Tuesday, September 2

the dinner dilemma [again]

we have an unspoken deal around here that i do most of the cooking...its just worked out that way, i think we tend to migrate towards ownership of responsibilities that best match our proclivities and talents. Not that im boasting, but my husbands late wife was mother bear inside the house,inside was her space,'her' kitchen, outside was his. My SIL told me a story about when, just after simons first wife had passed on, her son asked her who was going to get uncle simons breakfast now that aunty gabrielle had died? So when i met him, he was very timid in the kitchen having basicly not thought about meals for 25 years. i just cant imagine it. This traditional splitting of the household tasks made me very uneasy when we first got together, but im ok with it now, i figure im just as unlikely to go out and rebuild the bridge thats rotting over the creek as much as he is about to offer to make pancakes and omelette for the whole family on a sunday morning, besides, sometimes i really want complex flavours and know that i will have to make them if i want imbibe. He cooks at least one night a week and they tend to be simpler, one pot affairs; risotto, soup, pasta, pizza. What does get me however is the sheer bloody regularity of feeding. We do it every day people! Trying to make healthful and varied food choices every day requires mindfulness and some skill. We tend to not do takeaway very often at all and with a 10yo who is a staunch vego since age 4, a teen who doesnt like the taste of meat anymore and 2 adults who dont eat much meat due to issues around cloven hooves, topsoil and input/output energy values, takeaway is limited fare; indian, some thai or pizza. My mum is a vegetarian so growing up we ate pretty well but it was in the days of the meat substitute; gluten roasts, mock chicken, TVP bolognese. Shes better now...the introduction of asian cooking into aussie culture has been a vegetarian delight. My kids are not fans of the mock meat style of vege cooking so we do lots of interesting things with beans and lentils. I digress, what im really trying to do is say sometimes throwing a chop on the grill and making a salad sounds like heaven! Im not sure whats on the menu tonight.

6 comments:

emmani said...

Hi Kel,

You're so right about Indian food being the tastiest vegetarian food ever...

I hope you don't mind me plugging a few blogs for you to get ideas from, one of them is mine, ha ha, no really I've posted a couple of Indian veggie recipes:

http://indian-earth.blogspot.com/2008/08/urad-dal-puris-with-potato-bhaji.html

http://indian-earth.blogspot.com/2008/07/little-yellow-flower.html

And then there's my favourite Indian veggie cooking site, Jugalbandi, really fresh ideas and a great concept...

http://jugalbandi.info/about/

Good luck and happy cooking!

Kelly said...

hey, thanks emmani. will check it out.

Kerrie said...

Hello Kel,

I came across your blog via another (as how it often happens) and have really enjoyed reading your writings.

I know just how you feel about the "sheer blood regularity" (and often the sheer volume) of feeding a family. I too, do almost all of the cooking for our family, it's just the way things fell into place when my partner and I blended our two little families. He's working full time and the breadwinner, I'm not working, (but hope to be part time employed soon), so it's a fair division of labour at this point in time, that will change when I am working. I also (mostly) enjoy cooking for our family and like yours, our family has some specific dietary needs. Matilda(14)is vegetarian and has been since age 8 although occasionally eats fish, Josh (20) and Myles (12) both have a number of food sensitivities (eggs, dairy and nuts, Josh is also highly allergic to eggplant, Myles has never been tried), I am highly allergic to shellfish. It has become easier over the last year or so, prior to us all living together the boys ate minimal vegetables and legumes, Myles ate with his eyes, if he didn't like the look of something he wouldn't even try it...now thankfully he tries everything and to his surprise finds he enjoys far more than he thought he ever could. Takeaway is hard and we don't do it often, (our pizza is far superior anyway) but fortunately we have an excellent noodle bar that caters for all of us when I just cannot face another night at the stove...!!!

I digress too...however after reading your blog today I have decided that risotto is on the menu for us this evening, haven't had it for a while. Thanks...!!!

Kelly said...

lol. that happens to me often..blog reading..viola! dinner idea.

Minni Mum said...

I can so relate to the dinner dilemma, but I come from a meat-and-three-veg background so not eating meat very often now provides a challenge for me to come up with something that the kids will eat (they love pulses thankfully) and doesn't take me all day to prepare. As you say, throwing something meaty on the grill and slicing some salad ingredients is so darn easy!

Anonymous said...

Night before last I looked around the kitchen and thought, "I don't care, I wish my Mum would come and take care of it" (I was developing a cold, not bad enough to stop work, just enough to get the blahs) so we had toasted cheese and salad. It wasn't just that I didn't feel like cooking, I didn't feel like eating much either. It was perfect. Sometimes you need a slack day, and you're right, throwing a chop or snag on the grill and making a salad is all you feel like doing. Even if it's not what you feel like eating.

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