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Ask Amelia: Mothers-in-law and Food Frustrations
It’s Friday and Amelia Hamilton is here to answer your questions on life, love, and sweet tea.
Dear Amelia,
My mother-in-law drives me nuts. What should I do?
Signed,
Every Husband Who Ever Lived
Dear Husband,
You maybe should have signed that “every married person,” as I also hear this regularly from the wives. By now everyone should know that when they marry a person, they marry that person’s family. Healthy boundaries are important in all relationships, including yours with your mother-in-law and your wife’s with her mother.
If you feel that your MIL is overstepping in a way that is crossing a line, talk to your wife about how to solve the issue. If she’s just annoying, it’s probably not going to change. You’ll probably just have to suck it up and get on with life. Don’t go rocking the boat, but maybe take up a hobby that gives you an excuse to leave the room when she’s around. That basket isn’t going to weave itself.
Dear Amelia,
Why do wives continue to make food with ingredients they know good and well their husbands absolutely hate?
Signed,
Hungry Hubby
Dear Hungry,
Perhaps she wants you to eat healthy meals so that she may enjoy your company for years to come. Perhaps she is tired of cooking dinner every day and trying to think of something that will please the entire family, so she just does her best. Presumably you know where the kitchen is. I’m sure you’re welcome to help yourself.
Dear Amelia,
Sweet tea is the drink of the gods, but I have a friend who’s a heretical apostate and refuses to drink it. My question is: are his taste buds broken and, if so, can they do a transplant.
Signed,
Southern Boy to the Bone
Dear Southern Boy,
Now that Michelle Obama has spoken out against sweet tea, is it possible that he’s on her bandwagon? If that’s the case, you should definitely torch your friendship.
If he just doesn’t like it, I think you’ll have to weigh your friendship overall. Does he bring anything to the table that is more important than sweet tea? Sleep on it, I know that’s not an easy question.
Agree? Disagree? Have something to add? Leave a comment!
Want to submit a question? Tweet using #AskAmHam, leave the question on my Facebook page, or e-mail AskAmelia@mail.com. So many options!
Published in Culture
From the looks of her, Michelle Obama doesn’t seem to follow her own advice regarding health food.
I hate sweet ice tea, can tolerate hot tea sweetened with honey. One of my daughters recently re-married, and her new hubby is a sweetheart. I don’t think there will be a problem, as he loves her, so I’m happy.
I can’t second this one enough.
I made it very clear when we got married that neither of us were marrying the other’s family. It’s worked out pretty well.
In my first marriage we became part of one anothers’ families. This worked well for the most part, although my falling asleep at MommaK’s stories did not go over well. A decade after being widowed, my fiancée and I are adopting well to one anothers’ families. I love her kids, she loves mine, I like her folks too but have no parents to share
It’s very different the second time, 35 years later. We each have a wry amusement at some of the foibles of blending two families. I’ll tell you in 4 or 5 years how it works ourt!
Dear Amelia,
Why do You presume that all the ingredients Hungry Hubby was referring to are “healthy?”
There’s a lot of Families out there that had/have ancestors that ate meat deep fried in fat and smothered in butter with bread and bacon (pork, not turkey) with every meal while chain smoking two packs a day and drinking a 12 pack that actually celebrate Their 50th Wedding Anniversary. Substituting meat with kale may extend Yer Life by a year, but You lose several years due to the depression.
Animals eat grass. People eat animals.
As a Gen Xer I have yet to meet a chick that can actually “cook,” or certainly one willing to do it everyday. Would You have Her order His dinner if They dined out?
Sure, if He’s willing to listen to Her b and complain about how He helped Himself to foods He enjoys that may not be “healthy.”
Signed,
Buzzed and Satiated.
If I were any more Southern I’d be a fish. I do not like sweet tea. Never have. I like tea, though. My friends tolerate me. I just don’t drink their tea.
Animals are food. Vegetables are what food eats.
I’ve always assumed than when people get married that they ARE marrying the other’s family. That’s the way it worked for my parents. My two grandfathers didn’t see eye to eye on everything, but they enjoyed each other’s company and spent time together, even when it didn’t involve their children and grandchildren. The next generation has its own examples. The generation coming after ours is thin on children, but among all of us, the inlaws are all “married” to the rest of the family, usually even after they became ex-inlaws.
Before I was married I looked forward to having a mother-in-law. I knew that wasn’t the most common wish for a guy, but I assumed it would be like having an extra mother. Unfortunately, my wife’s mother had died before I met her, but it wasn’t enough of a drawback to keep me from marrying her.
1. My MIL drives my wife crazier than she does me – and she drives me pretty crazy. My wife, her brothers, their spouses and I constitute a support group.
2. Sweet Tea is gross. Might as well chug a bottle of corn syrup.
3. I do 90% of the cooking in our house. I try to accommodate the likes & dislikes of others, but sometimes just get selfish and cook something because I like it. The others are free to eat it or fix something else for themselves.
Unlike the Brand X Jimmy Carter, Ricochet’s Jimmy Carter gets it right.
Sometimes wives just know better. My husband claims to hate eggplant, or claimed so for a while. When I make babaganouj and just call it baba, instead of roasted eggplant spread, he loves it. Same for eggplant parmesan. In fact, I have to fight him for the left-overs now. There has been a similar transition with mushrooms (as long as I cut them small–turns out he doesn’t dislike the taste, but the texture, which turns out to be the case for most mushroom haters in my experience). My friend Lisa’s very yummy vegan kale stew that is eaten grudgingly and sparingly, gets scarfed when some chicken and red bell pepper are tossed in with the other vegetables.
Bottom line is that I cook what I like because I mostly get the left overs for lunches. For my dearly beloved, I take his tastes into account as I do for company, but in the end I cook to mine. Fortunately, he likes my cooking. Also, I don’t overdo with the stuff he doesn’t like. He hasn’t embraced ratatouille. Yet. I also make a lot of stuff that I know he likes very much and I like well enough. He gets those left-overs. All in all, it works nicely for us. Except for him stealing my eggplant parmesan lunches….