Food in a family is a precarious thing. Everyone has their likes and dislikes and finding a balance is a challenge for moms everywhere. I have learned to pick my battles.

When my oldest daughter was old enough to eat, she would eat anything. I thought I was some kind of genius mother. My daughter would eat anything because I fed her everything. I thought parents with picky children assumed their kids wouldn’t like certain foods and just didn’t try. I was really pretty full of my own success with my oldest…then my younger daughter was born.

When she started eating, she was very specific over food. She would not eat spaghetti sauce on macaroni noodles and vice versa. She didn’t like anything gooey, fizzy, spicy, green, vegetables,  or tomato pizza sauce. Her tastes would change from week to week. One week she’d like rice, the next she wouldn’t. Needless to say feeding her was somewhat of a challenge.

I refused to cook separately for her and I refused to buy into her pickiness. Both my children would not eat the crust on their sandwiches, but I never cut crust off their sandwiches. I figured if they didn’t like it they could eat around it. This resulted in my youngest eating everything in a “C” shape to avoid the crust. She even did it on a burger with a round bun.

Because I refused to cook separately for my picky eater, I devised a dinner plan. I would make sure she liked one thing I prepared for dinner, but she had to at least try everything. Then I told her how long it would be until her next eating occasion. She could then decide how much and what she wanted to eat depending on her level of hunger. This has worked well for us as a family and now in her teens she has ventured out to quite a repertoire of food choices.

Then I have to deal with my husband. He would prefer a slab of meat and a large helping of potatoes at every meal because that is how he grew up. Early in our marriage my husband had to learn that if he didn’t eat what I prepared (and happily) I could easily stop cooking. But he does have strong preferences for foods I refuse to buy. He loves junky cereal I like to coin as Chocolate Frosted Sugar Bombs (lifted from a Calvin and Hobbes cartoon). I don’t buy them, but if he goes into the store for any reason, he buys them. His purchase of junky cereal backfires now that our kids are older and can reach the cereal and pour the milk themselves; it’s usually gone before I even realize it was in the house.

There are foods my husband prefers that I actually do buy. But one day I went to Costco and they switched their peanut butter brand from Jiff to Skippy and I thought my marriage was over. I went to a different store just to get the Jiff even if it was more expensive and in a smaller package. I felt if we were going to switch peanut butter brands he’d better have time to prepare. Fortunately, I wasn’t the only one whose marriage was on the line because Costco resumed carrying Jiff.

There is also the added problem of creamy versus crunchy peanut butter. I prefer creamy, although I grew up with crunchy. My husband and one of my children prefers crunchy and my other daughter likes creamy. Every time I use my creamy peanut butter, my deceased father’s voice runs through my head and calls me a wimp. So we have both, and I try to quiet my father’s voice by appeasing him with my continued purchase of crunchy peanut butter.

For years I’ve been trying to switch my family to whole wheat and whole grain products instead of the refined white products. I have successfully switched to brown rice and whole wheat pasta. But I have had the worst time switching them to whole wheat bread. I had success for several years with Oroweat’s Country whole wheat, then they quit making it. I should’ve written them a letter telling them how they ruined my life. Since then I’ve been searching for a replacement.

My husband was fine with my replacements, but my kids protested by taking white bagel sandwiches in their lunches and letting the whole wheat bread go to waste. So I just decided a few months ago to buy them white bread. Let’s face it, I won with the whole wheat pasta and brown rice, but white bread makes my family happy.

Gretchen Leigh is a stay-at-home mom who lives in Covington. She is committed to writing about the humor amidst the chaos of a family. You can read more of her writing and her daily blog on her website livingwithgleigh.com.