Kids Dish

Callisto Shampoo has a blog at http://callistra.livejournal.com/

KidsDish: Hi Calli! How many kids do you have, and what ages?

Calli: I have one 18 month old little boy, Vinnie.

KidsDish: How much influence do you have over the food he eats?

Calli: I’d say about 95% control, maybe even higher, but I don’t interfere
when he’s at Mum’s place for dinner. There’s nothing she has given him
yet that would make me worry.

KidsDish: What are his favourite foods?

Calli: Bananas. Bananas. Oh, and another banana thanks. He ate three today.

KidsDish: Do you have trouble getting him to eat healthy food, like fruit
and vegetables? What methods have you developed to encourage him
towards healthy food?

Calli: He loves his fruit, so I try to make sure there’s fruit after his
lunchtime sandwich, and fruit as snacks too. At this stage, we put the
food in front of him, and he tends to feed himself. He likes steamed
rice, broccoli usually gets eaten, and as most of our meals tend to
focus more on vegies than anything else, he usually can’t avoid too
many of them. I always give him little bits of vegies that I am
chopping up for dinner, just because he likes it. He usually eats
them, too!

He also likes figs, mango, watermelon, rockmelon, chocolate, apples,
pears, but he is less enthusiastic about the veg. He did start eating
a potato the other day (raw) but I don’t think he bothered to finish
that.

He gets the same food as us now, I think he often doesn’t like it if
we have different food. I sometimes steal a bite of his dinner, and
sometimes feed him from my plate. He’s always been a really good
feeder. If he can grab a handle on it, he will stuff it into his gob.
Whether it stays in there is a different thing though. He also likes
spaghetti. He swallows it and then grabs hold of the end and pulls it
back out and then swallows it again and … yeah.

We eat at the table about 9 out of ten times, and he eats in his high
chair with us. He has sat on chairs and had his dinner before without
even a cushion, and he is very good at sitting and eating.

KidsDish: Do you enjoy cooking for your family? What are some of your
favourite things to prepare?

Calli: I love cooking, and can cook reasonably well in Indian, Thai, Chinese
and Japanese. I love to cook a proper stir fry, and get a real kick
out of making good wok hay flavours. My husband and I love love love
egg plant, so we go through one large or two small every week.
Szechuan style eggplant is good, there’s indian style eggplant dishes
I do, I can make good noodles most of the time, I love my
crockpots…. I can talk about any part of food preparation, cooking,
style, anything until the cows come home. And I can talk about
growing vegies and chickens too….

KidsDish: What’s your breakfast routine?

Calli: I sleep as much as possible. Oh, you mean *breakfast* routine. OK.
Vinnie wakes up at about 6:45, and J usually looks after him while I
doze. V gets a bottle and usually porridge, with some tinned or fresh
fruit mixed through, or else shares toast with jam or vegemite with J.
I get up eventually and stare blankly at my emails while I drink
brewed coffee and wake up. I will often have a late breakfast of
toast, 2 minute noodles, or fruit.

KidsDish: (so jealous! I want that breakfast routine!) Vinnie’s probably a bit young for this, but can he cook, or prepare food? If so, what sort of
food can he prepare?

Calli: He can wave capsicum around while going “oooo!” Does that count? I
intend for him to be involved in the cooking process, and if need be
then he can beat an egg and I will find a way to use it in the meal…
I think too many people are just so divorced from the food they eat,
so my plan is to have him aware of what I am doing and why, and also
getting the eggs from the chickens and knowing where eggs come from
and where chicken meat comes from too. I buy my vegies from a local
vegetable shop and buy my meat from a local butcher. I’m putting
together a garden, and V already loves coming out to help me water and
play in the veg. I expect that even if he doesn’t like cooking, he
will have a good repetoire of skills in the kitchen by the time he
leaves home.

KidsDish: Do you ever feel guilty about what you feed Vinnie?

Calli: I feel guilty when I open a tin of food for him. Usually this is
prompted by time constraints rather than food constraints, but I do
serve prawns occasionally and I haven’t tested him for allergies to
prawns, and I have no intention of doing so for a very long time yet.
Other than that, no.

KidsDish: What’s your favourite vegetable?

Calli: It is ze eggy plant. Pumpkins. Er. I like vegies. I love pumpkin, and
I am hanging out to get my hands on some Australian Butter from
Diggers seed club. I also want their mixed pumpkin set, which includes
Turks Turban pumpkins, Australian Butter, and all sorts of weirdo
pumpkins. I’m excited! We love eggplant, the myriad of ways we can
cook with it and it’s taste. That took a bit of practice to cook
properly, if you do it wrong you end up with mush or hard blocks.

KidsDish: And finally, tell us a little about yourself.

Calli: I never quite know what to say at this sort of point. Which part of me
would you like to know about? I love to cook, and love having the
time to do so. I have two crockpots, a rice cooker, a sandwich press,
two blenders, a food processor, a kenwood chef, a sontaku knife, a
bbq, a weber, two cast iron hotplates, a cast iron fry pan, two
not-chinese style clay pots, three woks though I only use one, 6
burners, an oven which is 74 centimetres from inside to inside, and
love to watch Good Eats, an American cooking show by Alton Brown, who
I think is kind of sexy. I am a raving feminist who believes in
choice, education, and family. I love to organize and run things,
camping is going to be so exciting I can’t wait to start making lists.

Oh, and I’m ambivalent about going out for dinner because I can often
cook better than a lot of resturaunts. *grin*

Really, I just like food!

KidsDish: Thanks for doing this interview, Callisto Shampoo!

KidsDish: Here we are again! I’d like to welcome Mark (AKA Chucklemonkey on Livejournal) to the KidsDish interview. Hi, Mark! Tell us a bit about yourself.

Mark: Young dad, an Englisman living in Sweden, flitting between paternity leave and editing, writing, starting up a publishing company and working on a short film. It’s all go for me here in such a good way at the moment!

KidsDish: So, how many kids do you have, and what ages?

Mark: I have a son, Maddoc, who is eight and a half months old.

KidsDish: How much influence do you have over the food Maddoc eats?

Mark: Unluckily for him, 100% (or 50% if taking my wife into account too)!

KidsDish: What are his favourite foods?

Mark: At the moment he is a big fan of porridge, adores banana and seems to be warming to bulgur wheat (his dad’s favourite).

KidsDish: Do you have trouble getting him to eat healthy food, like fruit
and vegetables? What methods have you developed to encourage him
towards healthy food?

Mark: Well in terms of getting him to eat healthily, that’s easy due to the fact that we only give him healthy foods and because he is so young. By that I mean that he isn’t walking past McDonald’s and wanting to go in there and dragging our arm off when passing the sweet shop… yet.

In regards to trying to get him to eat healthily, we believe that by doing that ourselves gives him a better chance to do it too. I mean I have a lot of fruit through the day and we cook using fresh vegetables every day. He will naturally be interested in junk food and snacks, as all kids are but with his parents avoiding those things most of the time means it will be easier for him in the long run.

KidsDish: Do you enjoy cooking for your family? What are some of your
favourite things to prepare?

Mark: I love cooking, I haven’t really been too adventurous recently but yesterday I did a mean roasted vegetable dish (swede, garlic, onion. potato) with rice. I love pasta, rice and bulgur wheat and using them as a base we try to add in a variety of vegetables.

KidsDish: What’s your breakfast routine?

Mark: Me and Maddoc get up at around six, he has porridge and I have muesli. Sometimes he lets me eat with him, other times he is too impatient and I have to feed him before I can eat! Then we play for an hour and then he goes back to bed with his mum.

KidsDish: I know he’s a bit young, but I always include this question - can he cook, or prepare food? If so, what sort of food can her prepare?

Mark: He’ll be doing that sooner than he thinks.

KidsDish: Do you ever feel guilty about what you feed Maddoc?

Mark: I worry that he doesn’t get enough of everything, being a vegetarian family we have to be very aware of what all his food contains and occasionally I worry that he doesn’t get enough in terms of protein.

KidsDish: What’s your favourite vegetable?

Mark: I think mine would have to be broccoli, although I overlook potato as a vegetable, seeing as I use it as a base (it is pretty versatile).

KidsDish: Thanks, Mark, for doing this interview!

Dirk Flinthart has been publishing short stories and books for many years now. He moved from Queensland to Tasmania some years ago, and he and I promptly founded the Invisible College, a Hobart-based writing group for people interested in writing speculative fiction. He also has the most hobbies and interests of just about anyone I know, in addition to being the primary carer for three small children (his wife Natalie is a GP). His excuses for not making it to meetings of the Invisible College are usually elaborate, fascinating, and utterly true. That he ever makes it at all is a miracle…

Dirk sent me the answers to this interview from the Internet room of the Avenue Hotel in Wanganui, NZ, on a rare family holiday.

KidsDish: Hi, Dirk. Let’s start with the basics. How many kids do you have, and what ages?

DF: Talleyn is six. Perran is almost four. Mieke is sixteen months.

KidsDish: How much influence do you have over the food they eat?

DF: Rather a lot. I do pretty much all the cooking, and the shopping. Of course, if Natalie thought I was doing badly, I’m sure she’d make some noise — but she
seems to approve, overall. And that’s good, because she can’t cook.

KidsDish: What are their favourite foods?

DF: Hmm. Talleyn adores pasta, and nasi goreng — Indonesian style fried rice, with spices and vegetables and little bits of chicken and prawn. Perran absolutely loves fish, and is extremely fond of sushi… and even sashimi, which is raw fish dipped in soy and spices. He has a weakness for chocolate, but makes up for it by eating lots of healthy stuff. Mieke is still too young to have a lot of preferences, but she likes all kinds of fruit, yoghurt, chicken, sausages, pasta, rice, carrots, and hot chips.

KidsDish: Do you have trouble getting them to eat healthy food, like fruit and vegetables? What methods have you developed to encourage them towards healthy food?

DF: No trouble at all. Let me repeat that: absolutely no trouble. There’s no trick to it. When they’re quite young — up to about two years old — you simply don’t present them with foods you don’t want them to eat, and you make sure that you provide plenty of nutritious and tasty snacks. Best is if you can set up a sort of self-dispensing system for things like apples and carrots. Both the boys were happily finding their own healthy snacks from their special drawer in the kitchen before they could even talk.

I know it sounds too good to be true, but it’s the real thing. Some people say that their kids will “only eat junk”. Well, after about age five or six, yeah — you’ve let them build habits that are very, very hard to break. But if you simply start young and present them with tasty, healthy foods… well, Natalie is a doctor, and she says she’s never, ever heard of a two-year-old starving themselves. You just have to be more patient and stubborn than your kids.

It really does help to start young, though. Talleyn’s first solid food was avocado. I used to make his baby food for him: blended rice with salmon, coriander, lemon, spring onion and just a pinch of salt — that was a favourite. People who came visiting us used to take whatever was leftover and spread it on their toast… which made me laugh.

KidsDish: Do you enjoy cooking for your family? What are some of your favourite things to prepare?

DF: I just like cooking. Family? Well, they’re the usual audience, yeah. But I flat-out like cooking. It’s an art form: you have the skill base, the artist, the medium (food!) the actual creation, and the appreciative audience. I’m practiced enough now that I like to create something brand new for Natalie’s birthday every year. This year, I used my ice-cream maker to create leatherwood honey-mascarpone ice cream, which I froze till it was hard. Then I scooped out little balls which I rolled in gingernut crumbs, and served. Yeah!

In general, though, cooking is fun. I like working with Thai, Malay, Indonesian, Vietnamese, Japanese and Mediterranean ingredients and techniques. I’m far from expert in any of those styles, but I know enough about most of them to create interesting cross-over dishes… prawns, dressed in lime, chilli and coriander, then wrapped in fillo pastry and baked; smoked salmon served with a salsa of avocado, spring onion, cucumber, capsicum, soy sauce, sushi vinegar, lime juice and a little palm sugar, all placed on a bed of crispy-fried potato shavings.

You get the idea.

KidsDish: What’s your breakfast routine?

DF: Breakfast is higgledy piggledy. As a writer, I have to work late at night. Natalie usually gets her own breakfast, and puts out some toast for Perran. Mieke eats a bit of whatever Natalie has. Talleyn is addicted to cold cereal — he likes Uncle Toby’s Oat Flakes. Once Natalie goes to work and Talleyn goes to school, Perran usually gets a second course — avocado toast, or maybe some porridge. I use muesli to make porridge, because I find plain oats boring as hell. My own breakfast is usually pretty simple: toast with beans, or muesli, or fruit, or some sort of mix of the lot. I’ve never been a big breakfast person.

KidsDish: Do any of your kids cook, or prepare food? If so, what sort of food can they prepare?

DF: Talleyn and Perran are both too young to do a lot of food prep, particularly as I keep my knives wickedly sharp. However, they both enjoy helping me prepare sushi, and pizza, and Perran in particular loves mixing stuff and rolling things. We make biscuits together now and then. I bought him a little rolling pin and a bunch of biscuit cutters for Christmas…

KidsDish:. Do you ever feel guilty about what you feed your kids?

DF: On occasion. Seriously: I sit down, and we’re eating maybe Indonesian-style fried rice, or perhaps san choy bau, or maybe won-ton soup with home-made dumplings and stock… maybe a fresh blueberry cobbler for dessert, or perhaps a salad of different melons dressed with ginger syrup and mint, and I think: what are these poor kids going to think when they get around to eating away from home? How are they going to handle meat-and-three-veg?

But then I have to go out for an evening, and Natalie cooks sausages and noodles… and they eat it all, so I figure they’ll survive.

Actually, I mostly feel proud. I am utterly delighted that three-year-old Perran will face up to Turkish-style stuffed vine leaves like he did tonight… didn’t like them, but he tried them. And Talleyn? He loved them. Ate two, as well as his Turkish “Chicken Iskander”. (We were at a Turkish foodery.)

The best bit comes when my small children start chowing down, without so much as blinking, on foods that a lot of adults I know are afraid to try. We had a medical student in our house last week. He took pictures of Perran, who was eating the leftover part of the Chinese Cabbage (wombok) that I’d used to prepare Spring Rolls. He couldn’t believe he was watching a three-year-old eating raw cabbage…

KidsDish: What’s your favourite vegetable?

DF: Oooh. Tough call. Umm… I really like spring onions, for the flavour. Zucchini is versatile, but it’s technically a fruit (like melons, pumpkins and
eggplant.) Carrots are incredibly satisfying to crunch, and very tasty. Lettuce is a little bland, but you can use it for all kinds of things.

Nope. I can’t pick a favourite.

KidsDish: And finally, tell us a little about yourself…

DF: Nearly forty-one years old. Married, three kids. I write stories (and occasionally books), cook a lot, and teach ju-jitsu. I play flute and Irish whistle, and I keep trying to play harp, but my harp has narrow string-settings, and my fingers aren’t the most delicate and slender.

I live in northeast Tasmania, and I love all the fresh fruit, the fish, and the game meat I can get there. I don’t ever want to run a restaurant, but I like eating in good ones.

KidsDish: Thanks for taking part in this interview!

Maxine McArthur is an award-winning science fiction novelist, based in Canberra, Australia. Her latest book is Less Than Human, a mystery about near-future robotics in Japan.

KidsDish: Hi, Maxine! How many kids do you have, and what ages?

Maxine: Two sons, aged 17 and nearly 15.

KidsDish: How much influence do you have over the food they eat?

Maxine: Quite a bit, as i do the shopping. Actually, their father does the shopping!

KidsDish: What are their favourite foods?

Maxine: James (17) likes italian, curry, and sweet things. Ray (15) likes egg dishes and eats huge quantities of cereal. They both like ice cream.

KidsDish: Do you have trouble getting them to eat healthy food, like fruit and vegetables? What methods have you developed to encourage them towards healthy food?

Maxine: Their father does not eat a huge variety of fruit and veges, and because he does the shopping, we all tend to eat the same kinds of things. We have always eaten the same meals, from when the kids were very small. So there were never ‘adult meals’ and ‘kids’ meals’. If somebody, either kid or adult, does not like what is served for dinner, they can eat a smaller portion. But there is no alternative dinner. The other thing we do is make it a rule that unless you eat the main dinner, you can’t have sweets or dessert.

We always have fruit available for snacks, and I always served fruit for breakfast and put it in the kids’ lunches when they were little. Now they eat what they like for breakfast and make their own lunches, but I notice that they do eat fruit regularly.

KidsDish: Do you enjoy cooking for your family? What are some of your favourite things to prepare?

Maxine: I enjoy cooking but don’t have much time to do it. I love making baked desserts, like lemon upside-down pudding and custards. Jewish potato pancakes are another great favourite.

KidsDish: What’s your breakfast routine?

Maxine: Never miss breakfast! I usually get up at 5:30-ish, have a cup of coffee and think about my writing, then get my lunch ready while eating a slice of toast with vegemite and drink a glass of freshly squeezed orange juice. James gets up and has a glass of milo. Then after I’ve walked and fed the dog and the chooks and had a shower, I have a bowl of cereal. Ray gets up and has his cereal. James has some fruit. Then I go to work, via the horse paddock where I feed the horse. I spend more time on animal breakfasts than I do on my own!

KidsDish: Do any of your kids cook, or prepare food? If so, what sort of food can they prepare?

Maxine: For the past two years, both my sons have one day a week when it’s their turn to cook. Of course, i give them a hand when they need it. They can cook stir fries, noodles, various pasta dishes, curry, bacon and eggs, sushi, junket, jelly, and make toasted sandwiches.

They also have one day a week each when it’s their turn to wash up.

KidsDish: Do you ever feel guilty about what you feed your kids?

Maxine: Sometimes. But I also feel guilty about what i’m eating myself a lot–I think we should eat more vegetables. I don’t feel as bad these days because what they eat is now largely their responsibility. If they want their father to buy a different kind of healthy food at the supermarket, they tell him. Of course, if they want lollies and coke, they have to use their own pocket money.

KidsDish: What’s your favourite vegetable?

Maxine: Fresh corn on the cob

KidsDish: Tell us a little about yourself…

Maxine: I’m a writer of science fiction and fantasy, although I also have a nine-to-five day job. I live in Canberra with my husband, two sons, dog, and six chooks. I have a really messy garden that i’m always promising to tidy up, and I keep a horse in a different suburb and ride it nearly every day. My ideal life would be to live on a small property in the country and grow lots of vegetables to be self-sufficient. At the moment, all I can manage is a few tomatoes, but it’s a good start!

KidsDish: Thanks for taking part in this interview!

Rowena Cory Daniells
(who also writes as R.C. Daniells and Rowena Cory Lindquist) is an author of nearly 30 published books for children, and a fantasy trilogy “The Shadow Kingdom” which was published internationally. Rowena’s next book, “The Evil Overlord” will be published in Jan 2008 as part of the new ABC Books series “The Lost Shimmaron”.

KidsDish: Hi, Rowena! How many kids do you have, and what ages?

Rowena: 6 children. 12, 14, 16, 18, 20, 22 and a husband who thinks he’s a child.

KidsDish: How much influence do you have over the food they eat?

I buy the food. I discovered 20 years ago you can cook food and put it in front a toddler but you can’t make them eat.

KidsDish: What are their favourite foods?

Rowena: Each one has a different favourite and each one hates something different. These often clash.

KidsDish: Do you have trouble getting them to eat healthy food, like fruit
and vegetables? What methods have you developed to encourage them
towards healthy food?

Rowena: They hardly ever eat fruit. They will eat some vegetables. I can’t afford to buy food to throw it out. So I only buy what I know they will eat. I find they get a little more adventurous in their early teens.

I hide vegetables in the meat by throwing in a can of diced tomatoes, kidney beans or grating pumpkin into the mince.

KidsDish: Do you enjoy cooking for your family? What are some of your
favourite things to prepare?

Rowena: I hate cooking. When the children were little my father in law had a heart condition and diabetes. So I had to cook food he could eat, food my husband would eat and food the children would eat. I ate the scraps.

Rowena: Now I prepare large dishes of things like Chilli con carne, Mexican meat for tacos, beef Stroganoff and Bolognaise, and freeze them in individual serves. That takes care of my husband for the week. Then I make a huge pot of vegetable soup and freeze that individually. That takes care of me.

The older children come in from jobs at different times, will dash out to have dinner with friends, or will arrive starving and want food in 30 seconds. The three youngest ones currently will not eat the same thing. So I end up running a restaurant.

The three youngest boys would happily eat steak or roast lamb but I can’t afford to feed them that, so they get it once a week or so. For the longest time the safe fall back was peanut butter sandwiches and milk.

KidsDish: What’s your breakfast routine?

Rowena: They get their own breakfast. Toast & cereal. Or I make pikelets or eggs and bacon.

KidsDish: Do any of your kids cook, or prepare food? If so, what sort of
food can they prepare?

Rowena: Toasted sandwiches, bacon and eggs, poached eggs, French toast, noodle dishes.

KidsDish: Do you ever feel guilty about what you feed your kids?

Rowena: All the time. My father refused to eat vegetables and sister was allergic to fruit, so my kids have inherited these odd food likes and dislikes.

I cut out white bread and only buy the Helgas light rye or soy and linseed. I only buy raw sugar and lite milk. We don’t have soft drink or cordial in the house. We rarely have fruit juice.

KidsDish: What’s your favourite vegetable?

Rowena: Spinach. I know, it’s crazy. I eat normal food.

KidsDish: Tell us a little about yourself…

Rowena: Food is only an energy source not a way of life.

KidsDish: Thanks for taking part in this interview!

KidsDish: I’d like to introduce Lee and Lyn Battersby, a married couple from Perth who both balance writing careers with the busy day-to-dayness of work, family and… well, more family!

Welcome to KidsDish, L&L! Tell us a little about yourselves.

L&L: We’re a blended family of 7: Lyn contributed 3 children, Lee one, and we collaborated on our youngest. We’re both award-winning short story writers, currently working on novels and a screenplay. We have two passions in life: our family and writing, and everything else is worked in around the edges of those. We currently live a medium bike ride away from the beach about 40km North of Perth. Lyn is rubbish at gardening, which is fine because Lee enjoys it. He, in turn, is rubbish at housework, which is unlucky because Lyn hates doing it all, so he has to help anyway

(Lyn would like to point out that she *has* been helping out with the garden: she can point a hose and buy a flower with the best of them! And she took the momentous step of planting some of them recently)

KidsDish: So how many kids do you have, and what ages?

L&L: 5 kids — Cassie, Aiden, Blake, Erin and Connor, respectively aged 15, 13, 12, 5, and 2.

KidsDish: How much influence do you have over the food they eat?

L&L: With the first 4, a lot, when they’re with us. Cassie has become more picky in recent days, and tends to rely on the usual teen fare– McDonalds and 2 minute noodles. Connor also tries to be very picky, and will throw away whatever food he doesn’t like. The two youngest children go to day care every week: Connor for five days, and Erin for 2 afternoons and 3 full days. We’re aware of the centre’s menus, and have offered suggestions, but on the whole they’re fed pretty well there– lots of fruit and vegetables, and nutritious things throughout the day.

As a family we probably eat out a bit too much, but try to avoid fast food. We eat at cafes and Sizzler, where we can order the kids to eat salad However, Lyn’s an excellent cook, and we both concentrate on low-fat alternatives and healthy variations when we eat. We also have a system of allowing the kids to name two foods they don’t like, which they then don’t have to eat. For example, when Cassie was younger, her two items were avocado and pumpkin. Later, she declared a dislike for sardines. In order to add it to her list, she had to take one of the others off, which then became part of her eating. Pumpkin was dropped, and now she loves it. It gives the kids a feeling of choice, and allows us a wide range when cooking for them.

There are some foods we don’t expect the kids to eat, such as peanut butter and raw onions, but they’re either things we hate ourselves or obvious stuff.

KidsDish: What are their favourite foods?

L&L: Cassie loves Lyn’s chicken & vegetable soup, and curry. Aiden will eat anything put in front of him except peanut butter, but being 13 and a boy, declares KFC as his eating preference at all times (he lives in a hard luck zone ) Blake is a pizza lover, so we try to make home made pizzas every now and again to at least ensure he eats good ones. Erin is a pasta fiend (all pasta is spaghetti, and all spaghetti is good…) as well as a dedicated lover of sushi. And Connor is also a pasta and sushi lover, although he’s recently started to eat his Dad’s breakfast cereal (Bran flakes with sultanas and yoghurt-covered sultanas) with a single inhalation.

(For the record, Lyn loves spaghetti Bolognaise, and Lee is a pasta fiend, so, you know….). A quick and easy family favourite is pasta in thick tomato soup, with grated cheese melted into it.

KidsDish: Do you have trouble getting them to eat healthy food, like fruit and vegetables? What methods have you developed to encourage them towards healthy food?

L&L: The kids will eat fruit at the drop of a hat, and they’ll all pick up a tomato and eat it like an apple. Lyn makes a lot of casseroles, and the younger two can get a bit picky about them, especially Connor. Tricks include grating vegetables into dishes, and making many sauces tomato-based. (She says this tactic works with the zucchini-hating Lee as well). They’ll happily eat salads and Connor’s a big rap for food he can hold: he loves broccoli, too.

KidsDish: Do you enjoy cooking for your family? What are some of your favourite things to prepare?

L&L: Lyn loves cooking for the family, to the point where Lee rarely does any more. He likes it, but Lyn is passionate. She particularly loves cooking spag bol, and totally believes nobody in the world cooks it as well as she does. She also loves cooking soups, and is the muffin queen of the universe. Lee cooks a perfect pasta carbonara, has a killer recipe for fish cottage pie, and loves a tomato and capsicum soup that the rest of the family do nothing but complain about so he never cooks it anymore.

KidsDish: What’s your breakfast routine?

L&L: At the moment, the kids have either Weetbix or the bran flakes with sultanas. Connor’s refusing to adjust to daylight saving time, so his gets boxed up and served to him at day care. Our weekend routine usually includes either pancakes, or a home made cooked breakfast of eggs, beans, hash browns, lean bacon, and tomatoes.

KidsDish: Do any of your kids cook, or prepare food? If so, what sort of food can they prepare?

L&L: The older four kids all enjoy cooking, and get a chance every now and again. Cassie’s speciality is an Asian style chicken & noodle soup. Aiden cooks scrambled eggs regularly and does a mean satay. Blake is also an egg cooker, and has a list of ingredients for his special version that’s about a mile long. Erin is at the helping-Mummy stage, especially with muffins and Anzac cookies. It’s all about licking the spoon…. Connor, well, we’d let him do something if he’d stand still long enough…

KidsDish: Do you ever feel guilty about what you feed your kids?

L&L: We feel guilty that we eat out too much, and with summer (and poverty) hard upon us we’re making an effort to eat at home much more. There’s no excuse, really: we much prefer home cooking, and it’s usually a weak need for convenience that sends us out– we both work full time, we fit food shopping in on a Thursday night, when the kids are cranky and we’ve already put in 10-11 hour work days (we live an hour’s journey from our jobs) and often it’s just easier to sit in the food hall than come home and *then* start cooking.

Even then, we keep control of what they eat- sushi is a better choice than KFC, and so on, but we’d much rather know every ingredient than trust in others, so we get the guilts.

KidsDish: What’s your favourite vegetable?

L&L: The tomato. Yeah, so it’s a fruit, but it’s still our favourite It’s amazingly flexible, fits in everywhere from salads to sauces, is highly nutritious, and can taste wonderful (beefsteak tomatoes are divine). And the kids love them. Lyn also loves pumpkin, but the raw flesh burns her skin, so it’s a matter of asking Lee to peel so she can cook it.

KidsDish:Thanks so much for taking part in this interview, guys! I know your lives are hectic, and I appreciate you taking the time.

L&L: Hope you like the answers!

KidsDish: Meet Anna, everybody! Anna, could you tell us a little about yourself?

Anna: I’m a part-time statistician working in the health field, with a plethora of hobbies. These include a partner, three kids, food, books, music, dancing, science fiction, and my garden, which I hope will be a fabulous place to relax one day. I aspire to growing a good percentage of the fresh vegies that our family consume, but until we have some trees to cool our garden down, I’m not having much luck. Since finishing my most recent studies last year, I’ve been trying to give more back to the community, getting involved in volunteer efforts in a number of areas - school meetings, running science fiction convention, judging for a book award. I enjoy talking about myself, and really should stop now!

KidsDish: How many kids do you have, and what ages?

Anna: 3 kids, aged 8, nearly 6, 2

KidsDish: How much influence do you have over the food they eat?

Anna: A reasonable amount. The youngest one gets three days a week of daycare food, which is okay. The older two get two days a week of after school care food, which seems a little less carefully thought out in terms of nutrition, and more focused on variety and things kids will eat

KidsDish: What are their favourite foods?

Anna: Hmm. Oldest one will eat just about anything containing peanut butter. Youngest one is pretty keen on sweet things - chocolate, bikkies, etc. Oldest one very fond of green apples as well (wouldn’t allow friends to cook ‘his’ apples to make dessert, as he ‘needs’ them for school). Little one very keen on lentils, mandarins, berry fruits, tomatoes, rockmelon. Middle child will cheerfully eat body weight in watermelon, but seems a lot more relaxed about food than the other two, thus has fewer ’stand out’ likes. All of them very fond of olives, middle one also capers, older one dill pickles.

KidsDish: Do you have trouble getting them to eat healthy food, like fruit and vegetables? What methods have you developed to encourage them towards healthy food?

Anna: I’ve not had a problem with getting them to eat healthy foods - I think that modelling from the adults around them is very important, and we eat a pretty good diet, as do most of our friends. There are particular fruits and vegetables that they don’t eat, but we have allowed them to pick three that they won’t eat, and anything else they are required to eat (acquired this idea from Battblush). One thing that we do do to encourage them to eat healthy food is to talk about what is in food, and why we make the choices. I don’t think the little one understands much of it yet, but she certainly has the idea of ’sometimes food’. The older one is getting a pretty good idea of RDI, necessary nutrients, reasons for why we eat the way that we do.

It helps that we are a predominantly vegetarian household - I don’t cook meat, as I find it takes too long. I can get a meal on the table in 30 minutes, from opening the fridge door saying ’so, what shall we eat tonight’ to the last person sitting down to eat, as long as I don’t try and add meat to anything (bacon is the exception, but I probably only cook it once a quarter).

My favourite technique for getting them to eat things is the ‘whinge’ rule - they are allowed to not eat something that someone has served for them, but they are not allowed to whinge about it. The question ‘do I have to eat [X]?’ has only one answer - ‘YES’. Comments of ‘I don’t like [Y]’ are followed by statement of ‘well, if you don’t complain, you don’t have to eat it. just put it to the side of your plate’.

Various other thoughts: We don’t use dessert as a reward, it is an occasional thing, depending on whether someone felt like cooking it, although a reasonable amount of dinner should be consumed. Claims of ‘not hungry’ where mains are concerned are immediate grounds for not receiving dessert, unless one parent judges that other parent served more than a reasonable amount of mains. Children get a say in what they eat - everything is brought to the table in cooking/serving dishes, and served out. However, they don’t get complete control. If there are a variety of vegetables, they are required to eat a quantity (approximately 1/2 a cup for the big kid, but it can all be cauliflower). Servings are kept small - better to ask for seconds than not finish firsts.

KidsDish: Do you enjoy cooking for your family? What are some of your favourite things to prepare?

Anna: Love cooking. Most of my favourites are not things I get to do frequently, because they are either not healthy enough, or they are too time consuming. We all love spinach gnocchi, although will use pretty much any similar vegetable (current favourite is warrigal greens). I like red lentils, which I usually do with some mix of spices, because they are so quick - much faster to do a pot of lentils than to order take away. Have recently learnt to make profiteroles (dairy and wheat free), so practice those whenever I have time and opportunity. Love making cakes/biscuits. Have had a bit of sucess with nougat, but really can only do that when I have the house to myself - the last two attempts I’ve managed to burn something.

KidsDish: What’s your breakfast routine?

Anna: Mostly everyone gets their own. On weekends, we try and sit together, make it more of a family thing. Sometimes, someone makes porridge (one of the adults, or the 8 year old), which is very quick and easy in the microwave. Different family members have different cereal preferences, all of which are healthy enough that I’m happy to indulge them.

KidsDish: Do any of your kids cook, or prepare food? If so, what sort of food can they prepare?

Anna: The 8 year old can, when I’m willing to let him. He is competent at french toast, porridge (microwave), not quite confident with pikelets. Dab hand at peanut butter sandwiches, but not so good on the cleaning up. The other two get to help sometimes, but I’m not ready to let them have as much autonomy - more about my ability to give them space in the kitchen, and less about their readiness/willingness to learn. All of them can watch a pot, and stir, with varying levels of trustworthiness.

KidsDish: Do you ever feel guilty about what you feed your kids?

Anna: Yes.

KidsDish: What’s your favourite vegetable?

Anna: Do I only get to pick one? For eating or for cooking? We eat a lot of cauliflower - I like it because all the family will eat it, it is quick, can be plain, or fancied up. Tomatoes are also a family favourite, although eldest son goes through fads with regards them. For eating, maybe spinach - good for cooking, adds to a salad, gives colour and texture to sauces.

KidsDish: Thanks for taking part in this interview!

Anna: You are welcome.

I first “met” Sharyn Lilley (AKA Eneit) on the HarperCollins Voyager forums, known to its loyal denizens as the Purple Zone, and have since continued our online acquaintance through reading her Livejournal. I’m very pleased she’s added her voice to this interview series - as you’ll see, she’s a Mum with a capital M!

KidsDish: Sharyn, tell us a little about yourself.

Sharyn: I’m a forty year old musician, mother and author. I’m learning about editing an anthology by being thrown in at the deep end, and that tends to be how I’ve lived my life - the first fruit cake I ever made was a two tiered, royal iced wedding cake.

I have a deep abiding passion for the high country, and the Rutherglen and King Valley wine and food regions, my childhood home being somewhere between these areas.

I can’t remember not reading, and the 600 odd page novel, Papillion, read in my teenage years, stands out in my memory solely because until I read it I had never before read a book where they mentioned people going to the toilet. Immediately after that I read Go Ask Alice. After which I decided I prefered to not know quite so much detail about toilets.

KidsDish: So how many kids do you have, and what ages?

Sharyn: I have 6 children, although next May that will change to 7. From the eldest down their ages are: 20 (son); 19 (daughter); 17 (son); 14 (daughter); 27 months (son); 8 months (son).

KidsDish: How much influence do you have over the food your kids eat?

Sharyn: The 20 year old is in the army, and the 19 year old is living away from home - so my influence over the choices are limited to what I managed to beat into … I mean - teach them, when they were younger. Which, apparently, was considerably more than I realized at the time. The 17 year old and the 14 year old are allowed certain choices; I’m not going to stress over them not having a lunchtime sandwich provided they have had a healthy breakfast, fruit during the day and eat a good tea. There’s far too many other issues you can argue with teenagers over, I don’t consider a peanut butter sandwich one of them *g* The younger boys, well, totally in so far as I regulate when they eat and what they are offered - but the 2 year old gets to choose his sandwich toppings (usually from a choice of two, that I have selected, never the same two in a row)

KidsDish: What are their favourite foods?

Sharyn: 20 y.o. - homemade lasagne; 19 y.o. broccoli and cheese sauce (apparently every meal needs to be served with this side dish, if I’m cooking *g*) but her favouite to make is homemade chicken schnitzels; my 17 y.o wants to be a chef, and his favourite meals are incredibly varied, but if I’m cooking he likes roast beef; my 14 y.o. loves lemon roast chicken and homemade wedges; the 2 y.o. loves yoghurt, pumpkin soup, chicken and corn soup, spaghetti bolognese, sausages, chicken casserole and cornflakes; the 8 month old is showing a liking for stewed apples and rice cereal.

KidsDish: I’m impressed that you remember all that! I suppose you’d get into trouble if you didn’t… Do you have trouble getting them to eat healthy food, like fruit and vegetables? What methods have you developed to encourage your kids towards healthy food?

Sharyn: I didn’t have a lot of money to buy treats very often when my older children were babies, so I got into the habit of taking individual containers of cut fruit and sandwiches with me when we went out. I realized, quite by accident, that this was a good thing to do when at a Playgroup association party, my toddlers were quietly eating up their apple and banana pieces while all the other kids were fighting over the plates of lollies on the tables. So I continued. Even when I have the money, chips and are a treat, not an everyday item; McDonalds was for holidays (this doesn’t yet apply to the younger ones) and kids, if you want cakes and biscuits you can help make them, and help clean up afterwards.

Sharyn: When I had the eldest four bring friends home after school I used to supply a huge plastic platter filled with wedges of watermelons, orange segments, apple rings, banana slices, celery boats, fairy bread and chips. This looked hugely impressive - but in reality equated to one thick slice of watermelon, two oranges, two aples, two bananas, three sticks of celery, four slices of bread and two of the lunchbox size packets of chips. The kids all thought they were having a party (especially if I used food colouring to turn each their drinks different colours) Their birthday parties had similar platters, with the addition of chocolate crackles and birthday cake *g*

KidsDish: That’s a great idea, I’ll have to remember that one! Do you enjoy cooking for your family? What are some of your favourite things to prepare?

Sharyn: I love cooking. I read cookbooks, usually for inspiration the way some people read novels. I rarely make a recipe absolutely to the book after the first time I’ve made it. For large parties, I like pasta dishes - make ahead, and reheat *g* For family gatherings, roasts in winter, cold meats and their favourite salads in summer. During the week, everyday meals are often “experimented” with.

KidsDish: What’s your breakfast routine?

Sharyn: Adults and teenagers fend for themselves; feed the babies as much as they need help with. *g*

KidsDish: Do any of your kids cook, or prepare food? If so, what sort of
food can they prepare?

Sharyn: My older four are all capable of preparing a range of full meals. The 14 y.o. is a little overshadowed by her brother’s efforts, so she tends to stick to making biscuits and cakes, and helping me (ok - potato peeling is usually done only under duress *g* but she likes making marinades) The 17 y.o. had to make a three course roast meal for his major 2nd semester Year 10 Food Technology assignment, here at home. This included a dessert of chocolate truffle cake roloude. The filling was kahlua flavoured whipped cream, and the finish was a bittersweet dark chocolate ganache - does this child know of his mother’s chocoholism or what?

KidsDish: Do you ever feel guilty about what you feed your kids?

Sharyn: No.

KidsDish: What’s your favourite vegetable?

Sharyn: Potato. So damn versatile!

KidsDish: Thanks so much for taking part in this interview!

Sharyn: You’re very welcome.

This is the first of a series of interviews I want to publish with a variety of mums & dads of my acquaintance. If you have kids of any age still at home, and would like to be interviewed, please drop me an interview, or leave your email address in the comments spot.

Rachel Holkner
is a chief child-wrangler and manuscript wrestler. Or, child-raiser and collector of rejection slips.

KidsDish: How many kids do you have, and what ages?

Rachel: I have one daughter, Abbey, who is very-nearly-three.

KidsDish: How much influence do you have over the food Abbey eats?

Rachel: I have allll the influence. It’s one of the things my partner and I are most pedantic about.

KidsDish: What are Abbey’s favourite foods?

Rachel: We’re lucky in that she eats nearly everything presented to her. Her favourites vary according to the phase of the moon as far as I can figure. Soups are good. Risotto too. Spag Bol. And tonight - chinese takeaway.

KidsDish: Do you have trouble getting her to eat healthy food, like fruit and vegetables? What methods have you developed to encourage her towards healthy food?

Rachel: We almost never have trouble getting Abbey to eat healthy. We imposed rules early on like at least one snack per day must be fruit. The other might be toast or a muffin. Sweet treats (lollies, cake , ice-cream) are very rare and are usually in conjunction with a special occcasion. We have never related food to behaviour or toys to food (as in Happy Meals).

I guess eating healthy is just eating normally as far as Abbey is concerned.

We realise though, that we are very fortunate that she has not (to date - touch wood) ever been a fussy eater, and she’s always willing to try new things.

I am also conscious of keeping Abbey involved in food selection and food preparation. She helps choose fruit and veg at the shops and decide which meal we’ll be eating tonight. I’ve also started a small veggie patch so she can see the food grow. I must say, she’s very patient when it come to waiting for the strawberries to ripen, but she won’t share them once they are!

KidsDish: Do you enjoy cooking for your family? What are some of your favourite things to prepare?

Rachel: I have never considered before that I might enjoy cooking for the family, but I guess I do. It helps to have enthusiastic recipients! I like trying out new recipes to break the monotony, but doing the weekly shop is something I delegate.

One pot meals are always a winner - saves on the washing up. Soups, curry, risotto, pasta… We cook the old “meat ‘n three veg” so rarely now it’s become a novelty.

My particular specialty is making things up from what’s left in the fridge.

Fiddly things like lasagne are made under sufferance and require red wine to ease the pain.

Also, I think it’s important to note that I do not maintain a monopoly on cooking dinner. I cook probably four nights out of the week with my husband covering the rest.

KidsDish: What’s your breakfast routine?

Rachel: I have the best breakfast routine - it involves staying in bed until it’s all over. My partner has breakfast with Abbey - weetbix with sultanas and milk, either hot or cold according to the season. If I get up early I’m usually coaxed into preparing porridge.

KidsDish: Does Abbey cook, or prepare food? If so, what sort of food can she prepare?

Rachel: Abbey loves to cook. She has her own apron and a step stool to put her at the right height to the kitchen bench. Mostly she takes the lids off jars for me, but she can also de-stalk and peel mushrooms, stir anything with abandon, press out pizza dough, sprinkle cheese and grind the salt and pepper (although you’ve got to keep an eye on that last one. She does like grinding the pepper mill…)

KidsDish: Do you ever feel guilty about what you feed your daughter?

Rachel: Never. By having a stable, healthy base, I don’t have to worry about those times when we slip off the rails. Besides, if we never ate fish n’ chips, she’d grow up wanting nothing else!

KidsDish: What’s your favourite vegetable?

Rachel: Too hard! What’s the opposite of brussel sprout?

KidsDish: Thanks, Rachel, for taking the time to answer my questions!

Rachel: Thank you, Tansy!