Cooking and family

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I need to sort it out.

I am one of those who eat to live not live to eat. I also have difficulties with executive functioning.
My husband loves cuisine and he's a very creative cook.
So far so good - he's the one in charge cooking.
Also, as he's in charge of cooking and he doesn't get sutdowns in supermarkets, he's in charge of groceries.
So far so good.

But

He's rather anxious about not gaining weight paired with the "seafood" ("I sea food so I eat it") tendency. Avoiding keeping ready to eat snacks in the house is the way he copes.
He prefers to eat some salad at noon and the main meal about 8 p.m. - but he's pretty irregular about it.

We have children. My husband's cuisine is usually spicy and not very child-friendly. The timing is also poor. I make breakfasts but it's hard for me to schedule big cooking with an ambitious cook hovering around.

Our younger daughter has entered the stage in life when she suddenly needs big meals. She's on me all the time asking for food. I should make something fair for her - but I can't organize things with lots of distractions and poor EF. My husband works remotely so he's present but unavailable, which makes it even harder for me - how to focus on making a lunch when he's just making a salad for everyone? Then he goes to his lair and I'm left with half-hungry children and a promise of a dinner "soon".

Any ideas how to resolve it? How to schedule things to make them work?

What times do your children seem to get hungry? When your husband makes a "salad" is it possible for one of you to make the kids a sandwich with it, so it's easy to make and the meal is more filling to them?

Another idea. I know your husband doesn't want readily available snacks around since he cannot resist them, but is it possible to make pre-portioned snacks for your children in little containers/baggies/etc. that have their names/"for kids" on them? That way your kids can have food that you can easily hand them when they come to you for it, and they are technically not "available" to your husband.

Could you make a big amount of some food on a less busy day, like on weekend, put it in a fridge/freezer and then just take a suitable portion out and warm it up when the kids get hungry? This is my go to -tactic; on Monday (my work week starts on Tuesday), I make food that lasts me from Monday to Wednesday or Thursday, so I just have to heat it up when I want to eat. Sometimes, when I make big portions of something, I put some in to a separate container or a few that has enough for one meal each, then put them in the freezer to eat a lot later, like on Thursdays or Fridays when I've ran out of the stuff I've made on Monday. Of course, you could also suggest to your husband that he'd make bigger patches so you could save some and have them ready for the kids when they need them... from the less spicy foods, of course.

I'm trying to work it out... today I made pasta with pre-produced sauce. Not bad but it didn't fill the kids for long, they got hungry two hours later.
I'm thinking of potatoes. My husband hates them and my children are ok with them so something prepared from potatoes would have a chance of ending up in the right stomach.

Thanks for suggestions, I need to experiment.

You could add some meatballs to the pasta sauce and add a little extra olive oil to make it more filling and like Fireblossom has suggested, why not double the amount you would normally cook, which will give you leftovers for the next day or could possibly freeze. It will require a little more prep and time, but less energy than having to cook an entirely different meal.

Casseroles and stews are very filling and can take minimal preparation. Chuck some meat into a slow cooker with some vegetable, potato etc, a bit of stock cube, salt and pepper, add some water and turn on. If you don't have the energy or time to steam any additional vegetables, then the stew should be filling enough on its own. No need to worry about leaving the oven on and forgetting about it either.

Sausages, potato and vegetables can be a very filling meal. If you cook extra sausages, these could be eaten as a snack. Same with chicken. If you get a big whole chicken and roast it, then you could get a few meals out of this. If you cook extra potato or rice on a particular day and have a chicken in the fridge then you may only need to prepare some vegetables to steam as an example. If the kids are hungry they could always take a bit of chicken off the carcass as a snack as well.

Smoked fish can be a good addition to a salad. Smoked mackerel has a relatively high fat content, which will make it more filling and is cheaper than salmon. Requires no cooking or prep.

I agree with you that salad is not enough for growing children. You could add to the salad hard boiled eggs, left-over chicken, cheese. A hefty salad dressing would help too. In the US we have some thick creamy dressings, ranch and Caesar’s.

You could also serve a soup with the salad. There are some pretty good and healthy canned soups here. Also add a bread product if you can. Or serve a sandwich with the salad.

Growing kids do need snacks during the day, no matter what they ate for the meal. Easy snacks could be some fruit, a cookie or two, some crackers and cheese. Plan for the snacks. Kids need them.

Finally keep in mind that kids can also clamor for food when they are bored.

We meal plan every weekend and share the cooking and shopping responsibilities using a timetable. We often cook big meals as suggested above so we have left overs for lunch the next day. This is a very easy way to avoid meal prep when you’re busy working from home as we currently are. We often cook stew, pasta, rice/meat, roast chicken as mentioned above as they usually have left overs!

My partner and I have two kids (one being a very hungry teenager and the other less food motivated), and despite their eating differences they will snack regularly between meals. We do healthy snacks like bake biscuits, cake, muffins and have nuts, fruit, cheese and crackers at hand. Yogurt can be good and my kiddos love smoothies. I understand the need to snack because despite being 33 I never grew out of my hunger, and fast metabolism luckily!! But I imagine this motivation is hard if you are an ‘eat to live’ kind of person.

How old are your kids? Can they be building independence and food self sufficiency?

I’d say my number one thing, especially if EF is a problem, is always mitigate risk and uncertainty by putting a plan in place that works for all. Hope this helps

8 and 9.
I struggle with EF and I hate thinking about food: when I'm hungry, thinking of food hurts and when I'm full, thinking of food makes me nauseous.
When I'm alone, I survive on soups and casseroles but I'm completely confused when it's about 4 different people.

How about a buffet? Put out a bunch of different foods and let everyone pick what they want.

Let them eat ramen?

[quote="magz"

I'm just frustrated that he's the one in charge of food but I still have to put so much effort into it.
[/quote]

That IS the problem, of course. And I suspect you know that.

I too have EF, in charge of cooking for 20 years for two children, little motivation to cook when I am not hungry. Allowances: Clean up: takes a long time, I take breaks. Type of food: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner can be any type of food, such as eggs for dinner, stew for breakfast. Not always variety: the same food again and again. Recipes: I can follow a printed recipe. I make that recipe again and again until I get good at it. I can follow a video. Share: anytime I make something for myself I make it for everyone else. Message Board: I write what I have made on a message board just like restaurants do.
Like most women it seems that you should take over some cooking. You may not be a good cook, I was never a good cook. It will be impossible for you to make food that your husband doesn't like and your children do. Sounds like you can forget about his food. I know nutrition so I make sure there is protein from nuts, seeds, eggs, dairy, meat, lentils less sugar. I have shutdowns in stores but after many years I learned to do my own shopping because then I can get the right thing. Very hard any time they change the store around or stop carrying a product, or the produce is bad. I take a long time to decide what to get so I don't shop with anyone else because no one is that patient. Sometimes I wear headphones to block out noise and listening to music is structured.
Be proud of anything you cook or make. Be proud when you learn a new thing.