Strong's Kitchen Nightmares.....

So more often than not, I feel like I’m running a fucking restaurant. This is on account of all the sodding meals I have to cook each evening.... and at different times. I’m often churning out 4 different meals per night - 2 at a 6pm slot and then 2 at 8pm, when Tim gets home from work. I must be completely mad. But the sad point is, in this respect, I’ve failed as a mother.
You see - when the kids were very young, I should have insisted they eat everything that was put down in front of them. Instead, I was weak and let them get away with leaving what they didn’t like - which, in Teddy’s case - is every vegetable under the sun. Teddy is the most appalling fussy eater. The only vegetables I can get down him are carrots and edamame beans (random, I know.)

Ben is slightly better, and will venture into broccoli and leek territory - but I am limited as to what I can cook each night. Also Ben HATES any sort of potato - which is seriously fucking annoying - as it means me having to cook pasta, rice or Yorkshire puddings each night.... but of course Teddy LOVES potatoes - so I feel it only fair to cook those for him.

So last night was a typical example of the madness - I lovingly cooked home-made fish fingers and baked potato for Teddy and salmon and pasta for Ben. (Teddy hates salmon - but of course, it’s Ben’s favourite thing).

I wandered off to do some chores, but after 5 minutes, Teddy came bounding into my bedroom, exclaiming he hated the fish fingers and was refusing to eat them. Ben, in the meantime, had surreptitiously dumped his food in the bin, probably on account of him chowing down 4 packets of “quavers” when he got home, so leaving him totally stuffed.

Now any decent mother would insist on Teddy finishing at least one of the bastard fish fingers, but not me. Teddy has a will of iron and I can safely say, he will NOT do anything he doesn’t want to do - especially when it comes to food. I occasionally resort to bribing Teddy - he has managed to get a fiver out of me before, for trying a piece of parsnip... I know - shocking isn’t it, but sadly true.

So Teddy is saved from the fish finger - and of course, it ends up in my fat gob, which is wonderful for my diet...

Things only get more ridiculous when I start preparing dinner for Tim and me.

Tim loves his food and, like most men, seems to be able to eat anything without putting on weight. (If he does put on a couple of extra pounds - he literally diets for 3 days and loses like half a stone.. I mean how can that happen? It’s so unfair!)

Now I know there are men out there who are just like dogs - happy to eat whatever is shoved in their faces. Alas not Tim, he knows what he likes and is quite picky as to what he’ll eat. So I have to rustle up some fancy meal of meat, veg and starch each night.

Now if I was a supermodel, I could get away with eating all of that as well, but I’m not. I am constantly on a diet - so dinner for me is normally salad and some sort of low-fat protein (chicken, prawns, salmon etc).

The sad truth is though, that by the time I had cooked those 3 different meals, I literally couldn’t be bothered to make any effort with my own... so ended up forgoing the aforementioned salad and shovelling a handful of chocolate digestives into my mouth instead...

But what really took the piss, was when Teddy came into the living room, proclaiming he was starving and proceeded to gobble up the rest of Tim’s “Persian Chicken” stew. I mean seriously, he’ll eat spicy chicken and chickpeas, but not a plain old fish finger. Why do I fucking bother?!!!