For those of you who do the cooking in the family...

[tracymom1]

Are you expected to prepare food that you would never eat?  For example, you are the only vegetarian in your house.  Everyone wants burgers/steak/fish for dinner.  Do you make it and just eat what you can out of the meal?  Do you pick an alternative type product and try that out?  Would you regularly prepare meat if you were the only one not eating it?

Or say you really dislike a particular seasoning or style of food but your DP or DC love it and would eat it every day if they could.  Do you 'give in' every once in a while and prepare what they like?

Just curious...

[sosurreal09]

Well I am dairy free for moral reasons as well as health, DH LOVES dairy. DD has dairy issues that involve the runs lol (TMI) So for example last night we had tacos.

I made our tacos with grass fed beef, kidney beans, and rice. We used Daiya cheddar but I did use regular cheddar for DH sliced that I melted on his tortillas.

DH also doesn't notice the difference between Tofutti better than sour cream and regular, so he just says "Do we have sour cream?" and I say "Oh yeah here ya go babe."

I get away with what I can, but I also respect he has a different eating style. I wish he was 100% on board with dairy free, but he has accepted things, like I refuse to buy milk. Every now and then there is a small pint of milk in the fridge though.

He will use coconut creamer though and Earth's balance butter so that's good

before when I has a million intolerance diet for DD I would usually cook him something special once a week...

[dakotablue]

I'm gluten free...I make gluten meals for Dh and gluten free meals for myself, I"m going back to dairy free and make meals that can have dairy and not

I don't expect Dh to be gluten free along with me, then again its cheaper not to be...

Also, I make meals that are the same meal with additions or subtractions not entirely different meals (like I'll have gluten free pasta Dh gluten pasta with cheese on top)

[MadiMamacita]

I make things for DH that I won't eat. 

I make him regular pancakes and waffles and I make myself Gluten Free pancakes or waffles. 

He really enjoys liver so I make him that sometimes, but I won't eat it.  

The other night DH and I had steak, but I made chicken for DS. Steak is still a little too much work for him to chew up.

Most meals I make something we can all enjoy, but sometimes I will make variants for people. 

[dawningmama]

Moving this over to N&GE.

My answer: Yep, I make for everyone when I do the cooking. I'm gluten-free, I've got 2 veg*ns in the family and a type 1 diabetic. My dp, one of the veg*ns, cooks meat. I cook gluten. We often end up with 3 meals or more at one sitting. it kinda sucks, but that's just how it goes for us.

[LynnS6]

For kids, I'd consider it. For my dh, no. If he wants a food that I really don't like, he gets to do it himself. So, for example, he likes boxed mashed potatoes. (It's a long and complicated story related to his mother's attempt to get more 'healthy' foods into him, and thereby making very lumpy mashed potatoes, and his own texture issues.) I shudder at the mere thought of them, and I make a mean regular mashed potato (that he likes). But when he's sick/needs comfort food, that's what he turns to. But I do not cook the evil boxed potatoes.

By the same token, I like a lot of veggies and dh doesn't. I don't expect him to cook broccoli or squash or brussel sprouts for me.

[cappuccinosmom]

I like cooking things that my family enjoys eating, whether I enjoy it or not.  One of the big parts of my enjoyment of cooking is giving the pleasure of eating something good to others.

Fish, for instance.  I personally hate it.

Dh loves it, and one of my boys does too.  So I cook it on a semi-regular basis.

Since I'm the cook it's no trouble for me to make sure I have an alternative to eat on those nights.

[treeoflife3]

I absolutely HATE cooking but do all the cooking for the family (which is a whole other issue) and since I can't stand cooking, I refuse to make whole meals I dislike.  I will make PARTS of a meal something I don't like for DH's sake (for instance, I don't like corn but he does so once in awhile, I'll cook him up some corn.) but I would always have part of the meal be something I do like and will eat (so if I'm making that corn, its going to be paired with say panfried pork chops and biscuits)

If he were want, say meatloaf and corn, a meal I'd want no part of, I'd tell him that he would need to cook it himself.  I'll eat what he cooks even if I don't like it, but I'm not going to cook a meal I won't eat.  He is lucky I'll cook at all hehe.  So far, he has yet to cook a meal I don't like so I don't think it bothers him that I won't make a full meal just for him that would make me want to make my own separate meal.

[elmh23]

There are only a couple things that one or two of us LOVE that the others can't stand.  I make them sometimes, but not regularly.  Except seafood.  I will not cook seafood.  The smell/taste/texture make me gag.  I will buy it and dh can make it if he asks, but he doesn't and just gets his fix at his sisters house.

My older son has some gut issues and we've tried a bunch of diets to help fix that.  When he's on a diet, I make sure most of dinner is safe for him or 100% safe for him.   When he was grain free, I still made a lot of rice for the rest of us and he would just not eat it.

[AirMiami]

I am dairy free right now because of stomach issues. I don't really make meals with dairy in them, but I buy the dairy products that my husband and daughter like to eat. If my husband or daughter requested a specific meal, I would make it no matter what the ingredient, even if I couldn't eat it. 

[Ornery]

I haven't eaten red meat or pork (except in sauces a few times, accidently) since I was 7.  I prepare red meat and pork approximately 4 times a week for my family.  At this point, I can't physically eat it without getting sick but my husband is very much a meat and potatoes kinda guy.  I also don't eat potatoes due to texture issues.  We have those at dinner around 3 times a week.

I do absolutely refuse to prepare anything but fresh caught fish.  I won't cook/prepare store bought fish but will cook/prepare fish that has been caught by the family or by our friends and given to us.  I hate, hate, hate the smell of fish and restricting it to those parameters mean that I don't have to cook it that often!

[MusicianDad]

Yup. Everyone gets a chance to have something they love made, even if I find it really, really gross. Just like a buy things while grocery shopping that others in the family love and I hate (think ketchup, which is one of the worst inventions in human history, but whatever).

[newcastlemama]

I do grain and dairy free (they cause Lyme flare ups for me) but I bake for my family, add sides to dinner (like rice or cornbread), and make oatmeal and such that I never eat. Sometimes we make homemade pizza together just because they love it so much. I just eat leftovers that night or someting easy like a chicken salad. I generally cook meals that I can eat most of and then add sides that have grain or dairy in it for my family. They like it and it is is cheaper than having everyone on my diet. I have been preparing meals this way for over 4 years and I am just used to it now.

[pear-shaped]

Yes. I do all the cooking but I'm also a fussy eater, which means that I often don't eat some of what I've prepared. I'm willing to cook things I don't like if they are very healthy and nutritious. My dd and dh love certain veggies like cauliflower, broccoli, broccoli rabe, that I really can't stand, but they're such healthy foods, that I just couldn't not offer them, ykwim? The other food I cook for them but don't eat is fish. The smell alone makes me gag, but they love it. I try to cook it once a week for them, but sometimes I'll go two weeks without cooking it. When it's the vegetables that I don't want to eat, I just eat the rest of the meal. I always make another vegetable side that I like. If it's the fish, sometimes I eat leftovers together with whatever veg I've prepared, but sometimes I don't eat anything if cooking the fish has made me really queasy. That happens most of the time, actually.

[Sol_y_Paz]

 I won't prepare or touch beef/pork. 

[ollyoxenfree]

This question stumped me at first because I couldn't think of anything I won't prepare or eat, other than insects. Thankfully no one in my family wants to eat them either. Then I realized that I won't cook a lot of prepared/processed stuff. A couple of months ago, I found a box of Shake 'n Bake in the kitchen. DH and DD slipped it into the grocery cart when I wasn't looking, mostly as a joke. It's still sitting in the pantry, until he cooks it up. 

I guess my answer is that if I had a strong moral reason for avoiding certain foods (eg. if I were vegan because I objected to use of animal products), then I think I would not prepare it and hope that my family understood. If it was simply a preference because I don't like something, I'd probably hold my nose and make it once in a while - unless I objected on health grounds (eg. Shake 'n Bake).  

[yeahwhat]

I'm vegetarian and do 95% of the cooking in the house.  I do cook meat.  I am not so much expected to cook meat, as I am willing to cook meat because 4/6 people in the house choose to eat it.  Not every meal involves meat and meat is not always the centre piece of meals that do involve it.  I want everyone in the family to enjoy meals, so I cook a variety of things taking into account everyone's preference, but I don't cater to everyone every single night. 

[HollyBearsMom]

There are foods that our son and I love that my husband does not like *at all*.  I take advantage of nights when he is not home to cook those things or we (my son and I) might have them for lunch.  If we really have a craving I might incorporate them in our meal and make something w/o it for my husband.

I will not/can not eat green peppers. Even the smell makes me sick. No one else feels strongly either way so so they rarely make an appearance in our home. They do eat yellow, orange and red ones so I will make those for them and just skip that myself.

My husband loves a big bloody steak, creamed spinach, etc. Steak house type food.  Don't get me wrong, I like a good steak but not my favorite but I cook a meal like that at least once a month.

My husband and I love veggie heavy pizza-sauteed spinach, mushrooms, caramelized onions, artichoke hearts, the works.  Our son does not but how hard is to make a small plain cheese pizza at the same time?

So yes, I do cook things I don't like and would never eat.

[mamalisa]

The only thing I cook that I don't like are sweet potatoes/yams. It's only twice a year though and they don't gross me out or anything, I just don't like the way they taste. Otherwise we're not picky or diet restricted in any way so there's nothing I can think of.  My dh doesn't eat red meat so when I make that for me and the kids I make him something else.

[Llyra]

Sometimes yeah I'll make something that's not particularly my favorite, if DH seems to really want it, or the kids are jazzed about it. And often, when I'm home with the two little ones during the day, I'll make separate lunches for me and them so they can have what they want, and I can have what I want. And if it's something simple, like they want mushrooms in the gravy and I don't like them, well I can just pick mushrooms out, so that's fine. But I won't generally make things for family meals that I myself won't eat at all. If DH wants something I don't like, he can cook dinner himself, and I'll sit to the table, and eat the parts of the meal I like, and then fill in the corners later on with a snack.

But for the most part, I make the dietary decisions in the house.

It helps that I work two evenings a week, and DH cooks-- he and the kids use those nights to experiment with all sorts of food I don't normally like or cook-- trout, mustard, mushrooms, olives, herring, winter squash. Sometimes it's a total flop, and sometimes not, but they have a lot of fun thinking of new things to try. it's sort of a bonding experience for them.