the challenges of feeding a family Archives - Circles in the SandCircles in the Sand

Despite having not lived in the UK for just under 10 years, I’m still pretty English.

DH (who’s American) would agree: You can take the girl out of England, but not the English out of the girl, we say.

Mostly our different backgrounds complement each other, but if there’s one thing that DH does that annoys me, it’s when he CORRECTS me in everyday conversation.

For example, I’ll ask him (politely) if he can take something out of the boot, and he’ll shrug his shoulders and pretend he doesn’t know what the boot is. “The trunk, you mean?” he’ll say, in a soft mid-Atlantic accent.

And I refuse to back down. The way I speak, my British spellings and British tastes are so deeply ingrained, it’s like I’m holding onto them for dear life – and living in an expat society such as ours, I’m sure they define me.

This theory also applies, to some extent, to food. We’re lucky enough in Dubai to have access to all kinds of restaurants, from Lebanese to Vietnamese, sushi to Indian. While I enjoy most of these cuisines very much, occasionally all I really want is a shepherd’s pie, or fish and chips.

If only they’d open one in our compound

Or bangers ‘n’ mash, or a greasy spoon …. a proper sausage roll. I could go on.

What has become glaringly obvious, however, is that my expat children are having none of it. To my dismay, they reject nearly all my favourite English foods.

Case study: Chez Circles, yesterday evening
I’m in the kitchen, making an old staple: beef stroganoff with mashed potato and broccoli. It’s bubbling away nicely, smells delicious and I’m just waiting for the potatoes to cook so I can add butter and milk and pummel them to fluff with the masher.

BB comes in. “Mummy, are you cooking?” [clue no.1 as to what’s going on]. “What are you making?”

Then, “OH.NO. Not pie. Oh please Mummy, not pie.”

I made shepherd’s pie last week and the two of them sat at the table for a whole hour while DH and I practically force-fed them in a culinary stand-off.

BB’s eyes actually start shining with fright. “No darling, it’s not pie,” I say glumly.

We sit down to eat, I tuck in. DH politely does the same. I have a hopeful look on my face that this meal will be a success.

“WE.DON’T.LIKE.IT,” they wail, wiping the smile off my face in an instant and leaving me grinding my molars in frustration.

“Maybe you should have done rice,” says DH, quietly (clue no. 2).

Through clenched teeth, I tell them I used to eat potatoes every day when I was a girl, that mashed potatoes are yummy and that they’re being ungrateful. And then I try shock tactics and tell them (for the hundredth time) about the starving children in Africa.

BB eats slowly and silently. LB fidgets on his chair.

I go back into the kitchen to pour more wine, pondering to myself how my children could possibly dislike food I grew up on (the answer, of course, is that their taste buds lean towards Asia rather than England, because our Filipina helper cooks rice for them more often than I care to admit).

And that’s when I heard the yelling: “Mumm-eeeee, QUICK. EMERGENCY!” shouts BB.

His brother has reluctantly taken a few bites…and vomited. Everywhere. Bringing the meal to an unceremonious end.

[Thinks: it might be time to reclaim the kitchen – and use ear plugs at the dinner table.]

This week, I’ve been having my favourite lunch of the year: turkey soup and a turkey sandwich made with gravy.

It’s why, despite not enjoying cooking, I insisted on having Christmas dinner at home. The reason I spent four hours in the kitchen toiling over a hot stove, preparing sweet potatoes with marshmallows, creamed onions, stuffing, roast potatoes, Christmas pudding, custard and brandy butter. (The bird was a take-out turkey, from a local Lebanese restaurant, which DH picked up rather like you’d collect a pizza.)

DH had wanted us to eat out at a Christmas brunch to save all the effort. “BB will just ask for bread and hummus,” he argued. “And LB will say he doesn’t like it.” All true, but I stood my ground, salivating at the thought of a whole week of my favourite, easy-peasy lunch.

The cat will help me finish the turkey at least

And, you know what, apart from a minor incident with some burning oil that caused the kitchen to fill with smoke and LB to run round the house shrieking excitedly, “The kitchen’s on fire, the kitchen’s on fire,” the Christmas dinner was a big success – if I may say so myself and even though I had to lie down afterwards it took me so long.

But back to the cold-turkey sandwich. It’s such a simple, no-hassle, tasty lunch. I was sure the rest of my family would agree.

They didn’t.

“Yuck,” harrumphed BB. “Not turkey a.g.a.i.n. Can I just have bread with nothing on?” Then when I practically shoved a bite in his mouth: “EUUUGHHHH! What’s that brown stuff?” he cried, eyeing the gravy suspiciously and dropping the sandwich like it was about to explode.

LB was less vocal in his complaints, and having eaten all the sweets off the gingerbread house wasn’t particularly hungry.

Until five minutes later…when he asked in a small, plaintiff voice, “Mummy, what’s for lunch?” (after serving a perfectly good meal, I literally bristle at that question).

If you’re sensing some frustration it’s because my children are going through a particularly fussy phase at the moment (I say phase, it’s lasted since BB was first weaned) and they’ve thrown a few too many meals back at me recently.

The turkey soup, needless to say, was a no-go, as the children took one look at all the veggies swimming around in it and gagged.

But I was confident DH wouldn’t think I was trying to poison him. He’d just got back from a long flight and what better way to show-off my wifely skills than by serving him some homemade soup with French bread.

“You’ve got to try my soup,” I enthused. ‘It’s delicious. I’ll bring you some.”

He took a few sips. I waited for a reaction. He ate a little more. I went back into the kitchen, still hoping he’d like it.

He sort-of-did – but only after he followed me into the kitchen, reached into the cupboard for the Hot Sauce, and poured a whole load in.

“Just needs spicing up a bit,” he said, before running for cover.

I may not be one of life’s cooks but, boy, was the brandy butter I sought solace in good.