Pancakes. They are a staple in this house. While the directions point out, “just add water!”, I need to feel good about what I am feeding my kids, so I throw in some eggs and milk and call it a balanced morning meal. Once my husband and I even went so far as to chop up some spinach and add that to the mix. The kids ate them! We should do that more often. But this post isn’t about healthy trickery.
My kindergarten-age kiddo usually only eats cheerios in the morning on school days. It is quick and we need quick at 7:12am. After we drop him off at school, we come home and I have TIME to make his sister something more fun for breakfast. (Read: she will not eat cereal.) But she must be blabbing about her morning meals, because the other afternoon we found this taped to the fridge:
He apparently could only find Barbie paper to write on.
When the kids have their annual check up appointments at the pediatrician, the doctor always asks them, “Who is the better cook? Mom or Dad?” They look my way, I hold my breath, then they look at the doc and shout together “my Daddy!” and I flinch. The doctor always laughs, and writes this finding in the kids’ files (yes, in a filing cabinet at the Pediatrician’s office is the notation that my husband is a better cook than me). She looks at me and says: “So, they don’t like your fancy cooking?” Fancy? If that’s what we’re calling it these days. Example:
This was supposed to be a Pancake. I mean, it IS a Pancake.
I am not very good at this. The mixture is always too runny or too thick, too lumpy, or not lumpy enough. Maybe it’s the pan. Some of my pancakes burn and stick to the pan. But some of them halfway make it and I serve them. My husband’s pancakes? Perfect and pretty and adorned with chocolate chips. You won’t see a picture of THAT on this blog. He doesn’t need anymore culinary props. But it never occurred to me that my kids might not be so fond of my pancakes. Slap some syrup on anything and it is delicious, right? A pancake is a pancake is a pancake. A little crispy on one side? Serve it with the other side showing! The kids never know, and eat it anyway. I was secure with this assumption.
Last month, on a day like any week day, I was getting ready to make a batch of pancakes. I had the mixing bowl out, the whisk was clean, the pan was sprayed and heating, the eggs were ready to be cracked. As I started mixing, my 4 year old daughter sat down at the table with a piece of paper and a pen. She was writing something. I asked her what it was.
“Um…it’s a menu for the breakfast you are gonna make me. This page is for Burned Pancakes. I don’t want one of those today, ok Mom!?!?!???!!”
Fine then. Message received. Loud and clear. I think I offered her a granola bar.
RITZ
momantic comedy 
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