I worry about what I’ve taught my daughter about food. One area that I don’t worry about is body image, she and I are both naturally thin and can pretty much eat anything we want. I don’t think Hailey has ever even heard me use the word diet and she’s certainly never seen me deprive myself of my favorite foods.
What I worry about is all the packaged and convenience foods she’s eaten over the years. When I was married I cooked most nights, actual meals, not just heating something up in the microwave. When I got divorced I worked longer hours and there just never seemed like there was enough time to make a real dinner so I started relying on convenience foods. It’s amazing the packaged dinners you can buy in the freezer section of the grocery store. For several years that was my favorite aisle, a complete meal in a bag just waiting for me to heat it up.
Now I’m afraid that in addition to pumping her body full of preservative and additives and more sodium than ten people need, I haven’t taught her to appreciate food. It’s one more thing to feel guilty about, another tradition that has fallen by the wayside due to lack of time. Why make your child a peanut butter and jelly sandwich when you can buy them, frozen, with the crusts already cut off?
I haven’t really taught Hailey to cook, I was always in too much of a hurry to just get dinner on the table and get it over with, we never really slowed down to enjoy the food. We usually ate together but the food was more of an afterthought than something to savor.
Sadly, there will be very few things that Hailey will want the recipe for, no traditional foods handed down through the generations. I’m trying, there are a couple things that Hailey thinks are the best, but those things are few and far between. I’m afraid Chef Boyardee did more to develop her taste buds than I did.