Fixin' Supper

Current status: As of right now, if you visit the East Nashville listserv, Google has deleted it: http://groups.google.com/group/East-Nashville.

I am working to find out if there’s actually anyone at Google I can ASK about this [they are notorious for not actually having customer service], or if it’s a moot point.

By 7/5, I will decide if it’s time to cut bait and make a new start for the list. Watch my blog and Facebook page for updates! And please, spread the word.

I do NOT have a list of group members. I would love to collect one, so if you were on the East Nashville list and would like to remain on it, please email me at lcreekmo@gmail.com with “East Nashville list” in the subject line. I will not reply to all immediately, but I will collect your address and let you know the minute I’ve figured out a solution.

After getting called out by the list administrator any number of times [no names to protect the guilty], some of us decided it would be nice to have another list, one for debate, discussion and general carrying on. Because as a neighborhood, we just didn’t get to do that enough at the local restaurant [we weren't the coffee-shop-haven that we are now] and the neighborhood association meetings. So I started one.

For years, it sat quite contentedly at around 300 members. Well, “content” is not the right concept. It was vibrant and lively. We were solving the problems of the world. Then a few years ago, it had edged up to around 750 members, and the Tennessean did a feature story on neighborhood lists. Within two months, we reached 1500 members. This year, we hit 3000.

We’ve been on the Google Groups platform for a number of years. It’s a nice, easy platform to use, and it allows me to moderate the first post of any group member — thus catching untold amounts of spam and letting me ban spammers before they can bother the group. Google did NOT, however, allow me to moderate pages and files — it only allowed me to either post pages and files myself, or allow anyone in the group to do so. Thus, I spent a lot of time deleting porn spam from both areas, until I finally turned them both off this week.

I have no idea if that’s related to what happened to our group or not. This week, Google reset its spam filters, and for some reason, the East Nashville group triggered the filters. They gave me the option to re-submit the site for review, so I did. Then this morning, they deleted the group. No warning. No communication. Nada.

Now, first of all, it says quite clearly in their Terms of Service that they can delete your group anytime. So I’m not arguing they did anything they didn’t warn me about in advance. But as a marketing tactic, Google’s approach fails on every level. They are the 800-lb. gorilla, but there are other options out there for a lot of their services, and I can’t imagine why they think it’s a good idea to anger people who work on web strategy for a living. I get it, I’m a tiny peon compared to the mighty Google. But seriously? This is how you treat the world?

I’m looking for a better solution for my neighborhood list, and spreading the word to re-compile my group. Still waiting to hear from Google. Not holding my breath.

In case you haven’t noticed here before, my two children are VERY different, especially when it comes to food. The 9yo used to eat anything — until she went to kindergarten. That year, her food tastes changed dramatically. When she turned 8, she also decided to become a vegetarian. [A picky, vegetarian 9yo is EXACTLY as hard to feed as you think she would be.] To her credit, she has really worked on the picky issue in the past year, and she finally seems ready to branch out more in her eating habits.

The 3yo is the eater the 9yo used to be, to a large extent. He eats almost everything you serve him — all food groups. This time around, I simply know better than to congratulate myself on that. We’ll see what the next few years bring.

But the problem with the 3yo is something I have YET to encounter with his older sister. He has a truly frightening ability: He can tell from the other end of the house, through walls even, when someone else is eating. It doesn’t matter how small the morsel or how fast you chew. If you put something in your mouth, he knows, tells everyone else, and wants some himself.

Now actually, I was much more like this as a child than I was like the 9yo. At least, in my memory. I know I went through some picky stages, but I don’t remember that being my overriding food personality. But the food radar on the 3yo is really impressive. At times I’ve been worried at how much of a social eater he is — while I certainly view eating as a largely social experience [would I spend so much time sharing my thoughts on it with you if not?], I don’t want to train my kids to think that you should eat even when you’re not hungry. At the same time, the 3yo is so skinny there’s obviously no cause for worry at this point, and he does refuse food if he’s not hungry. So I really don’t worry.

But I do get really annoyed. Late this afternoon while all the tornado warnings were going on, I was watching the weather on TV and working in the kitchen to put some casseroles in the freezer. I’m trying to get ahead a bit for the summer when the baby is born. During the time it took me to put 3 casseroles together and freeze them, including making marinara sauce from scratch for one of them, I put two things in my mouth: One fun-size Snickers, and 1 tortilla chip. Despite his paying no attention whatsoever to me the rest of the afternoon, the minute those two items hit my mouth, the 3yo appeared out of nowhere with the same question: “Whatcha eating? I want some.” There’s no way the child was hungry. He’d just had a large snack not an hour before.

I actually saw the only false positive I’ve ever noticed on his food radar today, as well. I was picking up some of the crinkly, plastic, recyclable packaging I’d emptied when I started cleaning up and SHOOM! the 3yo appeared. “Whatcha eating? I want some.” I guess what I take from that is that I eat too many things that come in crinkly packaging, but I promise you his radar also works on completely silent food.

The really funny thing is that after being refused the second, late-afternoon snack he wanted, he professed not to be hungry at dinnertime. A problem quickly but inadvertently solved — five minutes later I had to tell him that boys who didn’t eat any dinner certainly didn’t get to share a peanut-butter cup with their moms after dinner.* Guess who actually was hungry after all?

*Just to be clear, we do not have the clean plate club at this house. I have never used the “clean your plate or no dessert” rule. I think that teaches bad habits, too. [Obsess about food much, do we?] But you do have to eat at least some dinner if you want dessert in my house, just on general nutritional principles. We eat grow food before fun food.

I recently wrote about my journey parenting a vegetarian. We had an interesting situation come up last night, and it reminded me about a tip I’ve been practicing unconsciously — but that seems so critical now.

We were having hamburger patties with sauce [really ridiculously easy, but still tastes and feels homemade], and the 3yo said, “You didn’t give [the 9yo] any meat.” Now, we’ll ignore for the moment his stunning lack of observation, since his sister hasn’t eaten any meat for 2/3 of his life.

I responded, “The 9yo normally doesn’t eat meat. If she ever changes her mind about that, she will let us know. In the meantime, get to work on your dinner.” [The 3yo is such a social beast that the vast majority of our mealtimes are taken up by my telling him to shut up and eat already.]

I went on about my business, but a couple of minutes later, the 9yo grabbed the spoon, served herself some meat and said, “Well, never mind being vegetarian. I can have meat if I want to every once in a while.”

HA!

I don’t know that she’s going to change her mind about the whole idea, but the incident was a great reminder for me that we spend a lot of time telling kids who we think they are — when we should spend our time supporting them as they explore their choices.

I’ve blogged some here off and on about the 9yo being vegetarian. It isn’t surprising — her stepmom has been a veggie as long as we’ve known her. I was a veggie for about 1.5 years several years ago. One of her best friends has always been veggie.

But that doesn’t mean it’s easy to cook for a vegetarian kid who doesn’t actually like vegetables.

So over the past year and a half, I’ve built up a number of strategies to handle the 9yo and ensure she eats well.

I’ll also throw in on the front end that she, her pediatrician and I have discussed her diet in some detail, and the doctor’s advice: Give her a multivitamin and don’t worry about it. And I work pretty hard to do just that. The absolute last thing I want is to set up a control fight over food with a very skinny, fairly emotional 9yo girl.

But I have also worked hard to make her aware of her food choices, and to be in charge of her own healthy eating. Here are some of the strategies we use:

• Make a list of favorites. About a year ago, I had the 9yo write out a list of every single thing she liked to eat. And I told her, if she wrote it on the list, she was agreeing to eat the food whenever I served it. From that list, I got everything I’d ever need to make her a lunch for school and dinner several nights a week, no questions asked.
• Don’t let a favorite food become a crutch. We only serve mac and cheese once a week at our house. The 9yo would eat it every night if I let her. But what if she burned out on it? Then where would I be? And heaven knows, it’s not the world’s healthiest food. So I watch for the emergence of other monopoly foods, and I try to reserve them for when they’re truly needed.
• Don’t make two meals. I’ve told the 9yo many times that I make one meal. I will always make enough to feed both her and the omnivorous sorts in the house, but I’m not making two meals at one sitting.
• Give the child control, within limits. All that said, we only have one real rule about food in the house — you have to try it. So if I’ve found a new veggie dish, the 9yo agrees to try a bite. If she doesn’t like it, no harm, no foul — but she makes her own peanut butter sandwich. And, don’t ever make a meal with all new foods — not fair to kids [and hell, to many adults], who often need time to adjust to new ideas.
• Help her become a nutrition expert. From the time the 9yo was about 3, and now with her younger brother, I’ve taught my kids a lot about nutrition. At first, it was just “grow food” vs. “fun food.” You have to eat some grow food before you can have fun food. As the 9yo became vegetarian, I ramped up the details. She knows how important it is to get protein every day, and knows several ways she can get some. She also knows that foods like tomatoes and spinach are super-healthy. As she grows older, I’ll continue to add to those details.
• Support your child’s choice. This may be the most important one on the list. The 9yo became vegetarian because she’s very tender-hearted toward animals, and she can explain very clearly to anyone who asks that she won’t eat something if you have to kill an animal to get it. So I help her at restaurants and at friends’/relatives’ homes — inquiring if there’s chicken broth in a casserole, or reminding her where gelatin comes from. You wouldn’t believe the relatives who try to sneak meat products off on her. I find it disrespectful, and I think the 9yo appreciates the backup when another adult questions her choices.

Coming soon: I’ll share some kid-friendly vegetarian recipes.

Hard-boiled eggs=Gross

Just a few moments ago, my kids ate hard-boiled eggs for dinner. My daughter ate two. I realize this is not exactly exciting news. But since I was 2, I have hate, hate, hated eggs. It was all I could do to cook them and smell them while they ate.

In fact, I had to look up how to hard-boil eggs online. My mom has told me before, but seeing as how I’ve maybe done it one other time, I didn’t remember. [I use blown eggs for Easter. That way you can keep them from year to year.]

Apparently, I figured out this whole egg-boiling thing, but you’re going to have to take the kids’ word for it, because I certainly didn’t try any.

I bought this 3 lb. bag of organic peanuts in the shell at the grocery the other day. I have no idea why. I don’t really have plans for these peanuts. But the 2yo loves them.

Let me also add this, before I get to my point:

I’m a freak-a-holic about children and allergenic foods. I read all this crap important research before the 8yo was born. About how even if food allergies don’t run in your family, but other allergies do — I personally have had most auto-immune diseases known to man — then you should be careful of allergenic foods, which can be triggers.

I sent the 8yo to day care with a chart of what foods she was not allowed to eat. No chocolate. No strawberries. No raisins and hot dogs [for safety reasons, of course]. No eggs. And of course, no peanut butter.

I have photographs of the now-8yo enjoying her first peanut butter and jelly sandwich at the age of 3, when the allergy gurus finally deemed she was old enough to try the offending legume. The pics are adorable. And we were really fortunate with her. So far, the 8yo has nothing more than a raging case of hay fever….same as everyone else in my family.

When the 2yo came home at the age of 7 1/2 months, he was already eating table foods. Basically, he’d eat anything he could get his hands on. And I had no real way of knowing either his birth family’s medical history, or what he’d eaten already in the past few months.

So I started from scratch, testing each food, just as I had with the 8yo at the same age. The 2yo probably made it to the age of 1 or so before he had some chocolate, and strawberries. I didn’t worry about eggs this time around. And he could chew nuts [I learned by accident] before his 1-year molars came in. So I wasn’t too worried about him choking.

But I was determined to wait til he was 3 to give him peanuts. You know, just as a precaution.

Well you know, children have a way of handling these issues for you. As I mentioned last year, the 2yo took it upon himself to demonstrate that he’s not allergic to peanuts. And he’s been enjoying large quantities of peanut butter the last 9 months or so. But this was his first exposure to real peanuts.

I discovered quickly that the process was just as much fun to him as eating the peanuts. He tried hard to crack the peanuts open, and was successful a couple of times. The rest of them he handed to me, instructing me: "Mommy, smash it!" And so I would. And he’d eat the peanuts, get down from the table, throw the shell away, and come back to start again.

This is one of those things I guess that’s cutest when it’s your own kid. Because every single thing the 2yo does is precious. Don’t ya know.

I got so exasperated tonight with the 8yo. She was ready for dinner and I had nothing to make for her. Nothing, that is, except for the peanut butter and crackers I sent to school with her the past two days, or the macaroni and cheese she had for dinner two nights ago. I actually got her to try some ambrosia [oranges, pineapple and cherries, so delicious] and it made her gag. Sigh.

So I had her make a list for me of ALL the foods that she will eat. And she agreed that I can feed her anything off this list at any time, and she will eat it. It’s not that long a list, if it’s your entire diet:

Peanut butter
Pinto beans
Baked beans
Peanuts
Pistachios
Cashews
Pecans
Macaroni & cheese
Biscuits
Spaghetti
Tortillas
Campbell’s Goldfish meatball soup*
Bagels
Honey Nut Cheerios
Cheerios
Graham crackers
Apples
Strawberries
Bananas
Red grapes
Kiwi
Dates
Artichokes
Corn
Potatoes
Peas
Tomatoes
Tomato sauce
Alfredo/cream sauce
Spinach salad**
Yogurt
Frozen yogurt
Cheddar sticks***
Milk
Cream cheese
Croutons
Ranch dressing

As a side note, with the exception of salad with salad dressing and tomatoes, or a tortilla with beans or peanut butter, she eats almost all of these things alone. Meaning, there’s no point in getting creative and making a dish with cream sauce and vegetables….she won’t eat that. She doesn’t eat melted cheese at all, for instance. Lots of traditional ways of combining food? Forget it.

I know, I know, everyone keeps telling me she will grow out of it. All I can tell you is that she started becoming a picky eater around the age of 5, and it has gotten progressively worse since then, dramatically so this year. And not just because she became vegetarian this year — she’s limited herself in lots of other ways, too. She used to eat green beans. Several other cereals. Any kind of cheese we had. Hummus.

Not anymore. Hahaha she tried to get me to put Cheetos on this list. You really don’t want to know my response.

*She knows this has meat in it. She says that is OK, that she is vegetarian about everything else.
**I viewed this as a major concession on her part, for which I am most grateful.
***Apparently these are some mysterious kind of cheese sticks, which I have never bought, but that one of her friend’s mothers feeds her on the way home from dance. I can’t wait to find out what they are, and how close they are to all the other kinds of cheese [and there are many] already in my refrigerator.

  Crunchy peanut butter apples

An impromptu recipe, adapted from Mr. Rogers by the 8yo.

Crunchy peanut butter apples
1 apple
Peanut butter
A couple graham crackers

Stick two graham crackers in a plastic bag and seal. Roll with a rolling pin til they are crumby. Peel the apple and slice it into thin planks. Spread each plank with peanut butter. Dip into the crumbs.

I tried one too; they are surprisingly delicious!

When I am able to cook again, I can assure you the menu will include squash. Right now at my house, I have

• 3 acorn squash
• 5 butternut squash
• 2 spaghetti squash
• 2 zucchini

I have promised the 8yo she can choose the first meal to be cooked on the new stove. This is all manipulation on my part. Despite my efforts, she eats more junk and less nutritious food than I’d like, and sometimes seems to go for days subsisting on the occasional tub of applesauce.

Any hope of her choosing some of that squash for her meal? Somehow I doubt it.

However, she has — after a lengthy flirtation with the idea — declared herself this week to be a full-time vegetarian. Both her father and I have made an effort to educate her on the fact that that will require her to actually eat vegetables.

Her reply: I like artichokes.

Eight-year-olds can muster up quite a bit of scorn when they try. I then urged her to get a paper route so we could afford to feed her year-round.

Here we are at Fixin’ Supper, having one of our regular madcap Saturday nights. The 8yo has a friend over for the night. They are having fun, but let me tell you, I’ve decided it’s best not to be in the room when two bossy 8yo girls play. I have already said about 15 times tonight: I am not getting in the middle of this. You girls work it out yourselves. So far no one has cried, so I’m calling it a big success.

The 2yo has managed mostly to mind his own business.

And I made a zucchini cheese bread that I highly recommend to you.

Also, I have this tip. If you do like I do, and frequently end up with 2 or more cantaloupes in your refrigerator for days on end, because you somehow think it will be such a hassle to slice them, even though cantaloupe is quite possibly your favorite fruit in the world, volunteer to bring snacks to church. The cantaloupe is at a peak of perfection, despite my attempts to kill it, and it will be all I can do to actually take it to church, now that I was forced to slice it. Get some now before summer is gone!!

I have to go now. I’m dividing up animal crackers into zipper bags so the 3rd graders will have sustenance to make it through the day at school next week.

Stop me before I go this crazy next time, will ya?