Feeding up Granny

[BroccoliSpears]

We've got Granny coming to stay for a week. I know she doesn't cook particularly well for herself, so I'll be taking the opportunity to feed her up with lots of good nutritious fare.

She's mostly vegetarian, but has been told by the docs to eat some meat. She flatly refuses to eat birds or lamb. She'll eat beef if it doesn't look like it came from an animal (she's okay with mince and or a small slice of really well done roast. She eats gravy). I think she eats ham (if it's very thinly sliced )

She tollerates a bit of fish.

I usually cook vegetarian at home, but she doesn't really like what I think of as good, nutritious, varied veggie food - too many beans and pulses for her liking.

What she really likes is chocolate, biscuits and sweeties, and then a small spud and a few veggies with gravy at dinner, and then leave half of it.

I'm struggling to come up with a week's worth of food without overusing mince.

She's quite frail and shakey, so anything tricky to eat is out (no spaghetti, no fajitas, probably no soup which is a shame).

I thought I could do one or two mince dishes (shepherds pie / lasagne?)

A roast.

A fish pie.

A veggie curry.

Any other good ideas?

Sorry my OP is so long. I hadn't realised how many rules there were until I wrote it down! Thank you if you take the time to read it all.

Potato and cheese bake with yourself in it as well as other veg of course.

If anything like my 80 years old Father, he does not eat very much at one time I give him breakfast, (he loves Bananas on Granary toast after he saw me eating one)

Then at 10.00 he will have a crumpet with preserve , lunch will be say poached fish veg and mash with a butter sauce, dinner, mug of veg soup, as long as its not too hot it is easy to handle , and then at about 7.30 before he goes of to bed will have a apple pie or such. I cant get him to eat much fruit unless it is soft, but have persuaded him to have fresh orange and apple juice.

Oh yes, a cheesey bake is a good idea (with myself in it? That took me a minute to work out!)

She does like to snack, you're right. Perhaps if I make sure there are snacky things like cheese and biscuits, rather than just chocolate that would be good.

Thank you!

Bump

(in case of loitering foodies)

She's probably lacking in iron with her diet, which is why the doc suggested meat. If she's not keen on pulses then try green leafy veg, broccoli/cauliflower/brussels sprouts, tofu, nuts and wholegrain cereals, particularly iron and protein rich ones like millet and quinoa (they can be used instead of/together with mini pasta in a minestrone for instance). Make her snack on dried fruit instead of sweets, and give her some fresh fruit or juice at the same time. You could try making a cake substituting molasses for the sugar and adding loads of ground nuts and dried fruit (I make a banana and walnut loaf like this, you could also do carrot and almond or apple and raisin, whatever takes your fancy).

HTH

In many ways cooking for the elderly is not unlike cooking for a small child, for their appetite is smaller than that of a school child or active adult. It is very important that older people include ample protien, vitamin and calcium in their diets and that the food choosen is interesting and easily digested** I was looking for a gingerbread recipy which includes black treacle (full of iron) in an old cookery book and came across the above passage.

8oz plain flour, 2oz sugar, 1 teaspoon mixed spice, 1 level teaspoon bicarb soda, 1-2 teaspoon ground giner, 4 oz lard or butter, 6oz black treacle, 2 oz golden syrup, quarter pint milk 1 egg.

sieve dry ingredients into mixing bowl. Put butter, blk treacle golden syrup into a saucepan and heat until fat has melted. let this coll slightly and add to dry ingrediants. Warm up the milk in the empty but durty saucepan and pour into the bowl with the other ingrediants.

Now beat this well, lastly beating in the egg. Pour into a lined7 inch cake tin and bake in the center of the oven on gas mark 2 300-325 F for 1 and a half hours. Allow cake to cool for ten mins and then turn onto a wire tray. Store in an airtight tin for several days before cutting - yeah right - to allow the flavour to develop - as if you can wait that long.

Veg stew with a few lentils thrown in? Also dumplings made with wholemeal flour.
(I do 6oz wholemeal SR flour, pinch of salt, few dried herbs, rub in 3oz margarine, add water to make a dough.)
Also veg soup with lentils.
Nut roast?
Porridge for breakfast.

Thanks Brangelina. Nuts are a good idea. She loves them, though I'm not sure how her teeth manage these days. Will give it some thought.

Fantastic Ivy. Thank you so much. Didn't know about black treacle being fill of iron. Will definitely make that as it's Christmassy and she'll love it.

Brilliant idea too about porridge for breakfast. I tend to make it for dd anyway. Thanks TooTicky.

doesn't dark chocolate contain iron? how about dark chocolate brazils?

I must say "Make her eat dried fruit instead of sweets" - for goodness sake, the woman is a grown adult, and shouldn't be having her diet dictated to her. If she wants to live on biscuits, let her - offer her the good stuff, obviously, but don't be surprised if she takes 2 mouthfuls and then refuses to eat any more.

Is the meat issue perhaps because she struggles to chew/cut it and won't admit it? Because all the meat she will eat is easy to chew, I noticed,.

Not a meal, but banana smoothies with a bit of cream are a good way of fattening frail people up, and if she's got a sweet tooth it might work.

Macaroni cheese with ham added (cut matchstick thin)

Serve the veg curry with some dhal or add lentils or chickpeas to the curry (in fact chickpea & spinach curry would be good)

If she can't manage nuts then try nut butters. Would she try avocado perhaps served with vinaigrette?

Complan also tastes nice.

Rich beef broth

I personally wouldn't serve a vegetable curry to a fussy eating old lady. She probably will take one mouthful to be polite, unless you know she likes curry.

mac cheese with spinach in?

Will she eat eggs?

Cheese omelette, or soft scrambled egg with thin strips of smoked salmon, if so.

Smoked haddock with brown bread and butter

How about serving soup in a mug if she's a bit shaky?

snackwise, a really nutty oaty fruity etc loaf cake made with brown flour (with butter or cream cheese) is actually pretty nutritious - more so than a cadbury's mini roll anyway.

Actually a couple of small meals plus a number of filling/calorie rich snacks might be the way to go.

iirc this is how my Grandma preferred to eat in her latter years. Cocoa or Horlicks at bedtime.

How old is your Granny?

Ovaltine is fortified, so might be a good idea.

Like Ivykaty said, think of it as almost the same as cooking for a small child - high in calories, easy to eat, nothing too spicy.
When you make porridge, for example, chop a banana in to cook at the same time as the oats (really sweet and yummy) then use thick cream on top for max calories.
Put butter or marscapone in your mash and on your veg. Flapjacks with dried fruit in are good snacks or cubes of cheese maybe.
What about Sanatogen tonic wine or Guinesss?

I would make sure her meals are very small, this way she will not feel overwhelmed by the food you are serving and that can often have the opposite effect.

My gran lived until she was 94 and had a weekly shopping list of chocolate and penguins with quiche ham and sterilized milk. She found it difficult to eat to much as she had reflux and lost a lot of weight - so the chocolate was good to keep the fat on her.

It is the 70% chocolate that has some iron - not the other sugar filled pretend chocolate stuff.

Just make sure you enjoy her stay and she has a good time, rather than worry to much about what she is eating.

When my elderley dad was ill, we made him a rice pudding with full cream milk. Slow cooked in the oven, complete with nutmeg.

Yum. Scoffed the whole thing.

Thanks all. Will think about soup in a mug. Or maybe a goulash or something thicker. Lots of good ideas here.

And don't worry (ivy and coldtits) - am not planning on making it a health farm! Nothing on this earth could make my Granny eat something she doesn't fancy, and with Christmas upon us, her Quality Street intake will be apporpriately high. Was just after a bit of inspiration so that the things I'm offering appeal to her and might do her some good while she's with us.

She ended up in hospital earlier this year because she'd been living on chocolate biscuits and grapefruit juice. Not that she can't shop or cook for herself, just that she prefers biscuits and boiled sweeties to 'proper' food!

Brangalina - thanks for mentioning molasses, having gone to find the ginger bread recipy I have now made two batches of the stuff and it is wonderful on a cold winters eve. I hadn't made it in about 10 years.

I keep thinking well at least it is good for me all the milk and blk treacle = iron and calcium