has never liked certain textures, in fact when she was a toddler she was refered to a paediatritian as she was so anaemic with her picky eating...
about a year ago we all started to eat together..and we all have simular food.. hubby comes home at 7pm some weeks, and it wasn't fair to keep the kids up. I always have fresh rolls on the table and fruit so no one goes hungry...

SenoraPostrophe · 18/04/2006 20:01

lol at Jools going mad over choosing between jam and marmalade! (is it that she thinks it gets them too excited?)

frogs · 18/04/2006 20:04

Okay, allergies and medical conditions are a different matter. But what message does it give children if you cook an a la carte menu to indulge their every little whim? You're effectively teaching them that it's okay not to eat perfectly normal foodstuffs just because they don't like the way it looks, or the colour, or the fact that it's touching some other food. And they also learn that they can make random demands and you will jump up and down like a muppet trying to please them, which is not a message I'm happy for them to get.

Being seriously picky is a major disadvantage socially -- the kids I'm happy to have visit after school are the ones who will fit in easily. I'm much more likely to say no to requests for visits from kids who I know will go, "Eergh, what's that, don't like that, I'm not eating that" when presented with the most innocuous foods. That's just downright rude IMO, and believe me, there's a lot of it about. Really, you don't want to go there.

hermykne · 18/04/2006 20:06

upsadaisy, its very hard not to succumb to their tastes/demands because you naturally weant them to eat something. my dd was like this but i just decided abut a month ago that she just had to have what i planned and if she didnt like it she didnt get anything else or her dessert.
it works - but tiresometo listen to her whinning......

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