Dear Eric: My wife and I have a wonderful marriage, but I wish she would just let me do the cooking. Where I am concerned with the flavor of foods and taking those extra steps to make our food taste delicious, my wife is mostly concerned that what we eat is healthy and that it has all the nutrients we need, even though we all take multivitamins.
Having to force down a “healthy” meal can sometimes put my evenings on a real low. I don’t mind cooking for the whole family, but she often insists, or she just takes the initiative. How can I let my wife know that I would like to cook tonight, please?
— Healthy but Unhappy
Dear Healthy: Try a cooking calendar. Divvy up the labor and put in writing who’s running the kitchen on a given night. And if you don’t want to eat what she’s making, have leftovers from one of your nights. That’s my appetizer advice.
Now, the main course. Have a conversation about how each of you is expressing your values through food. You cook and eat for enjoyment, for umami, for gastronomical delight. Your wife cooks for nutritional value, for energy, for longevity. These are both valuable approaches and they’re both ways that you’re trying to show love to each other and to your family. It would be a shame to let that love go unreceived. Are there ways that you can craft a menu together, one that has nutritional value from her side and all the taste you’re after?
“Eating healthy and eating flavorfully are often perceived as mutually exclusive,” Miled Finianos, founder of MiledEats and Habibi Supper Club told me. “However, gravitating toward fresh ingredients and less processed foods can lead to a delicious and nutritious meal. This way they can still enjoy the food they cook while cutting down on some unnecessary bad foods, all while showing their love.”
Bon appetite!
(Send questions to R. Eric Thomas at eric@askingeric.com or P.O. Box 22474, Philadelphia, PA 19110. Follow him on Instagram and sign up for his weekly newsletter at rericthomas.com.)
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