The evolution of the Williams Family Dinner

When we were first married, way back 10 years ago, I was on a vegetarian kick. Eric is from Wisconson and you eat meat, with EVERY meal. Every once in awhile Eric would forgo the meat for breakfast in exchange for sugary cereal. That was his diet. So I was going to get him healthy. I tried everything to make tofu good and I put textured vegetable protein (TVP) in his chili and tacos instead of beef. Then, one day, I spent at least 3 hours making this vegetarian mousakka. Its got all these layers and I'd have to grill some of them or do something fancy to them before I coud layer them up. It took forever! Proudly I served it to Eric..... I guess Eric had it with the health food and said "this is disgusting, I can't eat this". He's not the most tactful person, if you didn't know.

I then switched to making meals where meat could easily be added or taken out, pretty much making 2 meals.

Then the kids came along and you know kids, picky, picky, picky. Now we're at the point of Sarah not liking much meat, Eric won't eat ham, peppers, onions anything that looks too healthy, And the kids, with about 4 foods they'll all actually eat. At this point dinner is frozen pizza for Eric, cereal for Sarah, and either mac and cheese, peanut butter and jelly, ramen or some sort of breakfast food for the kids. Most likely, I was pregnant or just had a baby throughout the 2,3 or maybe even 4 years. Mind you I'm sure I felt periodically guilty and cooked a dinner that everyone HAD to eat but I'd usually regress back to the less whining alternative. I'm sure this was the point Eric gained that extra 20 pounds.

Here we are now ten years later....the great creation of the make ahead dinner stores! I love them, I go and put in only the stuff we like and then bring them home and cook them up. The great thing about this isn't just that you have these easy meals all ready for you, the great thing and believe me this is great.....its not my fault if no one likes it!! See before I'd get upset that I cooked this whole meal for a bunch of whiners and then after cooking it, I'd have to clean it up. Ya, maybe its a little more expensive but we all know the saying...If mom ain't happy, nobodys happy. The picture that goes with this story is one of Elsie. Shes eating STEAK. At about 7 months she LOVES it. I've actually started to like the good stuff too. Eric will actually eat vegetables that aren't smothered in Velveeta. We're getting there!