Cooking when you have small kids

I used to love to cook. ESPECIALLY for my husband (when we dated) I loved to cook. I'd cook lots of cool stuff for him. It was fun when I didn't know how picky he was. I'd try everything. Elaborate lasagna, fettuccine, stir fries, quesadillas, all of that stuff. I loved it.

Then we got married, had a baby, I learned how he didn't really like steak, mustard, mushrooms, spices, etc.

Well I think he's going to have to compromise somewhat but...

... my real question is...

How do you find a love of cooking when you have two kids? I'm EXHAUSTED by dinnertime, my toddler is all "hey mom, wanna see this" or pouting about something and my 18 month old needs to be fed before us but she'll be running out to me in the kitchen and getting into stuff or in my way or something like that. It's just so hard sometimes to take care of everything and prepare a dinner that has more than 7 ingredients! It affects me because I wind up eating 2 boca burgers while everyone else has something I prepared to their tastes. I love food, I love exotic food, and for the most part I love healthy food! I don't like fried stuff or stuff with butter, that's why I loved to cook. How do I get it back when 4pm hits me like a ton of bricks since we get up at 5:30am every day.... How do I love to cook again?

and how to I get my very picky eaters to open up, broaden their horizons? Has anyone tried the "Eventually, you'll get hungry" thing and had it work!?

I read once that kids have to try a food AT LEAST 7 times before accepting and liking it. My daughter, at almost 5, knows that she has to try several bites of whatever we're serving before she can have something else to eat (aka: deciding she doesn't like it...this time).

I've not tried the "eat what we eat or be hungry" approach because I know my daughter won't sleep well on an empty stomach and I need my sleep! If she refuses to try what we're eating and doesn't get a substitute dinner, I always give her something to eat right before bed and it's never something exciting. A piece of fruit and cheese or some toast with peanut butter is about as elaborate as it gets.

The biggest factor in getting my daughter to broaden her pallate is going to preschool. I don't know what it is about eating with other kids but she eats things there that I've never seen her eat at home. Earliest signs of peer pressure?!

As far as finding the time/energy to cook, I don't know how folks prepare elaborate dishes with multiple kids in the house. Granted, I work full time and the last thing I want to do is come home and work on dinner for an hour or more. I prepare dinner from scratch (no prepackaged foods) but they're always simple things that don't take up a lot of our evening. I also double recipes and freeze half of them to use at a later time (such as enchiladas, roasted eggplant soup, chicken packets, etc.). You can always practice once-a-month-cooking or something similar. Use the weekends to prepare meals in advance while your husband gets in some kid time. My mom did this when I was a kid.

I don't know what to tell you about your husband being a picky eater--mine's not whatsoever. I'm the pickier of the two and there are only a handful of things I truely dislike. 

Hey thanks! I really think I need to cleanse the house of a lot of the garbage we have here and put a ninx policy on chicken nuggets! How exactly do you do once a month cooking?!?!

I think that pickiness might have something to do with a safety mechanism for young kids that might keep them from ingesting something dangerous.  It helps to think of it that way, anyway.

You CANNOT cook something different for everyone - you will run yourself into the ground.  Perhaps give everyone one night a week to pick what they want you to cook?

My kids are a bit older than yours - they eat ok, but the "eventually you'll get hungry" doesn't seem to work real well.  My five year old we have been saving her dinner if she doesn't want it, and she can have it before bed for her snack instead of whatever her little sister is having.  Sometimes this works.  The only reason I'm so steadfast about it is because she NEVER likes what I have cooked, even if she liked it last week.  I think she is "going through a phase."  The best advice I can offer is to have different foods around, and keep offering them, and let them see you eat them.  We visit buffets frequently, so sometimes the kids will see something they want to try - they usually don't like it, but they do try it.

I'm afraid my suggestion is to do what you can, and let the rest go.  Children are draining.  There is no way you can cook "fun" foods for yourself like you did before kids - perhaps save that for Saturday when hubby can help watch the kids?

And yes, hubby will have to compromise.  Mine likes sausages and fried chicken, etc.  He's limited to weekends for that, mostly, and not even every weekend.

It WILL pass, and eventually you will find yourself looking back on the "Hey, Mom" moments with fondness.  It does get easier, but the best thing you can do is find what YOU need to stay sane.

Original Post by puh8suwrux:

I think that pickiness might have something to do with a safety mechanism for young kids that might keep them from ingesting something dangerous.  It helps to think of it that way, anyway.

Haha! This cracked me up and I had to share it with my coworker when he asked what was so funny.

I have to admit that I do have a Costco-size bag of chicken nuggets despite my "no prepackaged foods" statement. I'm not anti-packaged foods but I try to avoid using them. I do get Tyson chicken breast nuggets which are breaded and not as bad as the fried versions. I saw that Costco has grilled chicken nuggets!

Once a month cooking is basically using one weekend a month to prepare an entire month's worth of frozen meals. You can Google "OAMC" or "once a month cooking" and get a plethora of information on it.

once a toddler decides he/she wont eat something its really hard to get them to try it.

I suggest when giving babies their baby food if its possible make it yourself.

then when they have had 5 veggies , 5 or so fruits and some sort of meat(usually around 8 months start maiking weekly meals for them try fish stew or chicken stew add spices, garlic, onion, basil, parsley, cumin anything really except salt.  Start them young to avoid issues about trying food with flavour.  once they have more then 4  teeth give more veggies like red pepper cauliflower.  small pieces even raw.  The trick is to get them young or else food and texture aversion  kicks in.

I gave all my kids and my daycare kids spices at an early age.

Can you get the kids to join in? Maybe not the 18 mo but your older girl could help stir things, measure things etc. It's messy and it would take a while but my own mother found we were always happy to eat anything we had "helped" (I use the word liberally!) to make.

I also love to cook.  I have twins and work full time.  They are five now and eat everything.  I never gave them chicken nuggets or macaroni and cheese more than once a week. 

When the girls were babies and toddlers we eate less elaborate meals because there was no time.  Hang in there they will grow up and it will be easier and you can go back to it.  You can just think of it that way. 

As far as picky eating, my husband is picky but I got him to eat some things like broccoli, shrimp, asparagus, bacon and other things that he would not eat.  He is soooooooo picky that he doesn't even eat peanut butter or mac n'cheese.  You can give up on that one, it caused me too much stress.  He is already grown and its very hard to change grown up people.

For the kids it helps to be consistent.  Never make a big deal about them eating or not eating.  Only make one meal for everyone.  Kids and toddlers don't like things mixed toghether like caseroles or stirfrys.  You will get them to eat things easier if you have rice on its own and vegetables on its own...you get the idea.  Watch the snacks and have a regular meal time set.  Don't have your 18 month old eat separatley from you guys. Kids eat better as part of the family.  I never fed my kids baby food from the jars I made my own and it tasted more like real food...the stuff from the jar makes them used to a different taste same with chicken nuggetts and other things.  By the way chicken nuggets are sooooo bad for kids.  They have almost an entire days worth of sodium in them.

I hope this helps and it will get better as they grow :)!!!And keep in mind that they will never starve themselves ;)!!!

i work full time too and i've been living on vanilla yogurt and double fiber english muffins for dinner.  julia eats cheese, then a gerber food, then yo-baby yogurt; and cheerios while I clean up.  my DH's mother is a wonderful italian cook.  he doesn't care for mine-  and always makes "suggetions" as to how I should make food for him.  It's insulting and embarrassing.  So, he can have whatever he feels like making for himself.

julia pretty much will eat anything i giver her.  she loves squash and green beans.  any type of yogurt and fruit-  she's the easiest! 

I miss cooking too. My youngest children will eat a variety of foods, so I can cook and know that at least they will eat it. My oldest however, he has food phobias. He is afraid to try anything that isn't on his "short list" of food that he likes. If I make him try a bite, he will gag and throw up. I just can't deal with this right now, so I just make the short list of foods that he likes.

Can you pick a day of the week to cook multiple meals and freeze in portion sizes? That way you can have whatever you want if the family wants something else.

Having kids and husbands is a tough job. Getting everything to go according to plan is even harder!

Original Post by lulufit:

Having kids and husbands is a tough job. Getting everything to go according to plan is even harder!

 Is it even possible?! ;)

I have two kids (ages 5 and 2) and it's my husband that really  misses the elaborate meals. I'll be fine with a little chicken breast, a veggie and some rice, but he likes spicy Italian food, stir fry, etc.

We do all eat together, and the five year old knows she has to take three bites of everything. She's a light eater so I really have to watch to make sure she gets enough protein and veggies. The two year old still has trouble sitting down for dinner, but we're working on it--he has NEVER wanted to eat at night. He pigs out at breakfast and lunch instead. I watch his calories/nutrition and he does fine. If I'm worried, I'll give him a slice of whole grain bread, which he loves. But no separate meals for anybody!

To make it more interesting, we cook a couple of big meals on Saturday and Sunday when there's more time and my husband's home, and make enough of each for two nights. So we'll have two nights of fancy leftovers to spice up the weeknights.

We've also learned to keep the rice and pasta out separate for the kids--they'll eat a lot of that and just taste the "elaborate" part. Which is fine with me. Baby carrots on the table are a big hit, too! And my husband's learned to season the food his way once it's on his plate, not in the pot :-)

And I just have to watch my servings on the "big" dinner nights :-)

I just wanted to brag for the small steps - I made a slow cooker casserole last week with a whole chicken (that I had to de-flesh after it was fully cooked... ick), egg noodles, broccoli, low fat cream of chicken soup and chicken broth with some spices. I let it simmer all day and told my daughter it was creamy chicken nugget noodle soup. I had to go to the dentist, but my husband said she took a spoonful and got a big piece of broccoli. She said, "dad? Oh, I should try it." and she ate it. She's 3.5 and the last time I gave her broccoli she gagged at me!

My husband and I are total foodies and that can be great for kids.  You wouldn't believe the exotic things my 5, 3, and 16mos old eat and it just takes offering it to them always, don't dumb down the menu for them because they won't grow out of it unless they are used to having them.  Come up with fun names for everything and add a dipping sauce and stick it on a skewer, introduce it with excitement about how cool it is.

The best advice i have for finding energy to keep cooking healthy meals is to prep ahead of time.  When i go grocery shopping on the weekend, that day I will peel and cut up ALL of my veggies and fruit into the shapes i most commonly use them.  You can use the scraps to make your broths or soup to use throughout the week.  Whenever you make something like a dough or a sauce double or triple it, or just make a huge pot and stick it in individual portions in ziplocks so it's easy to grab and thaw in the morning.  I always do up a batch of hommus so I roast extra garlic and red pepper that can easily be added to recipes all week.

If all of the elements to the recipe are ready to go, the cooking part is easy. 

I can't stress enough to young moms not to become a short order cook!  If they don't like dinner..nothing wrong with a PB&J after they try everything at least with a few bites.

telling your child "I can't do that right now...I am making dinner" is also totally fine to say! even better...pull up a chair and let them help (more likely to try it that way too)

YOU are the mommy...YOU can say no to your kids.

I'm probably in no position to say that, for I have no kids, but the whole husband issue... I wonder, how come all those ladies here have kids, picky husbands, work full time AND think THEY have the sole responsibility to cook?

I'm engaged and live with my to-be, never would I come on the idea to cook all the time. Or do anything all the time. I cook when I want to and have the time. The other times BF cooks. He thanks me for every single time I cook. If he would complain about what I cook, he wouldn't get any food from me anymore - the same's the other way around.

I'm surprised to see so much.. how to word it.. 1950's going on.

And to the kids-don't-eat-stuff issue, I was a terrible picky eater when I was little (and still am), if my parents wanted me to eat something and I wouldn't, they'd puree it or make soup out of it while throwing in a veg I like so it tastes like that veg. Also asian sauces and simmering techniques work wonders.

Best of luck.

For the record, my husband and I split the cooking evenly until we had kids.

He still cooks on weekends. But since he doesn't get home until 5:30 on weekdays, and I work parttime from home, I cook on weekdays. Since two days a week that's mostly reheating leftovers from the weekend (see my previous post), it's not a real burden.

The work needs to be divided up somehow, and there's a lot more work when you have kids. I think every family finds a way that's best for them.

If moms prefer to cook, or it's more convenient for them to cook, they should be respected for that choice, whether it's a traditional female role or not. NOT cooking because that's the way it was two generations ago is just as artificial as DOING the cooking because of the past.

I have started cooking freezer dinners.  Whenever I make anything that is suitable for freezing, I make a little extra, and then freeze it.  Last week, instead of making one meatloaf, I made two and froze one.  I made beef stew, and chicken tortilla soup, and froze the leftovers of those as well.  Making extra doesn't really take that much more time.

It works out really well, because on days that cooking isn't going to work - not enough time, not feeling well, cranky kids, etc - I can pull something out of the freezer and just reheat.  And we don't have days of leftovers that no one wants, as well.

The other thing I can add is SLOW COOKER MEALS!  Check out recipe books from the library to get ideas.