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Monday, June 13, 2016

Mommie Dearest...

I’m not exactly sure why I don’t like white wine. I just don’t. I like white grapes. I like white bread. I like white cats. It’s just the white wine that I don’t like. I also wonder what the deal is with lima beans. I don’t like ‘em. I like baked beans, I like beans in the bean soup my mother would always make after Easter, I like black beans and kidney beans, but lima beans rank right up there with liver and brussel sprouts on my list of non-faves. Beets, now there’s another thing that I could never sink my teeth into. So to speak. I don’t know if it’s the texture, or their striking resemblance to cranberry sauce from a can, but I just hate the taste of beets. I love cranberry sauce from a can, so maybe it’s just a deep seeded sense of resentment that the beet doesn’t taste as wonderful as canned cranberry. Who knows?

Anyway, my topic today is children and their eating habits. 14 and 12 could NOT be any more opposite in their food tastes and sometimes it makes me meshuggeneh. (it’s a word). For instance, 12 will eat almost anything that I make. Does it hurt that 12 is a tremendous suck up? No, not at all. She is my pleaser. She is my Bill Clinton. She feels my pain. She’d eat a fried tennis ball if I told her it would make me so happy. She eats almost anything that she is fed.  12’s favorite food is broccoli. Now I don’t for a minute actually BELIEVE that, but it’s what she WANTS grown-ups to believe, so who am I to say otherwise? However, 14 is a totally different story. Let’s start with rice. Ew. Rice. Hates the consistency. It’s awful. It’s so, small and…..ricey. 14 wouldn’t be caught dead gagging down even a grain of rice. Why, then, can I not keep a box of Rice Krispies in the house?? Same thing!! Rice Chex? GONE faster than you can say Chex Mix Rocks. But when I make a dish that has rice, she’s always looking for an alternative. “Mom can you make mashed potatoes instead?” No. “Can you make mashed potatoes AND rice?” No. Can you get over your hatred of rice? “No”. Then it seems we are at an impasse.

Let’s move on to anything that grows out of the ground and starts with the letter V and ends in table. If it’s not corn, 14 won’t touch it. I can make a can of peas (Peas!! Who doesn’t love peas?? They’re adorable and cute and taste so sweet!!) and I’ll put 6 peas on 14’s plate. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences should be alerted the next time 14 has 6 peas on her plate, because Meryl Streep has NOTHING on 14 when it comes to best dramatic performance. She chokes, she gags, she spits. You’d think I actually fried up something that came out of our dog Cosmo’s butt and made her eat it. (To be honest, he used to eat his own poo, so if it’s good enough for Cosmo, I don’t know why it’s not good enough for 14 but that’s a blog for another day). 

How about tomatoes? They’re not really a vegetable, right? They’ve got seeds. They’re fruit. Now while I will admit that I don’t personally enjoy the tomato, I will eat it in a dish where the tomato is a key ingredient. I make a delicious Pampered Chef recipe that my friend Jen gave to me called Zesty Ravioli. The recipe calls for diced tomatoes but when I make this recipe, 14 always ends up with a pile of little diced tomatoes that she picks out. When I make this recipe and serve it with a bagged salad, she ends up with a plate of diced tomatoes and a salad bowl with all the little teeny shredded carrots she’s picked out and put to the side. I could probably feed a small African village with all the colorful, healthy veggies 14 piles to the side. Call Bob Geldolf, we can do Live Aid 3 and send tons of veggies to those less fortunate. It doesn’t bother 14 that there are starving children in Africa, she won’t eat a pea.

I’ve learned to just roll my eyes and accept it. But let’s make one thing perfectly clear. I am NOT one of those GOOD moms. You know the type. The moms who want to make sure that their children are well taken care of and will make something different for their picky child if said picky child won’t eat what they’ve made. No, quite the contrary, I keep wire hangers in my closets, and I don’t make additional meals if I don’t have to. My kids are lucky I have the time to make what I do make for them. With the sports schedules, band, scouts, extra-curricular activities, they’re lucky they eat anything at all! Now don’t go getting all defensive and calling the mom police on me. My kids don’t starve. If one of my children (14) doesn’t enjoy the delicious delicacies which I have prepared, they are free to open a can of soup, or make some scrambled eggs or eat a hot dog. I’m okay with that. I’m keeping it real. I’m like Jenny from the blog.

Ok, maybe that’s going a bit too far.


  1. LOL! My mom and grandma was the opposite. They always cooked us anything we wanted. That's why I grew up a fat kid! But damn, the Italian food was great!

  2. My almost 12&16 girls are EXATLY the same! Except my youngest isn't a people pleaser I wish!! My almost 12 yo's favourite food is broccoli and will basically eat most things, whereas my neary 16yo won't eat ANY vegetable except corn, or ANY salad unless it's cucumber. Even onions have to be purée so she doesn't know what she's eating. When I was doing all the cooking, apart from the fact she was 5 years or so younger, there were no options. I diced up the veg she ate it. Then I got really sick and the hubster (who's a chef) took over making the kids dinner he made (and still does) them whatever they want, so he ends up making 3 different dinners, and he purée's onions etc so our oldest doesn't know what she's eating. He's insane, no way would I do that....purée vegetables lol so now he does all the cooking :)

  3. I'm the one who doesn't want to make my kids three different meals, but my husband blows it for me every time by being the "nice parent" who makes them mac & cheese. DAMMIT! I will not be undermined! Pass me some o' that mac n' cheese...looks good...

  4. I was like 14 when I was a kid. No, wait, I'm still like that now.

  5. I have pizza rolls and macaroni and cheese for this purpose alone.
    I always tell them, " I am not a waitress".
    If they don't like what I am making, that is what the pizza rolls and mac and cheese are for.

  6. Jenny from the blog... haha!
    Yeah I was going to say, mom of the year!! Your kids are on their way to be self sufficient, or they might be already. When I was growing up, mom was like that too and I ended up too and it worked just fine. My antagonism towards cooking, though, now is because I don't have the patience to wait for things to cook, marinate and whatever else things happen to food. So I just buy or... cook... *eye roll

  7. If you aren't waking her up at 3 in the morning to rant about wire hangars, I think you're doing just fine.

  8. My 11 year old is extremely picky, no pasta of any sort, no chicken. He actually uses the word "grody" which I thought went out of style when I was a teenager. He knows there is canned soup, or he can make himself peanut butter and jelly. My mom always said "I'm not a short-order cook!!" and I say the same! He's still alive and well

    1. Grody!!! Grody to the max!! That's how I feel about brussel sprouts.

  9. Lol 13&16 are exactly the same! For a few months broccoli WAS 13's favourite food, as well as Brussel sprouts, 13 loves her veggies and potatoes, and will eat almost anything. 16 on the other hand will only eat certain meats, certain pasta and sweet corn that's it. When she was little she ate anything I put in front of her. Everyone ate together and the same thing....then I got sick and The Hubster took over all cooking duties. For the first few months everything carried on as usual and then it changed! The Hubster asks the girls everyday what they want for dinner and then makes them whatever they want, whenever they want it. The Hubster's a chef, and has the patience of a saint. Those times of everyone eating the same thing at the same time are long gone. The Hubster cooks up to 4 different meals everyday. I guess you really can't take the chef out of a kitchen 😂 :D

