Photo by MoToMo on Flickr
I don’t entertain. I’ve never been secure enough in my cooking ability to have people over for a meal on a regular basis. And I’m just mentally unbalanced enough that a visit from someone requires three days of cleaning beforehand, making impromptu visits very uncomfortable for me. The few times I’ve had friends over I have been very ill at ease with the condition of the house, the food, the conversation. But some people come anyway.
Take my mother-in-law, for example. She’s a hardy soul. She stands not quite five feet tall and gave birth to three ten pound boys, each only two years after the last. She raised those boys alone after her husband took off, back in the 1960s when being a single parent made her a pariah. After the boys were raised, she found the man of her dreams and watched him slowly die of cancer. Now she’s on her own again, much stronger and smarter than she ever dreamed she’d be. She visits us often, as our house is halfway between her summer and winter homes. She loves to take the kids one at a time to go visit her summer home with her for a week or two.
She always asks what she can do to help when she visits, but I love treating her like a guest. We don’t have a room for her, but she sacks out on the couch quite happily, insisting the couch is the most comfy bed in the house (she could be right about that.) She loves to eat out, and it’s hard for us to curb the temptation to just go out all the time when she visits. Instead, she’ll take a grandchild out for a meal for some one-on-one time. One of her favorite places here is a tea room with lace tablecloths and real flowers on the table. To girls for whom “eating out” is defined as Taco Bell, McDonalds and Sonic, the tea room is the height of sophistication!
She knows about my sophomoric cooking level and eats the food I cook anyway. I told you she was brave, right? During this last visit, we discussed eating healthy foods. She said she hadn’t seen so many veggies at a single meal since she left her mother’s home. “I eat very healthy. I have my Cheerios with non-fat milk every morning and a Lean Cuisine frozen entree for lunch. Dinner I usually eat out, but I always have a salad first.” I smiled and nodded. I knew that night when we had dinner she’d ask about this vegetable, that sauce, and what-in-the-world-is-that?? and she’d get an earful then.
And so it is for the visitors at mealtime here. If you’re brave enough to come for a meal, you will be served the same, strange foods we eat right down to the raisin chutney on the coconut bread! I don’t even have any canola oil and white sugar I can break out for you. If you want sugar in your coffee, it will have to be the rapadura I keep for baking. If you bring margarine with you, that’s fine, but please be sure you take it home with you when you go and for heaven’s sake, please don’t offer any to the kids!
And I’ll need about a week’s notice before you come…
The Dark Side of Fat Loss
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June 11, 2009 at 10:34 am
Wardeh @ GNOWFGLINS™
I’m a new reader to your blog. I so enjoy what you write! I feel like you echo the thoughts I have if only I could put them into words. Any company we receive gets an earful, too ~ most times I feel apologetic, wondering what kind of torture are we forcing on them? Those feelings linger too long, even though I know our food is not that bad ~ in fact, our food is very good! I probably should spent 3 days cleaning, but I don’t.
June 11, 2009 at 11:09 am
Link Appeal – June 11, 2009: GNOWFGLINS™
[...] the way to the end and you’ll see the heart of them matter. (You’ll also want to read Feeding Guests ~ a funny and loving account of how she approaches having guests and serving healthy food to [...]
June 11, 2009 at 12:28 pm
Alyss
Haha… I have three words for you: get over it!
Your friends love you for who you are, not how clean your house is! I absolutely love entertaining, but also have to clean the house first. I generally just pile the piles of clutter in my room and close the door, but I do know the temptation to get out the vacuum.
Your mother in law sounds like a hoot! I would love to go our for lunch or supper at a tea room, sounds fantastic.
June 11, 2009 at 2:40 pm
Jenny @ Nourished Kitchen
Your MIL sounds like a lovely woman. When we invite people over for supper – which is often – I always prepare something that is normal fare for us but unusual for them. It’s funny to watch how tentatively they approach the food at first and how they limit they’re cream and butter, but toward evening’s end they always ask for extra helpings and dive into the funkiness like no one’s business!
June 12, 2009 at 7:48 am
Debbie
I relate to your post and it makes me feel better just knowing I’m not the only one in my shoes. I wonder how other people will like my healthy food, but mostly we don’t entertain because of unpredictable energy on my part.
Your table is beautiful, so I can just imagine the company it keeps …must be delightful beings.
June 17, 2009 at 3:54 pm
Katie
Funny! My father-in-law can never remember what he ate at our house, according to my sister-in-law. Last time I served veggie pancakes, I asked him, “what did we eat tonight?” and he said “salmon patties?” It’s tricky being the only healthy eaters in the extended family when it comes to birthdays and dessert opportunities, though. what do you do about Grandma feeding the kids unhealthy food? Donuts every Sunday, for example?
June 17, 2009 at 7:24 pm
localnourishment
You know, birthdays used to be a free-for-all for us. But with a large family, we have at least one birthday a month, sometimes two, for the first half of the year. That’s a lot of sugar.
I generally attack from the side instead of a head-on assault. Instead of saying something to Grandma about not eating this or that anymore, I just beat her out of bed on Sundays and make a BIG breakfast full of eggs, bacon, fruit and whole wheat toast. By the time Grandma gets up and unwraps her donuts, the kids aren’t as hungry and I’m not such a meanie for saying how many people have to split a single one! I’ve also got the kids so brainwashed into believing homemade is SO much better that when Grandma says, “Let’s all go out for an ice cream!” the kids say, “Let’s stay in and make some instead, it’s yummier!”