Don’t Play with Your Food
How many times have you heard those words? They were featured often in my life with Step-father #1. Usually it was when faced with something I seriously did not want to eat.
Lima beans were a regular feature in the conversation. I hated lima beans; their taste, the texture, the smell. Still do. And don’t even get me started on liver. But liver wasn’t a big player in the meal time power struggles due to its reliable and rather abrupt reappearance immediately after ingestion. Lima beans weren’t as reliable, they usually just made me gag. (TMI yet?)
I would push the lima beans (any beans really) or peas (almost as bad) around hoping that scattering them about the plate would be mistaken for them actually making it to my mouth. It never worked and I spent many extra hours seated alone at the dinner table with a plate of cooling food in front of me and the words “You’ll sit there until you eat it all!” ringing in my ears.
Eventually it would be bedtime and I would be released from my bean-imposed confinement and allowed to retire the battlefield. In a week, maybe two, dinner would once again feature the offending legume and we would repeat this delightful family ritual.
Whoa! That’s not how I planned to start this post but it sure feels good to get that off my chest.
Want to share any of your cherished childhood mealtime memories? Please, it will make me feel so much better to know it wasn’t just me.
Now, what I really want to talk about are the benefits of playing with your food. Yes, there are benefits (shut up Mother, it’s my blog!).
Play enhances attention:
When we play with our food, we are actually paying attention to what we’re eating. In paying attention, we are more likely enjoy what we’re eating and to recognize when we’ve eaten enough. Yes, playing with your food can be a diet aid.
All too often we view eating as a chore, or something we need to do before we can get back to doing something more pleasurable or important. Is it only me or have you ever found yourself standing in the middle of the kitchen, staring at the clock and eating your way to the bottom of a box of cookies while your mind is working away on something completely unrelated?
Play makes mealtimes fun:
This doesn’t have to mean actually playing with the food on your plate. I certainly don’t mean sticking asparagus spears up your nose and making noises like a walrus, but if that’s your thing who am I to complain (as long as you don’t do at one of my dinner parties)? It can be giving dishes silly names, creating whimsical presentations, or making up stories about where things come from. How much more likely would it have been for me to try choking down those damned lima beans if someone had made a game of it?
Play can be relaxing:
Adding a bit of play to the preparation, presentation and sharing of meals can help us slow down and enjoy the process, the food and our companions. I firmly believe the quality of our energy influences the quality of our product, in this case food. A happy, relaxed cook produces better meals and happy relaxed eaters.
Play is creative:
Playing with food can spur your imagination to create new recipes or add more enjoyment to preparing your tried and true family favorites.
When I cook it almost always ends up like play. With rare exception, I’ll start with an idea, a chopped onion and some garlic. It seems no matter how many ingredients I use, or how many pots and pans I dirty, it all ends up in one big skillet. The creating makes me happy and that happiness flavors all my dishes.
So ignore your mother’s voice and go ahead, play with your food.
When I was growing up one of our fav meals were pork chops in Rice-a Roni. I still like them like that; but the sodium count is off the wall.
My favorite was tuna casserole – essentially mac & cheese (no boxes in those days) with a can of tuna stirred in. Whenever asked what I wanted, that was my request. I didn’t find out until I was in my 30s that my Mother hated tuna casserole. Karmic payback for the lima beans maybe? LOL
I remember many nights sitting alone at the dinner table because of those darned yellow wax beans (something I have NEVER seen in nature!) and a 3-night standoff with split pea soup.
I love the message that when we play with food we are paying attention. It’s the mindless eating that does us in, not food itself!
Oh, and just for the record, childhood foods I will not eat at gunpoint: tater tots, mac and cheese from a box, and any casserole made with cream of mushroom soup.
Aaaagghhh – split pea soup! I’m with you on that one. I shudder to think of it.
I love food…and I love to make it fun for my kids. We sometimes have yellow night or white night where all the food on the plate has to be a shade of the appropriate color. My girls love this one as long as it isn’t green night. My husband’s family passed down backwards day…where you eat dinner for breakfast and vice versa.
I couldn’t agree more…spend more time with your food, really taste it and make it fun.
Darcie
Devoted to finding all things delicious.
http://www.discoveringdelicious.com
Funny! My fav was cream tuna, still is but I dont make it cuz the cream was Aunt Penneys white sauce, and it has way to many chemicals for me now…
Guilty pleasures. If only there was some way to make it so there was only one or two bites available. Much too dangerous to make a whole batch. I am totally craving elbow macaroni right now – so not on my diet.
As a Nutrition Coach I’m always talking to my clients about moving from a place of denial, deprivation and taking away and into a place of giving to yourself. Like giving yourself permission to play with your food. It’s such a great concept. Thanks!
We always seem to crave what we can’t have. That’s why denial doesn’t work, for me at least. It’s not always easy to find something pleasurable to replace the things we wish to avoid so adding a little fun can only help. And we can all use that.
I love playing with my food…and I was just having a conversation this morning, stating how I must start hosting luncheons and dinner parties again,,,,this is the greatest relief for me and a good way to play with the food. I recall as a little girl, having to sit at the table until I finished my mixed veggies, which I just could not figure out why they had to come blended together. I quickly realized that they are much tastier (if that is possible) hot, than they are cold. Now, I am a grow woman, that chooses to never prepare mixed veggies. Whew Thanks for the fun article.
Having people over to share a meal is so much fun. Plus it’s one of the few ways for me to get my place cleaned up. Somehow dusting is never a priority until company is coming.
The dinner time wars I remember included spinach, cooked carrots and clam chowder (which I now love)… on the other hand, I love playing with my food, particularly when it involves food color. My kiddo loved Mashed Potato Volcano when he was younger, which is essentially a large mound of mashed potatoes, broccoli trees, and butter with red food color. I also used to hide little m&ms in his peanut butter toast sandwiches to ensure he ate the whole sandwich.. worked every time!
But – clam chowder is white. Is his the exception to the white slimy food rule? Of course clam chowder isn’t slimy (or shouldn’t be).
Yes, Clam chowder is pretty much the only exception to the whole “no white food” thing. 🙂 Speaking of playing with food… evidently Uncle Bobby found some more old recipes from my great grandmas… the book is on it’s way to me and I will publish the originals at GrandmaBs and then put my own twists on them.. I love playing with food that way… last night it was chocolate cupcakes with a cream cheese twist and a cream cheese buttercream.. 🙂
Good thing you don’t live next door. I would not be able to resist those.
When I was 19 or 20, I got so that I couldn’t swallow when I was at home. I could eat out or at a friend’s house but not at home. My mother took me to a wise doctor and told her the story. She said that I needed to leave home. I left the following semester. It’s a different issue then yours, but it comes to mind for me right now.
WoW! Good for your mother for taking you to a doctor, and good for the doctor for prescribing the correct treatment. The body knows what the mind refuses to acknowledge.