Day 8 of My Captivity

And my captor shows no sign of letting me go. Her random punishments strike suddenly (vomiting everything we've coaxed her to eat over the last 18 hours, shrieking "My Outside!") and leave me cowed, flinching, and hyper-vigilant. Attempted to escape to the office yesterday. She allowed me to get about 10 miles from home, then, when I could sense freedom, she threw up all over the car seat, forcing me to turn back for home. Don't know how much longer I can go on.

Yesterday, all she had to eat for the first half of the day was ketchup. I am not exaggerating.

She has been sick for eight days, and can't have dairy until things are much more stable (unless I want to be peeling twelve hour digested dairy off my work clothes again). She weighs less than 24 pounds, when healthy, and will be two in less than a month. She's starving, but nothing sounds good.

Here's how things are going:

"Food, pease (vigorously rubbing chest in sign for "please", making winning smile".
"Ok! Do you want some toast?"
"No, food pease!!"
"Toast IS food. Do you want some cereal?"
"NO! Food PEEEASE!!!!"
"Cereal IS food (growing increasingly desperate). How about an apple? Banana? Jello? Popsicle? Tortilla? Raisin? Baloney? Carrot? Potato? Oatmeal?"
"NO!! FOOD!!"
By this time, one of us is lying on the floor crying.

Then I just open the fridge door and let her stare, hoping she'll find something she'll eat. Maybe I should just get honest and buy one of the Republicans' "My Carbon Footprint is Bigger Than Yours" bumperstickers.

I love to eat and cook food that tastes good, that is made of high quality and flavorful ingredients, that's locally grown when possible. But it's hard to be a slow food advocate when you'd give anything if your toddler would just swallow some freaking blue jello already.

The creamiest ever, stopetop, mac'n'cheese

This amazingly good, decadent, rich and creamy recipe is from Cook's Illustrated in the original The Best Recipe; the recipe in the New Best Recipe is not the same (side note vent here: I HATE it when a new edition of a cookbook I love comes out. I write all over my cookbook, adding comments, mentioning when I served the dish, suggestion alterations. When the new edition of a book I love comes out, I have to decide to buy it, and either start all over again transferring comments, or stay with the old one and risk missing something new and wonderful. It's especially bad when the new edition leaves out some of my favorite recipes from the old edition. So much for trying to simplify; now I own both). I don't think you can even buy the cookbook anymore (new, that is).

It's a stovetop recipe, my daughters both love it, it's very easy, and the keys to making it insanely creamy are:
*evaporated milk
*eggs
*having part of the cheese (half for me, usually) be smooth-melting American, which I normally avoid like the plague

You can saute some bread crumbs in butter and garlic and or parmesan if you'd like, to serve on top. If you do that, run the pan briefly under the broiler to brown the topping. I never even bother.

2 large eggs
1 can evaporated milk, divided
1/4 tsp tabasco
2 tsp salt, divided
1/4 tsp pepper
1 tsp dry mustard, dissolved in 1 tsp water
1/2 lb elbow macaroni
4 tbs unsalted butter
12 oz cheese (I use half sharp cheddar, half american) grated

*Mix eggs, 1 cup of the milk, tabasco, 1/2 tsp of the salt, pepper, and mustard mixture in small bowl and set aside.
*Bring 2 quarts water to a boil in large, heavy saucepan. Add remaining salt and macaroni; cook until tender. Drain and return to pan over low heat. Add butter and toss to melt.
*Pour egg mixture over noodles along w/3/4 of the cheese; stir until thoroughly combined and cheese begins to melt. Gradually add remaining milk and cheese, stirring constantly, until mixture is hot and creamy (5 minutes or so).

Serve immediately.

A few things I've found to actually work (sometimes) with kids and good food

*I once read that we all need to be exposed to brand-new flavors something like 21 times before we develop a taste for them. I've been telling my daughter this for years and so she knows that she has to try everything, every time, because one time she just might like it. It's worked as her tastes have changed (and it works for grown-ups, too; note my newly developed taste for sushi at the age of 35. Just in time to get pregnant and not be able to eat it and thus crave it horribly for the next nine months).
*Everyone in our family gets to pick one food that they never, ever have to try. It needs to be permanent; it can't change with every meal. I figure that kids, just like grown-ups, have things they really dislike and that should be respected, to an extent. My daughter's is broccoli, my husband's is grapefruit, and mine is eggs.
*In the obvious but true category: kids are more likely to eat things they pick out and help cook. When my daughter was old enough to read, we found a couple of good kids' cookbooks and we like to have her be primarily responsible for picking meals from them once a week or so. She struggles with math, and so the fact that cooking is a great way to understand fractions better is a great bonus. The cookbook we like the most right now is the DK Children's Cookbook. Another great resource is Family Fun Magazine.
*Take kids shopping with you whenever possible. And yes, I know it's a pain. I know you can get it done faster by yourself. I know sometimes you can tell your husband you are shopping, then get it done quickly and stop for a latte and a brioche and read the paper, while the kids are at home with him. Just take them with you sometimes, especially when you go to the farmer's market. Ask your child to pick one thing they've never eaten (one nutritious thing; not one new flavor of pop tart) and then go home and figure out together how to cook it.
*Garden. This theoretically works; I have a black thumb of death and kill most everything I plant. I do manage to grow tomatoes and rhubarb and zucchini and herbs every year. Let your child plant their own patch and eat what they grown.
*Join a CSA (community supported agriculture-click on the link to find one near you). Getting a mystery box of produce delivered to your house is exciting for kids and grown-ups. It's like a treasure hunt. There might be a plum! There might just be broccoli!

Getting vegetables down the kids

Nine year olds and vegetables. Sigh.

Here's what she'll always eat:
*Artichokes. One of her all-time favorite foods. Picked for birthday meals. Best prices usually at Trader Joe's-I can't stand paying two or three bucks a piece, which is what they will often cost in the grocery stores around here unless they are right in season. She likes them best plain or with ranch; I have to have bearnaise.
*Edamame (you know, raw soybeans in the pod-nice tossed with kosher salt after you've steamed them for 5 minutes). Trader Joe's has great prices-I always have whole and shelled in the freezer.
*Raw peas in the pod. Good deal when you buy the big bag at Costco for $5. Otherwise, usually pretty expensive.
*Raw baby carrots.
*Baked or mashed potatoes.
*Cucumbers
*Raw green beans and (horror of horrors) CANNED green beans. Gotta love that limp goodness.
*Tomatoes. We never get a good tomato harvest as they are always eaten right off the vine. Happy she enjoys them, but it's only good for those few precious tomato months of the year.
*A few leaves of lettuce or baby spinach.
*Raw jicama

Never:
*Broccoli. I've tried selling it as "little trees" a la Enchanted Broccoli Forest to no good. I think it's the absolute least favorite.
*Most cooked veggies, even with cheese sauce.
*Anything pickled.
*Wonderfully crisp, cooked green beans. Heaven forbid.
*Cooked squash, even with butter and brown sugar. This defies all logic, since it is now really more of a dessert than a vegetable.

Themes: crisp, relatively tasteless or sweet: good
cabbagey or cruciferous flavor: bad

So, my goal for the next month is to find a few more vegetables she'll eat. Wish me luck.