Live lunchtime webchat with Tana Ramsay, 1-2pm, Monday 13 October

[GeraldineMumsnet]

Tana will be online in half an hour to answer your questions about cooking and food for families, her new recipe book and anything else culinary you're burning to ask her. See you then...

[cocoleBOO]

DO you ever think sod it I'm not cooking and order a chinese?

[CountessDracula]

and which chinese do you order from if so?

[BlackEyedDog]

If you had a fiver (arf) and twenty minutes and four hungry mouths to feed what would you do?

do you really make your own blasted ketchup?

[TanaRamsay2008]

Hi Playmobil

You don't need a huge budget for this. Simple things like keeping kids plates or cups at a low level so they can set the table themselves, have coat hooks at low level, lay clothes out the night before with your children so they can dress themselves - all help towards making an independent child.

Also, having timetables and charts so that your son/daughter can see ahead for the next day - everyone laughs at me but I have timetables up and downstairs as my memory is appalling and having four kids to co ordinate I have to rely on them.

Tana

[dizzywitches]

hi Tana!

are you a MNer in real life?? you don't have to reveal your MN name if you are

[cupchar]

What do you think about this packed lunch? Salad (with a balsamic dressing) and cheese sandwich, yogurt and an apple from the garden?

[BlackEyedDog]

har har cupchar

[Rhubarb]

Sorry, I know nothing about you Tanya, or your dh. I have just read on here that you have 4 children - did you plan to have 4? And what do you think of the argument that large families are now only for the wealthy?

[Rhubarb]

Sorry, Tana.

[Oliveoil]

how in God's Holy Name can your son eat a pigs tail (iirc he did on Gordon's tv thing) when my two turn their noses up at 'bits' in sauces?

it is not fair

I do all the things I am supposed to - cook with them, we all eat the same, yadda yadda, yawn

and still they are fussy

aged 4 and 5

is there light at the end of the tunnel or am I doomed?

[needmorecoffee]

do you think there is a place for ready meals? Such as the elderly who are unable to chop and peel?

[MerlinsBeard]

That's a good question BED.

TANA (SOrry its caps so you can see!)

can you feed your family for a fiver?

[Oliveoil]

also, your dh is a bit of a hearthrob on here

do not search on his name or you will be shocked

[Rhubarb]

Ah Oliveoil - you take 'em to France where they are fed rabbit and mussels for school dinner. They soon learn not to be fussy when presented with rabbit ears floating in their stew!

[Oliveoil]

mine have been fed mussels in good ol blighty

they DID NOT EAT THEM

and went hungry

[failure]

[cocoleBOO]

[PestoFangsLookGoodOnMeMonster]

Tana,

what are you having for dinner tonight?

[pucca]

My dd would go hungry believe me! she is so fussy it is unreal. She will not eat any veg at all, yet loves all meat.

[TanaRamsay2008]

To cmotdibbler

Involving the kids in cooking is very important. In reality I only cook with the kids at weekends or school holidays but tend to do pasta salads, let them peel veg, letting them use knives is scary so i still tend to avoid that. They really do the stirring, add ingredients to the pans and of course love rolling pastry etc, but it doesn't have to always be the dessert.

rough chopping of veg with a table knife if you are making soups or stews is always a good one, you can then blend it so their chopping can be erratic, making sandwiches and other simple jobs is the best way to start.

Hope this helps,

Tana

[needmorecoffee]

eating mussels is like eating snot. Yuck. Or maybe slugs. ick.

[TheArmadillo]

pucca mine is the opposite. He will eat any veg (and fruit) but has never eaten meat or fish.

I love the 'no kids will starve themselves'. It makes me ROFL.

[Rhubarb]

Don't make it an issue Olivey. Just take the dish away then and get their dessert. So long as they don't get offered something else.

If you act like "bovvered?" then kids will discover they no longer have that attention of you cajoling them to eat and they'll start to get curious about the foods they see you eating.

But would YOU eat a pig's tail?

[needmorecoffee]

How old are your kids Tana? When mine reached grumpy teenage years they stopped eating what I cooked and insisted on the junkiest crap they could find as a type of rebellion!

[pucca]

I have to sneak cauliflower in her mash, last night she rumbled me though and said "Mum, this mash tastes like broccoli!" BUSTED! she is a nightmare. If she doesn't like the look of something - she won't eat it, point blank refuses.

[TanaRamsay2008]

Olive Oil,

Yes I was shocked at Jack eating that, rather him than me. My kids are all slightly older, 7,8 + 10 and are now at the stage where they like to shock me with how adventurous they can be - also it goes without saying they are encouraged to shock me by Gordon....

Tana