We currently have four litres of barbeque sauce in our cupboard. The hell, right? What are we – a pizzeria? A ranch-style restaurant? The thing is, when I was shopping this morning, I picked up what turned out to be our second bottle of sauce with every certainty that we had no more at home. Because I am on top of our household; I am the captain of our pantry.
Or so I thought.
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I need a little music when I unpack the groceries, usually to distract me from the depraved state of our kitchen. It’s become habit to put on Bernard Fanning. His soulful, melancholy voice is an apt accompaniment for when I weigh a can of lentils, or chickpeas, in my hand, as I convince myself that not only was it a healthy buy, but a useful one, too. But the months go on, and that can gets pushed further and further back until its arrested on the back wall next to the cashews that have gone rancid and ratty old patty-pan liners. I feign optimism when I shop. I live in the hope that one night I will cook a meal that we all will eat and we all will like as a family. Up until last week, I had that recipe. That single recipe: spaghetti bolognese. It was my fail-safe. That was until Riley decided he doesn’t eat it anymore. And so now we’re down to about five foods he will eat.
I’ve changed nothing about the way I cook the meal, haven’t risen or dropped what star-level beef I use. It was completely unexplained, and the best he’s been able to say in his four-year old way is that “I don’t like it now.” There was no yesterday, in his mind. Yesterdays are for pussies. They don’t matter.
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Keira proudly tells people she will eat everything that is put in front of her. “Except nuts or pumpkin,” she adds. Then recently Adam came home and told me he’s started eating tofu for lunch at certain eateries at certain lunchtimes.
“Excuse me, but do I know you?” I asked, as before, whenever I mention cooking it his nose has wrinkled in distaste.
This food-food-food minefield has to be traversed everyday when I cook, and once a week (or more) when I shop. I can imagine it might be a joy for someone who has children who eats whatever is put in front of them, but for me, when I come home and all I have to show for it is enough barbeque sauce to have a bath in, I get a little frustrated. But I’ll get on, as I have done for years.
I just needed to get this off my chest.
Now I’d best go think what to do for dinner.
