I used to love cooking – then I became a parent

I glanced at the clock and my heart sank. It was 4:30pm and it was almost time to start preparations for dinner. 

I instantly began scrolling through the contents of my fridge – which I know by heart – trying to find something that the children will enjoy, that’s healthy, and that I have the energy to prepare. But I already felt defeated.

Believe it or not, pre-parenthood, I used to love cooking: finding new recipes, trying new flavours, strolling supermarket aisles in the quest for something new. But being a mum-of-five (I have children aged 10, 12, 13 year-old twins and 15) has gradually drained any joy I once had at the hob. 

Instead, mealtimes have become a mentally exhausting, seemingly never-ending fight between what my five children are prepared to eat and what I’m prepared to give them. It seems trivial, but feeding my brood has become one of my biggest parenting battles.

When my first child was born in 2009, I could hardly wait for her first bite of solid food. I found mashing up various vegetables quite fun and the mess she made utterly adorable. Gradually as more little lives were added to the mix, I expanded my repertoire but kept things simple. 

My husband, Ray, and I made our lives easier (if blander) by eating pretty much what the children were (albeit not pureed), and my meal plans took on a familiar shape. Like a lot of parents I ended up rotating the same five or six ‘safe’ meals – including carbonara, spag bol and roast chicken – on repeat.

At the time I consoled myself that it would get easier as they grew. Surely their palettes would expand, as would their understanding of how much food cost, and how hard I was working? I was wrong. 

Certain favourite dishes (my classic lasagne) fell out of favour for being ‘boring’. 

One of my children developed a phobia of getting food ‘stuck’ after a particularly dry bite of potato lodged itself to the roof of his mouth, and he began to avoid certain foods. 

Another developed a deep aversion to some foods – and would come home from school ravenous expecting a hot meal, then another later on. 

Trying to cater mealtimes around my children’s new preferences only reduced my repertoire further and resulted in complaints from the others that we were eating the same old things. 

I’ll be clearing the remnants of dinner away only to have a teen wander in and enquire about food as if they’ve genuinely forgotten the meal minutes earlier. Even when a snack or sandwich suffices, the pressure of always having the right ingredients in stock (endless tins of tuna, packets of pasta, ingredients for a curry and a variety of cereals) is as wearing as my kids’ utter disbelief when we run out.

My light at the end of this tunnel of despair has been my low expectations. Setting my own bar low means that on the rare occasions that a meal works – when a new recipe is consumed with gusto, when the kids all clear their plates – I’m elated. 

But more often than not I’m scraping food into the recycling and feeling absolutely dreadful. 

Where once I enjoyed whipping up tasty meals for me and hubby, now we chow down with the children to save money, time and the remaining shreds of my sanity.

I know, at least, that I am not alone. Talking with other parents, I’ve learned that while some wax lyrical about healthy eating or family meals, most of us are dealing with a minimum of one fussy eater, and are sick of staring into the fridge or despairing over the food bill each week.

Eating together and letting the kids help themselves from a selection on the table actually encourages them to try more and eat more. 

One dish of chili, another of rice, some couscous, grated cheese, salad and French bread on offer means they can help themselves to their favourite elements and watch others enjoy the ones they’ve shunned. 

Watching each other eat what they don’t like (or think they don’t) is helpful, too – my youngest boy looks up to his older brother and is trying to emulate him, one bite of carrot at a time. 

Probably the worst aspect of cooking is the stress I put myself under to ‘succeed’ in all areas – health, budget and pleasure. With five children, that’s a near-impossible task. 

If I can learn to seek out the positives over the negatives, maybe my feelings around cooking will change. All my children eat well, all of them are healthy – that’s certainly not the case for every child.

Maybe ‘fed’ is enough. It will have to be.

Originally published October 2025

Do you have a story you’d like to share? Get in touch by emailing Ross.Mccafferty@metro.co.uk. 

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