I second the idea of buying frozen bags of food from TJs and letting them prepare it for themselves. Their gnocchi and pastas are amazing. I know they are a little on the high salt side but for my sanity, I’ve decided they need to fend for themselves at least a few days a week. In my house the o my thing all my kids like consistently is BBQ and for a veggie it’s always steamed broccoli, otherwise it’s always a crap shoot. So since we can’t eat that every day, I figure it’s better for everyone for them to just prep their own meal and meet us at the table.

Each kid is responsible for 1 dinner per week that everyone can eat.

This helped me last year. I, along with my daughter, made a list of all of the meals I generally make, some being quite simple. (Two of us are vegetarians, and that's how I cook). For example:

spinach quiche
vegetable pot pie
burritos
grilled cheese
vegetarian chili
pasta with alfredo sauce
veggie burgers
spinach lasagna
soup and salad

Then every Sunday, my daughter and I picked out 5 meals that we wanted that week (we did take out once per week and one day of leftovers/fend for yourself). We were on a really good roll and dinner time became much easier. Having said that, my son is the pickier one and he wasn't that interested in helping plan the meals, but it still helped having one person on board and being organized and committed.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yep. I no longer cook for the kids. I make dinner for myself + 2 leftover meals--ie, 3 people. If other people in the house want to eat some of what I made, great. If not, they are welcome to make something else.

I did this years ago. My kids ending up telling their therapist I didn’t feed them! And that there was never any food in the house (which is teenager for “there isn’t an endless supply of Doritos and Takis”).

Pp back again. For the pescatarian, I’d just keep reinforcing that her choice to eat that diet is exactly that - her choice. Not some additional burden that’s now your responsibility to fix. It’s 100% on her to navigate this choice in the world. If she can’t sit at a table and make a selection without drama, I’d probably take her phone/iPad away for a day. I’d say ‘if you act like a 6 year old, I will treat you like one.’

For the Doritos/snack issue, I bought enough individual packs, fruit and cereal bars, and nuts to last a month for my tweens. Split them in half, gave both child a box with a month of snacks and said ‘when they’re gone, they’re gone, there will always be fruit.’ It’s been 4 months and working perfectly.

Sorry, I meant to quote op’s quoting of me, 9:47

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yep. I no longer cook for the kids. I make dinner for myself + 2 leftover meals--ie, 3 people. If other people in the house want to eat some of what I made, great. If not, they are welcome to make something else.

I did this years ago. My kids ending up telling their therapist I didn’t feed them! And that there was never any food in the house (which is teenager for “there isn’t an endless supply of Doritos and Takis”).

Pp back again. For the pescatarian, I’d just keep reinforcing that her choice to eat that diet is exactly that - her choice. Not some additional burden that’s now your responsibility to fix. It’s 100% on her to navigate this choice in the world. If she can’t sit at a table and make a selection without drama, I’d probably take her phone/iPad away for a day. I’d say ‘if you act like a 6 year old, I will treat you like one.’

For the Doritos/snack issue, I bought enough individual packs, fruit and cereal bars, and nuts to last a month for my tweens. Split them in half, gave both child a box with a month of snacks and said ‘when they’re gone, they’re gone, there will always be fruit.’ It’s been 4 months and working perfectly.

Why don’t you all take turns cooking? That way you work together as a family to feed and nourish each other. I’ve trained my teens to be involved in our daily meals and so now they can pretty much cook anything I cook. I let them take the initiative so one teen finds recipes and plans it on her own. My other teen prefers I give her recipes and she then prepares it. They take ownership of this task and we all benefit.

I tried. One ended up cooking huge elaborate meals for himself, while the other ate one ham sandwich every day.
I now cook again for me and the kids, they’ll eat it maybe 4-5 days and make something else the rest of the time. My husband is a very picky eater so I have asked him not to eat with us anymore. He makes himself a PB&J every day and eats after we are done.

Anonymous wrote:Yep. I no longer cook for the kids. I make dinner for myself + 2 leftover meals--ie, 3 people. If other people in the house want to eat some of what I made, great. If not, they are welcome to make something else.

I did this years ago. My kids ending up telling their therapist I didn’t feed them! And that there was never any food in the house (which is teenager for “there isn’t an endless supply of Doritos and Takis”).

Anonymous wrote:At those ages, especially the 15 year old, they can figure it out themselves a few nights a week. I would navigate their preferences a couple times a week and make enough for leftovers. That’s it.

To get ahead of attitude at a restaurant, I’d send the menu to the vegetarian ahead of time when possible and sat, this is where we are eating, you are welcome to come if you see something you like.

That’s a good middle ground. I can make a batch of fajita fixings for the week and they can eat those until fajitas come out of eyes.

Re the vegetarian (actually pescatarian) and restaurants. We were traveling last week and it’s impossible to anticipate if the restaurant will have either salmon or a Caesar salad. It’s so stressful to go out to eat with her.

The mere threat of doing their own cooking seems to shut mine up. They've cooked when we've had life events that forced them to - hospitalizations, last minute parental travel, etc. But when I'm here and ready to cook, the grumbles vanish as soon as I say: "Well, why don't YOU cook?".

Which is strange. At their age, I loved to try a few recipes.

My kids are the same ages and there’s so little overlap in what they like. We eat pasta almost exclusively. So much pasta.

At those ages, especially the 15 year old, they can figure it out themselves a few nights a week. I would navigate their preferences a couple times a week and make enough for leftovers. That’s it.

To get ahead of attitude at a restaurant, I’d send the menu to the vegetarian ahead of time when possible and sat, this is where we are eating, you are welcome to come if you see something you like.

Yes!! Best thing I ever did for my mental health. My husband was complaining too. I stopped cooking and bought everyone Trader Joe’s meals and told them to help themselves.

Thar lasted for about a year. I got slowly back into cooking but then they started to complain again. Now I do hello fresh but I don’t make any special meals. I like hello fresh because I don’t get in a situation where I’m trying to think of meals everyone will like. It makes it easier for me to cook and set a boundary.

Yep. I no longer cook for the kids. I make dinner for myself + 2 leftover meals--ie, 3 people. If other people in the house want to eat some of what I made, great. If not, they are welcome to make something else.

My kids (12 and 15) are so freaking picky and I just can’t take it anymore. I have one vegetarian who gets grumpy at every restaurant because they don’t have one of the three acceptable (to her) vegetarian dishes. The other one only wants to eat carbs all day every day. They always have something negative to say about a dish or a side that I serve. There is a tiny Venn diagram of foods that both of them will eat and despite lots of conversations on the topic it seems to be getting worse. I’m thinking of letting g them prepare their own meals for a week to see if they get the message. Has anyone ever tried this?