I decided to make up a fresh, healthy, homemade meal for the girls today.  I got the recipe from a cooking magazine called “Cooking for Two”.  While technically I am cooking for three, I realized that this magazine was perfect because I can cook for Claire and myself and just assume Molly won’t eat it.  Molly is still only interested in six foods total: yogurt, lil’ smokies, raspberries, PB&J sandwiches, flour tortillas, and black beans.  So why not just go with it?  I decided to make a real recipe for Claire and myself and let Molly have an Uncrustable® and some raspberries.

I decided on the tandoori chicken because Claire always likes chicken.  Let’s add in some fresh apple slices, try sneaking in some steamed spinach, and toss in some potato chips to ease things along.  This was a serious cooking magazine from America’s Test Kitchen designed basically for at-home dates.  This was not a “quick dinner” recipe.  I spent 90 minutes making the tandoori chicken from scratch and finally presented the final meal to Claire for a slightly late dinner.  I was so proud.  Claire and Molly helped out with the cooking some, which made it more fun.

Once I served up the mean, Claire gobbled up the potato chips and apple slices and picked at her chicken.  She ate a few bites and said it was pretty good but couldn’t finish it because she wasn’t very hungry.  Molly ate her Uncrustable® in like 2 minutes.  It was maybe five minutes before the girls were finished and off to other things while I sat alone eating my hard-earned tandoori chicken.  Okay, the chicken was slightly dry and bland, but I worked hard for it!  And really, it’s tandoori chicken.  It’s supposed to be that way!

So I worked for 90 minutes on a fresh, healthy meal that was partly eaten in five minutes.  This is why Chick-fil-A makes so much sense.   I could have spent only $10 and 10 minutes getting them Chick-fil-A and spent an extra hour playing with them.  After 11 years of practice, parenting is still tricky.  You can never win!