Sunday lunch

There is nothing nicer than a family Sunday lunch. However, I have realised that Sunday lunch is not quite the same when you are at the helm as the Mother.

Last weekend, I spent most of Sunday morning peeling, chopping and basting, regularly checking the clock to ensure I am on the track with the timings – something my mother says is critical for the perfect roast. Needless to say, by midday I am surrounded by three small people saying, “Can I have something to eat?” I distract them with a small bowel of peanuts and glance again at the potatoes, which are as usual letting me down with not a crispy edge in sight. My husband looks up from the Sunday newspapers and asks, “We have got bread sauce haven’t we?” Oh woops, I knew there was something I needed to get. I fob him off with some feeble explanation and appease him with a new jar of redcurrant jelly. He disappears back into the Business section mumbling, “It’s just not the same without all the trimmings.”

The cries ring out from the playroom as the hunger sets in and arguments begin. If I don’t accelerate, this could evolve into temper tantrums, resulting with at least one child missing lunch altogether, choosing instead to spend it face down in their pillow. Red-faced, I speed up my gravy-whisking, pleading with it to thicken. Just to add to the pressure, the timer periodically beeps announcing each vegetable. Finally, I’m there and summon my husband to take his traditional place before the carving plate. I watch him pull my beautiful free-range bird apart, having learnt never to criticise a man when he is carving. Finally, we all sit round the table and for a small moment we are the perfect Sunday lunchtime family. From then on, one or other, or all three children periodically slide on and off their chairs. We battle and bribe over eating their vegetables and say, “You wouldn’t behave like this at Granny’s”. My husband and I eat at record speed, trying to remain calm. Suddenly I smell burning. I make a dive for the oven door, only to discover the very crispy, charred roast potatoes, which I had forgotten about. I know the sight of anything ‘black’ will cause the children to burst into a group “Urrgh”, so I quickly shovel them into the bin.

Having spent hours cooking the Sunday roast, it is over in a matter of minutes. I am left standing in the kitchen alone, leaning against the oven. I glance across at the piles of pans in the sink, close my eyes, enjoy the silence and count to ten. At least it is over for another week.

Trial by lunch box

The chaotic daily breakfast routine is in full swing. One child is doing her last minute school reading out loud in between mouthfuls of cornflakes. While the other has decided that he will now only eat fruit for breakfast. He says, “Sports candy is all that Sportacus (off CBeebies’ Lazy Town) eats.” Meanwhile, the baby is busy tossing marmite soliders to the dog lying under the high chair. They are totally oblivious to their mother barking, “Eat up. Put your coats on. Have you brushed your teeth?” Finally, once everyone is ready, strapped into the array of car seats, a small voice says, “Mummy, where’s my lunch box?” The deranged mother then tears back to the kitchen to frantically rummage through the larder, spread pieces of Hovis Best of Both, cut off crusts and slice cheese.

A friend tells me there is an art to the preparation of a lunch box. “You have to be well-organised and put a menu planner together at the start of the week. I cook a few good wholesome dishes in advance which they have cold in their lunch box each day,” she says. However, such military-style planning may be too much for some.

According to recent research, one in five parents in the UK include ciabatta and focaccia in lunches while three per cent include sushi and smoked salmon. Most parents I know in Dorset would not go to this extreme, but some do trawl supermarket aisles searching for novel healthy snacks. Whether it be yoghurt covered cranberries, organic fruit sticks or even olives, there is pressure to steer clear from the vast array of crisps and chocolate biscuits that most children long for. Every afternoon, we are told about the contents of other childrens’ lunchboxes. “Sarah had Smarties and James had Monster Munch today.” Eventually, we decide that Friday’s lunch box can contain a few treats - funnily enough it comes back looking as if it has been licked clean.

Perhaps we do need to get more organised and plan ahead, so our mornings are less fraught. But I will not be replacing sandwiches with sushi.