Eating a real dinner

When you have kids who are four and two, you can try to eat what you once did, meals that are good and full of taste, food that you want to eat yourself and is not processed, but sometimes you fail.

Last night was one example. We picked up a sirloin steak and made broccoli rabe and stuffed clams, sort of like a surf and turf and vegetable. (And red wine.) A decent meal. I was personally looking forward to it, and so was Claudine. I seasoned the steak, grilled it, and everything came together quite well.

I cut the steak into tiny kid pieces, even chopped up the broccoli rabe so it wasn't too large. The stuffed clams, I thought, would go over well with the kids because it was mostly stuffing.

But they were having none of it. We ended up breaking out bread and butter and yogurt (always good to have on hand). We were nearly prepared to pour them a bowl of Froot Loops.

Feeding kids is a funny thing. You want them to eat what you're serving and not have to be a short order cook for them. But this was one case when the food that we thought was good was evidently not good in their minds.

Of course, after they picked at the dinner, ate bread and butter and yogurt, they still wanted dessert. We balked at that request until they ate more steak. Ten minutes after everyone had finished, our son returned to the table, asking for spicy mustard and barbeque sauce in which to dip his steak. He wanted brownies.

Tonight, interestingly, we had a crappy dinner. Claudine went out, so I threw together random foods from the freezer, cabinet, and refrigerator. We had: green beans (Whole Foods, organic, loaded with butter and salt), Stove Top stuffing, Crinkle Cut French Fries, and Boar's Hoad deli rosemary ham. It was edible, but not steak with broccoli rabe.

The kids' verdict on tonight's dinner? They cleared their plates.