Going for the Jugular

A good friend of Whining and Dining was wondering why we hadn’t blogged lately.  And.... we have no good reason. In fact I probably blog daily in my head but it doesn’t quite reach the keyboard. So here we are starting up again...

When we wrote the book, the oldest child in our respective families was six, and now he is eight. Eight is different than six in the way that three is different than 3 months.  Eight year olds are mouthy, they have ‘tude, they sing nasty little ditties that they learned from their extremely innocent-looking friends. And by now they have learned your weak spots.  My eight-year old was having a particularly difficult day, maybe he had a bad Pokemon card trade, maybe his teacher yelled at him. Nonetheless, he came to dinner with an agenda larger than he is.  He took one look at the table and started yelling: “I don’t want that!” to which I calmly responded. He escalated and he escalated until he came up with this keeper, “You are a bad cook, you are a really bad cook.  YOU ARE JUST LIKE A NORMAL PERSON IN THE KITCHEN!”  I had to laugh, because yes, I am just like a normal person in the kitchen, I use ready-made products, I throw stuff together at a moment’s notice and sometimes it doesn’t work out so well. But on this particular evening what did I have the gall to serve?  Homemade chicken fingers.  Yes, I am a terrible person who does not take her children’s feelings into account. I made chicken fingers and I even used authentic panko, not the whole wheat organic panko which makes everything brown, the real junky panko from the Asian food market. And yet, I am a bad cook.  This was a good reminder that kids do want to push your buttons, sometimes they do want to fight and they will try and hurt you just to get your attention.  All we, parents can control is our reaction.  And my reaction on this day was to put some ketchup on his plate and eat up those horrible chicken fingers myself. Yum!  My eight-year old had yogurt, and some of the crispy bits that were leftover.

Comments

[Nadine]

First off, I love the book. That Pad Thai recipe has saved my ass time and again.

I am raising a future manorexic, I think. He is by far the worst eater on the planet. But when I show him photos in your book, he'll actually point to stuff and say he wants to eat it. It's somewhat promising...

Anyway, thanks for the book and keep blogging. You ladies have a great "voice" for blogging!

[Rosanne Wood]

How refreshing - a writer of children's cookbooks admitting to cheating on occasion and not having gastrono-perfect kids who eat all your creations! Sorry to say this, but it's good to know that you have the same problems as the rest of us and sometimes have to resort to the trusty yogurt. I am British and have just come back home from Toronto where we were visiting the in-laws. As I couldn't get all of the same ingredients that I usually use, I picked up your book from the libary for inspiration and really enjoyed reading it and making some of the recipes. I've tried to buy the book on Amazon UK but they're not stocking it at the moment, which is a shame.