A Cow in Horse's Clothing

It's shocking.

I've recently been reading a collection of articles on the horse meat scandal, but as if that whole fiasco wasn't bad enough, there seem to be a bunch of people out there trying to act cool about it.

"People eat horse meat all the time!"

Yes, I know, it's very popular in France. But I'm sorry, I can't see it happening in my kitchen. Mainly because I like the cute moonwalking Shetty in the Three advert, and especially if the pony trying to infiltrate my pot is doing it under false pretences.

The best/worst piece I read was in the main national Finnish newspaper, Helsingin Sanomat (sorry, Finnish article only). Someone had interviewed horse owners at a riding stables to see what they thought about eating their mounts. Most of the riders thought it a good idea, as long as the slaughter process was humane.

What?!

I refuse to believe that any normal family would feel completely happy about their daughter's pet pony ending up as part of someone's Sunday roast. Or worse still, if old Rosie was the main ingredient in their own dinner. Please tell me I'm not mental to be thinking this?

Anyway, I'm glad I never bought that jar of ready made baby spag bol for Felix. At least he has been spared the Trojan horse in his ready cuisine. 

Although now the doubts creep in. What if chicken isn't really chicken? What do they put in cheese? And can anyone prove where fish fingers come from?

Fat, Glorious Fat

Slim bank account, fat waist. Welcome January!

I blame the supermarkets. As soon as the tinsel-dressed panettone was on display in late October, I went at it. Just a little taste, I said to myself.

So I sampled my way through November and then, well, December was almost kind of Christmas anyway.

I proudly resisted chocolate until Christmas Eve when I ate half a crate load of Ferrero Rocher - and that was after seafood, cold meats, duck, potato gratin and varied desserts.

More and more food - made principally out of sugar, cream and lard - kept finding its way to our kitchen cupboards and into our stomachs: gifts from friends, corporate presents of cakes and sweets my husband brought home... never mind the stuff we bought in. We were gifted a two ton Christmas log made with marzipan, which my husband and I don’t even really like. That went in under five days.
Then it was NYE 2012, time to celebrate! At this point we were sweating slightly when we squeezed into our party gear and ate the canned Christmas goodies for dinner - smoked salmon, pate and various cheeses, a couple of limp lettuce leaves on the side for show. We went out, and since the baby was staying with his grandparents, spent the following day on the sofa watching telly and, yep, you guessed it, stuffing our faces.

Come 3rd January I suddenly couldn’t sit down comfortably in my skinny jeans - the ones I’d been so proud to squirm into after my post natal diet. When you lounge around in pyjamas with an elasticated waistband, you don’t notice the spreading Michelin.

Oh well. Christmas is once a year and they say it’s what you eat between January 1st and 23rd of December that counts. So this week on a mission to put an end to the ugly chocolate binges, I bought a bag of sunflower seeds to nibble on. Like a pair of fat, greedy canaries my husband and I crunched our way through two bags whilst watching Breaking Bad. Today we bought a third.

And dammit, I still know there is a giant Toblerone in the pantry.

Judge Not...

Oh how I used to criticise.

Watching Supernanny on the sofa (with no milkstains on the upholstery yet), in the orderly and quiet flat (that wasn't littered with musical toys, dummies and soiled milk muslins), my hair washed (sans the porridge clumps), I'd sigh and pity these people. Surely raising kids wasn't that difficult?

Then I had mine.

Felix is only eight months old, so I'm not exactly talking from a lifetime's experience, but it sure has been humbling. Child rearing theory and practice are two different realities.  

For example, TV and food used to be big issues for me. Neither should ever be used to distract a child. Right?

Hah! Meet my new best friend, the Baby Fresh Food Feeder. A tiny mesh bag with a handle, you stuff it with a piece of fruit or a biscuit... to be safely enjoyed by baby, alone. Magic. Gives you time to gobble down your own lunch.

Next, introducing children's TV. Some days the sound of Three Little Monkeys and Felix falling into silence for a minute or so means that I can go to the loo on my own, without having to hear a heart wrenching "Mamamamamamama!" from the playpen as I do my business as fast as possible (not good for the old post partum hemorroids I can tell you).

Because that's just it. I've come to see that we're not talking about toddlers being glued to reruns of CSI for eight hours whilst stuffing their faces with supersized Happy Meals. It's really about having five, yes, literally five, minutes to yourself. A short moment where you can have a pee, pull yourself together, make a cuppa or just brace yourself for the next six hours ahead. 

Keeping up with a high energy little person is hard work. I'm not saying that constantly taking the easy way out is right - or that it wasn't my choice to have a child. But it's not a cardinal sin to pacify your child occasionally with the "wrong thing" either. 

In fact, I'd be concerned if Felix stayed glued to the television like the little girl from Poltergeist. He has an very short attention span at the moment and even as he grows I really doubt I could make him watch TV all day - he's too busy discovering the world. I've also noticed that he stops eating when he's full (unlike many adults I know, yours truly included). Damage limitation seems to come as a built in feature.

Kids are really needy creatures and I for one have had to take my time to adjust to that fact. At the same time, the world is full of well meaning friends and scary statistics that can guarantee a lifetime of anxiety regarding our children's development. Yet why is it that there is no one expert formula that works perfectly for every parent and child? Because winging it with tons of love and an ample helping of common sense still seem to work best. For me anyway.

So as a heartfelt apology to all those people who I used to scowl at on the airplane when their babies cried: 

I promise I'll try very hard not to judge anymore. You're doing a great job without my help.