Not cooking nice meals for DSC anymore

[Juggle42]

I probably am being unreasonable but I'm so fed up of this situation.

My SC is 10 and is so fussy still with what they eat. Just to confirm there are no SEN issues. But his parents are not strict at all with food and getting him to try things and so if something isn't beige and bland he'll moan and turn his nose up.

I tend to do 99% of the cooking in our home and I try to make a variety of things. I'm not suggesting he has to like everything but it's literally a case of if it's not chicken nuggets or pizza then he'll have a face on him like a slapped arse and complain the entire time, pick out everything he doesn't 'like' which is essentially anything remotely healthy.

I'm so sick of spending time cooking nice meals just to have to silently seethe the entire meal time about his whinging and the wasted food too.

I'm seriously considering just doing him chicken nuggets and chips in the oven every night whilst we eat what I cook in peace because it's making me resent cooking for him.

There are other DC who seem to manage fine eating what I cook.

Fuck me, I'm not Jamie Oliver on bloody speed. I'm a normal working mother who's knackered more often than not and can just about get a pasta marinara together.

Sort of take objection to the inference I was not a ‘normal working mum’. Two working parent family, and I did long shifts which often turned into doubles, often without days off for long stretches and ran on no sleep for most of my kids childhoods thanks. It really was the sort of thing that could be done simply and easily though and as tired and buggered as we both were 5-10min made no difference, and as I said often fitted around cooking of main dish anyway. I’d much rather try and stay upright for an extra 5 to fit something like this in versus processed frozen shit full of salt and every preservative known to man.

Anyway, doesn’t last forever, by their 20’s they all eat ‘normal food’, and not only that but they get to take turns cooking it for you as well .

Should have added, wasn’t as though there were two of us in kitchen either. To avoid childcare we worked opposite shifts, days, or one would be sleeping from nights while the other was wrangling so we were only ever solo in the kitchen during those years. Not at all the same as single parents but we could go for weeks only tagging each other in and out the door.

Ah @HoppingPavlova I knew you meant well! I cook from scratch all the time so I do get that actually it isn’t much more work and wouldn’t be a hardship really. But sometimes even a little more work - 5 or 10 minutes’ worth, does feel like a lot. I just think OP isn’t quite at the stage where making chicken nuggets from scratch daily is going to solve her issues with being annoyed by/resenting the wider problems around food/eating/behaviour...it needs to be something that adds no more work, no more hassle.

@Nnique

Ah *@HoppingPavlova* I knew you meant well! I cook from scratch all the time so I do get that actually it isn’t much more work and wouldn’t be a hardship really. But sometimes even a little more work - 5 or 10 minutes’ worth, does feel like a lot. I just think OP isn’t quite at the stage where making chicken nuggets from scratch daily is going to solve her issues with being annoyed by/resenting the wider problems around food/eating/behaviour...it needs to be something that adds no more work, no more hassle.

I think it's just differences in what people consider "effort". Hand made nuggets and chips would be as much effort as I'd want to put into the main meal, not a random side addition. It would take me longer than 5 minutes, too.

Yes, it’s about what one wants to do really - for several years I used microwave rice packets because my work stress/lack of sleep/worries about teenage children etc meant that I simply did not want to rinse rice, put the pan on to boil, time it, and empty. It was simpler (in my head) to just pop the rice into the microwave at the last minute and it was done. No extra mental load.

Then various things stopped being an issue - I was no longer unwell with stress and so on, lockdown happened and I was able to be at home and cook daily without any pressure, and I could cook rice from scratch again. Of course objectively it’s not actually a hardship to cook rice properly (and you get a lot more back for the effort in terms of quality and flavour), but I simply did not have that capacity for extra effort at that time.

I'd just give them boring cheap beige food and make everyone else something nice. The psychology might be that she ends up feeling silly or left out and caves. And it removes your disgruntlement

@Nnique

Yes, it’s about what one wants to do really - for several years I used microwave rice packets because my work stress/lack of sleep/worries about teenage children etc meant that I simply did not want to rinse rice, put the pan on to boil, time it, and empty. It was simpler (in my head) to just pop the rice into the microwave at the last minute and it was done. No extra mental load.

Then various things stopped being an issue - I was no longer unwell with stress and so on, lockdown happened and I was able to be at home and cook daily without any pressure, and I could cook rice from scratch again. Of course objectively it’s not actually a hardship to cook rice properly (and you get a lot more back for the effort in terms of quality and flavour), but I simply did not have that capacity for extra effort at that time.

Haha as a side note this is exactly why I bought a rice cooker, never looked back!

It’s on my list!! Heh. It’s just I don’t actually need one now as I’m quite happy to cook it myself, so there are other priorities. But at the time I probably should have got one, would’ve meant much nicer rice throughout!

I've got a very fussy 11 year old- sounds very similar as we;ve only got 1 and DP mainly cooks (and we will either often eat separately anyway or all eat blands)- we have deferred to giving him stuff that he likes. I don't know if its spoiling though as he will go hungry rather than eat stuff he dislikes. its comforting to read how some posters were like this but now have normal tastes.Hopefully DS will suddenly see the light. I think its as much textures as anything he doesn't seem to like sauces really

We do try and give him a combination of new stuff and his old stuff- with the new stuff being what we are eating. i go through stages of trying to force new food on him (or did when he was younger) but its not a hill i'm going to die on and I'd rather he ate something. Just to say as bland as his food are they are not necessarily unhealthy just not very varied. So DA will only eat one kind of green vegetable - Broccoli - and one other vegetable (raw carrot) and only one fruit (banana - although he occasionally has an apple now i recall)- so whilst i would prefer he had a variety as long as he is having some of these i am ok.

@OutingHobby not at all, in fact it makes life very easy for me. I have chronic health issues and the last thing I need at meal times is a food battle. Plus we can’t afford to waste food.

With the DCs their food is very easy, we always have food in for them so I don’t have to think about it. There is always pizza, nuggets, fries, veg (fresh or frozen), Yorkshire puds, frozen jacket spuds, pasta, for the basics of the DCs meals.

I always imagined I’d have perfect children who loved fruits and veg, ate what ever I cooked etc. Unfortunately reality is very different. One child has food intolerances and allergies. The intolerances are something we have to work on building up, that’s not my child’s fault, neither are her allergies. So wether I like it or not we have to make sure meal times take into account what she can and can’t eat. Again it’s not my other children’s fault their sister has allergies so they shouldn’t be forced to eat or not eat foods they like because of her. The only line we draw is fish and seafood because her allergies are severe here. She’s also only 4 so I still have to monitor what she eats.

I also have another child with texture issues. They arnt being difficult, they have been the same since they were a baby.

What ever we make there is always going to be something different for at least one child, even if the DCs all want pizza, I have to make a separate pizza from scratch for dd with allergies anyway. It’s not really that hard, DH makes up batches of dough for her that we freeze or we use free from bases, some tomatoes paste, sprinkle a few herbs and add vegan cheese.

I use to try and get creative, hiding veg in meals, creating dishes for all of us, but for the most part it was a total pain, food was wasted, there were carrot batons at dawn. Now the only family meals we make are ones we know everyone will eat, even then there is always a twist, e.g Shepard’s pie is always deconstructed because of the milk and cheese in the mash, plus the texture child dosnt like mash.

The meal example I gave with the sausages is very easy, I don’t see anything complicated about it, I’m basically cooking the same food for everyone, except sticking a few fries on for one child while I’m boiling the spuds. The difference is how it’s served up, which most families will serving different sized portions.

DH and I try and find common ground in our meals, but we too like different foods to each other.