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Post by cynthia on Feb 22, 2016 1:49:36 GMT
I read somewhere in the last year or two that it is actually good for a little child, toddler, to play with their food. It instills a sort of affection, rather than a fear, of it when served in relatively small portions and the child eats only the part of it that they want. And exploring of this sort is good for the child. However, I don't have personal experience with this method, or even second hand, so who knows.
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Post by bixaorellana on Feb 22, 2016 1:55:59 GMT
Hmm. Wonder what my early childhood experience was, since I break the 1st Commandment every time I see food.
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Post by rikita on Feb 22, 2016 23:08:00 GMT
well, today she decided she likes nothing i made for dinner - sugar snaps she tried when she heard there is the word sugar in the name, but was disappointed. dumplings were yucky because "there is something inside" (vegetables), and the soup was understandably a bit too spicy.
so instead, while i was still setting the table, she took the soy sauce and poured it out over her plate. this was what she wanted for dinner. she procided to use a chop stick to dip into the soy sauce and then lick the sauce off. when that was too slow, even though i offered her a spoon, she just bathed her hand in the soy sauce and then licked it off her fingers. she found a use for the spoon though: repeatedly hitting against the soup bowl to make lots of noise. i ended up taking it all away from her, which made her angry.
(our dinners are not always that chaotic. it's just a phase, or so i am told.)
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Post by Deleted on Feb 22, 2016 23:13:51 GMT
Oh, sometimes it is hard to figure out how certain children are allowed to get older. I have learned to freeze more and more leftovers before thinking too hard about it. A week or three later, sometimes they turn out to be something I really want to eat again. Every now and then, I take one look and throw them away, but at least they got a second chance.
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Post by htmb on Feb 23, 2016 0:03:53 GMT
Sometimes, when little children do things like that, I have to turn away or leave the room because I'm laughing so hard and don't want them to see.
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Post by rikita on Feb 23, 2016 7:08:45 GMT
made exactly the sandwich she wanted for breakfast (okay, second choice, as her first choice was nutella and that is only for sundays and special days) and she has not eaten a single bite of her sandwich, only drunk milk. i suspect though that mr. r. shared a nutella bread with her before i got up (he is far less strict about this than me), because she has a suspicious brown spot next to her mouth.
the other thing we waste lately is tea bags: she insists every morning i make her a cup of tea (just as i do for myself), but she never actually drinks it. i try to circumvent making her tea, but just after getting up i am not good in dealing with tears and anger ...
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Post by mossie on Feb 23, 2016 15:08:22 GMT
No need to waste tea bags, just make her tea with the bag you used to make yours.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 23, 2016 16:27:28 GMT
Yes, good solution, Mossie.
I don't know about Germany, but I know in the US you can't get two cups of tea out of a teabag. They're so tiny that all you get is pale amber liquid on the second cup. I always get two cups out of a Canadian or British teabag. Damn colonials! *shaking fist*
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Post by rikita on Feb 23, 2016 23:30:06 GMT
that only works when i drink the same tea she wants though (and i have to do it the other way around - she wants to chose a tea bag and unpack it), which is fine some days, but other days i want tea she doesn't like. but yeah, some days i could do that (i always make myself a big can of tea with two bags, but i suppose i could put in one first, and add the second one after having it soak in her cup for a bit.)
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Post by tod2 on Feb 26, 2016 14:44:32 GMT
Talking about tea bags - were they around during the second world war?
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Post by Deleted on Feb 26, 2016 15:36:47 GMT
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Post by Deleted on Feb 26, 2016 17:10:10 GMT
My father was just telling me how tea was rationed during the Second World War in Canada. My grandmother was a favourite of the spice and tea merchant, and he sold her all the powdered dregs in the tea chests he received, as this wasn't even looked upon as tea and therefore not rationed. She would then sew bags to contain it.
Resourceful woman. She also crocheted oil lamp mantles out of parachute silk, as the mantles were unobtainble during the war in Northern Ontario.
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Post by tod2 on Feb 27, 2016 9:05:05 GMT
Thank you Kerouac - I wanted to know because we knew a man who had been a prisoner of war, during which time they became walking skeletons. Food was so short that he and his friends used to boil up the same teabag over and over until it only produced hot water. Nevertheless, one day one of them bumped over the brew which caused a major row, even though there was no sign of precious tea!
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Post by chexbres on Feb 28, 2016 17:47:14 GMT
I've read stories about Holocaust survivors - who never had anything to eat, of course - but would tell detailed stories to each other at night about the foods they had eaten and enjoyed before they were captured. Some would complain that they felt "too full" when a really good meal was being described, and would beg the storyteller to stop.
Today at the market, I thought I would buy a sizable chunk of inexpensive meat and let it simmer all day in the oven - if only because glacial winds have been howling all day. But then I remembered that I've almost eaten everything in the freezer, and didn't want to start filling it up again. Also didn't feel like cleaning the kitchen, either, so I just went home and binge-watched US television series while eating soup from a box. Much less work, almost just as good, and no food wasted today!
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Post by Deleted on Jun 4, 2016 9:12:01 GMT
There is a new TV campaign in France to try to convince people to waste less food.
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Post by tod2 on Jun 12, 2016 10:10:30 GMT
I think its a brilliant advert! Although I did not understand a word the expressions said it all.
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Post by chexbres on Jun 14, 2016 6:38:35 GMT
Buy a smaller size, if that's really all you need - even though it might be a little more expensive. Make a list before going to the store, so you won't buy stuff you already have. Don't take two rolls, because today's special is cassoulet, which is a heavy meal, and the second roll didn't want to end up in the trash with a couple of leftover lettuce leaves.
I can't seem to find it now, but I remember reading about a restaurant in Paris which serves food made from what most people would consider garbage - peelings from vegetables, etc.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 17, 2016 5:45:07 GMT
I scooped out a big tomato the other day to stuff it. I usually throw the innards away, but the pulp looked too luscious to waste, so I put it in a little bowl in the refrigerator, hoping I would find a way to use it. It took me three days, but I made a vegetable soup last night and was able to add the pulp to the water. There were too many other vegetables for me to taste the tomato, but at least I had the satisfaction of not throwing it in the trash.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 17, 2016 12:49:37 GMT
The innards of a tomato are a) the most delicious part (it's been proven that the jelly around the seeds has the most flavour), and b) the most vitamin-laden part. I never throw tomato guts away; sometimes, I'll just eat them with a spoon.
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Post by onlyMark on Sept 17, 2016 13:49:44 GMT
A standard Spanish breakfast I eat regularly is half a toasted baguette, drizzled with olive oil and tomato that is grated. Often the skin is removed first from the tomato. With the innards you had left I'd have done that with it.
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Post by rikita on Sept 20, 2016 11:39:11 GMT
i feel bad: i just threw out a big amount of food. had all this flour and other things that were sitting on a shelf for ages, and i just discovered that tiny black bugs have moved into them ...
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Post by Deleted on Sept 20, 2016 12:54:56 GMT
Ah yes, flour weevils. My parents had to keep the flour in the freezer living in Florida. The only place I ever saw them in France was in a Chinese grocery store -- one of the little ones, not the big ones where the products move fast. Some packages of ramen noodles were moving by themselves. I brought an employee over to see it for herself.
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Post by rikita on Sept 20, 2016 13:27:17 GMT
i suppose i should put all pasta and flour etc. that is still fine in the freezer, to make sure they don't just move in there, now that the others are thrown out ...
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Post by mich64 on Sept 20, 2016 17:33:01 GMT
We had weevils in an apartment when we were first married. I remember it was difficult to get rid of them. There might now be home remedies on the internet to assist you Rikita. I remember that I did switch to another grocery store.
When we cleared out the kitchen for our renovation, I did dispose of some open packages of flour and pasta and I have been researching pantry storage ideas and will be purchasing glass containers for flour, sugar, pasta and cereals. It is quite simple to bring even just one weevil home with you from the grocery store.
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Post by lagatta on Sept 20, 2016 19:55:39 GMT
Bruschetta is similar to that Spanish breakfast. I suppose people with overripe tomatoes and somewhat stale bread all have similar ideas on how to use them up. Another is putting the bread in salads.
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Post by rikita on Sept 20, 2016 22:12:37 GMT
we had them before, and got rid of them, though i don't remember how. do they like heat? the current infestation might have to do with the last few weeks being very warm, while in winter our kitchen gets quite cold (we usually don't heat it as we only use it to prepare food, we eat in the living room). am considering containers, too, though. the main problem is that i sometimes buy things i need for one recipe (like some special type of flour etc.) and then have three quarters of a package leftover for ages, before i want to make something else with it ...
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Post by mich64 on Sept 21, 2016 0:03:01 GMT
I would think that they would like heat Rikita. I am sorry that I can not remember what solution I used to get rid of them though. I do the same with buying some ingredients just for a recipe so I think that is why I am going to get the glass containers. Because of the renovations, I will be starting my pantry all over again, I did get rid of a lot of old spices so I will be looking for new storage solution for that as well.
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Post by fumobici on Sept 22, 2016 2:06:19 GMT
Bruschetta is similar to that Spanish breakfast. I suppose people with overripe tomatoes and somewhat stale bread all have similar ideas on how to use them up. Another is putting the bread in salads. Bruschetta (or a version of it at any rate) was quite popular here a few years back. I think my tongue might still bear scars from biting it trying not to say anything when people pronounced it broo-sheh-tah instead of broo-SKEHT-ta. Hitting the hard "ch" is necessary; pronouncing both "t"s is bonus points. The Tuscans make an incredibly simple version where you rub a halved garlic clove on the toasted bread and add a forkful of simply dressed fresh diced tomato immediately before eating it. So simple, and so good. <edit> Even better if you use non-Tuscan salted bread. But don't tell a Tuscan that!
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Post by lagatta on Sept 22, 2016 16:02:52 GMT
Yes, that was painful to hear. Also painful to hear people referring to the prepared stuff sold to put ON bruschetta as the latter.
There are parts of Italy where there are almost no double consonants. Venice comes to mind...
And I also prefer salted bread, though I have also eaten overly-salted bread, which is horrid.
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Post by chexbres on Sept 22, 2016 18:43:21 GMT
rikita - I use bay (laurel) leaves to keep weevils, etc away when I store things in cans and jars. Just one large leaf - dry or fresh - works really well. And it doesn't make whatever you're storing taste like bay leaf, either. Unfortunately, this does not work with silverfish...
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