The Child Friendly Chicken Curry

The Child Friendly Chicken Curry

So for me a really important part of this time where Anna has gone to work and I am looking after Reuben is giving Anna the chance to make the most of the weekend time she is getting with him. That means I am really conscious in making sure the naff jobs like Ironing, cleaning the bathrooms, hoovering and all those other things that make you want to put pins through your eyelids when you are thinking about doing them, are done by me. Being honest I actually really enjoy doing them, there is a sense of satisfaction of being organised and clean.

 

So Saturday arrives and we have Anna’s Mum’s or Nana as she is now known in our house coming over for dinner. I’ve decided to whack up a chicken curry for us all to eat in the evening. Through a bit of googling I find a really nice child friendly recipe by Jamie Oliver’s wife Jools.

 

I spent Friday night doing a big shop in the local supermarket to make sure all ingredients were sourced; the reason I chose to do the shop on a Friday night should be obvious. Although taking Reuben to a supermarket is a great thing to do, and as Anna points out it is quite educational showing him all different types of fruit and veg, the lad can be quite specific about where he wants the trolley to go and it is rarely aligned with where the shopping list needs it to go. Supermarket shopping with Reuben is such a great adventure, I’ll give it its own dedicated slot at another time.

 

So anyway one of the great advantages of this chicken curry is it takes about two hours to get done, which means Anna gets two hours of guaranteed solo time with Reuben. I genuinely think it is important she gets that, its extra close bonding when it’s just one on one, but without having good reasons to do it, we probably wouldn’t have made that happen and carried on hanging out as a three.

 

Now I do feel like I need to point out that the kitchen isn’t exactly my strong point. I have in the last 12 months discovered that cooking can be fun, but my repertoire of recipes that I’ve learnt off by heart extends to one, and that is only really crispy roast potatoes! So this is a big deal for me.

 

In true Jamie Oliver style, I get to work on prepping all the veg first. Anna has bought us this amazing chopping knife for my birthday and seriously what a difference it makes, I basically feel like Zorro as I slice an Onion, dice a carrot and chop up some garlic. I was even doing some pretend sword movements until I remembered the first time I used this mega knife I created a canyon in my thumb.

 

Chicken is coated in Tikka Masala paste, cheeky bit of coconut milk, natural yoghurt and giving it a mix as the onions and stuff are frying off. On the coconut milk I’d bought the lighter option for the sole reason of making me feel better about the incredibly large amount of curry I was planning on eating. Also let’s be really honest, when you buy the lighter option of things you tend to realise that with fat, sugar or whatever it is they’ve cut out, they have ended up cutting out the taste and flavour too. I was pretty sure I could conceal that lost flavour of coconut in the tikka masala paste here.

 

I get the chicken in and set it to simmer for one hour. It’s all gone amazingly well, too well it turns out. I’d left myself some buffer / I’ve made a total c**k up and need to leg it to a shop to buy some more chicken time, but hadn’t needed it. Nanny was coming over at 530 pm, and my chicken is due to be finished by 4:50pm! If I over simmer it for 40 minutes, it’ll be dryer than the average Egyptians big toe I’m thinking to myself. What to do?

 

Well I didn’t really want to bother Anna as I could hear her and Reuben were having a great time. I was pretty sure he was about to string his first proper sentence together saying something like “You are way more fun than Daddy, Mummy”, so I made the choice to ignore my timing problem. I just whacked the heat right down and headed into my comfort zone, the Garden.

 

I like the garden, most jobs involve working up a sweat and the job I’d been looking forward to all day certainly would. We have two trees in our back garden and they need a good old fashioned hack. So I get hacking, and branches are falling everywhere, it is great fun. The trees are quite high up so I’m getting a bit of shoulder burn as I hold the loppers up high. It’s a good shoulder burn though, you know the kind of pain where you feel like you are getting stronger, love it. Reuben, who was having solo play time with his Mum, notices that something new is happening in his world and decides to come out and investigate.

 

He is a bit of a green fingered chap, his absolute favourite thing to do when outside is to water the plants. Well actually we have this ugly fish stuck in our patio which we inherited from the prior owners, and he likes to water that. I think he reckons he is keeping it under water by doing it, I’m not sure if he’s being really smart or really dumb, but it’s cute anyway. He decides to come and help me with putting the branches into the bag, the problem is the little champ can’t tell the difference between daddy’s large branches and mummy’s precious herbs. Next thing I hear is “My Marjoram, what are you doing to my Marjoram”. In our house there is a bit of a legacy that most of the errors are made by me, so my instinct was to think “Unless your bloody Marjoram has grown up this tree I’m not doing anything to it” Then I remember I’m not the only mischievous male in the house anymore and look down to where Reuben has two big handfuls of Marjoram and is walking towards my dead branch bag. Oh dear.

 

Well after Reuben had received a bit of educating on the difference between a branch and an herb he was very useful in clearing up the garden. By now I could whack the heat up on the curry and just hope the chicken wouldn’t resemble raisins by the time it came to dishing up.

 

5:30pm arrives and its show time. Without doubt one of the best feelings of parenthood is when you’ve made your child a really healthy meal, and they wolf it down. You’ve put love and care into that meal and they are getting all the benefits of it. Anna is literally amazing at making Reuben meals, the lad has eaten an incredible diet up to now and the majority of the time he wolfs down her grub. Sometimes he plays up, but to be honest she would probably say the same thing about me. I do stand by the one time I did play up she’d basically put Tesco’s annual stock of fennel into her stew though, which didn’t really float my pallets boat.

 

So I dish up the curry as Anna sorts the table, Nanny is in the house and Reuben is mega happy as he loves Nanny a lot. I serve the curry up on the table, a little bowl for Reuben with the chicken cut up in to toddler friendly pieces. I’ve thought of everything. Put the little spoon in his hand and away we go right?

 

“Na”

 

‘Erm say what son?’

 

“Na, No, Na, no” Was his review of the curry, before he’d tasted it. Mums in the driving seat and tries getting a spoon into his mouth. Reuben’s favourite cuddly toy is a little toy owl and at dinner times you can see why, because like an owl he can turn his head backwards to avoid anything he doesn’t want to eat

 

“Na, no, no, no, na” he persists, but I’m thinking it will be ok when we get one bit into his mouth, he’ll realise this is homemade with love, care, affection and tastes real nice. Mummy succeeds, he has got a bit in his mouth. We are in, success is on the horizon.

 

That bite gets spat out down his bib. My loving, caring, affectionate, healthy meal that looks scrumptious in the bowl merely resembles some regurgitated vomit on his bib.

 

“Na, no, no, no” he continues to protest and flings his arms up in the air which is his signal to get him out of the high chair. He looks at Mama and Dada and we say “No Reuben you have to eat your dinner” so he goes to his failsafe plan B, he does that same but at Nana.

 

There must be some physiological change between being a parent and grandparent, because the real fact is Grandparents are a guaranteed soft touch, and Reuben has sussed this already. Every time he is at my Mum and Dad’s he gets the run of the place and about 15 new toys each time. When I was little, feeding the fish was only done by my Dad, now Reuben is about all rules are forgotten, he can feed them whenever he wants. Those fish see him and think they’re having a Christmas dinner every time, if you haven’t seen a fish smile head on over to my parents when Reuben is lobbing their little fish sticks in.

 

Nana being Anna’s Mum is definitely also viewed as a push over by the little Tyke. Nana however also says you need to stay in your highchair, although does look a little less stern that I do. As I’ve mentioned before Reubtube does come across as being pretty strong, so decides if we are not going to lift him out, he’ll just climb out and fling himself across the table. Luckily Anna sees this happening and decides to just lift him out.

 

Now this is where the father and son bond begins to get really tested. My loving, caring, affectionate, healthy curry is about to get some real feedback. Reuben walks over to a cupboard, yanks the door open and pulls out an Ella’s kitchen pouch. Picks that pouch up and passes it to his Mama. The look on his eyes says “Mum, I’m starving, I’d eat a horse, I’d gnaw on grass, I’d lick tarmac, but please don’t make me eat that curry of Dads and just whack this pouch in the Microwave will you”

 

“I see” I think to myself. An Ella’s kitchen pouch that is for 7 month old children, over my curry. Mummy refuses the Ella’s kitchen request, and places it out of reach. So the tyke heads back to the cupboard, yanks out a fruit pot. Strolls right past me not even bothering to make eye contact, past his Mum, round the table, to his saviour.

 

“Naaaaana” he says, handing her the fruit pot. So that’s a pouch and a processed mashed up fruit pot that now rank higher, than my loving, caring, affectionate, healthy, two hours to cook, 1 hour to buy the bloody ingredients CHILD FRIENDLY, chicken curry.

 

Nana takes the fruit pot, does the Grandma/ nanny style look towards the parents of “Oh you can’t really deny him can you, look at his adorable face”. My glance back clearly read something like “There is no way that little mug is going to eat fruit pot over my curry” so the fruit pot is put down.

 

We try him one more time in the high chair, we haven’t even got him sat on it before he’s pretty much dismantling the entire structure himself at the terrible thought of having a second mouthful of curry. Spoons are being throw across the room, it’s like a scene out of Conan the Barbarian, I’m pretty sure he’s specifically aiming for me as I’m ducking and diving to take evasive action from this cutlery bombardment. The noise coming from his mouth resembles an AC/DC concert.

 

Now he has only got eyes for Nanny, he’s turned the waterworks on knowing that will pull on her heart strings. I can see her hand is twitching ever nearer the fruit pot, so I look to my support network, being Anna, only to see her bloody hand is now twitching towards the fruit pot too. The little tyke has done it hasn’t he. He’s turned them against the curry and fruit pot is the new leader in the food time election campaign. I’m half tempted to lob the Ella’s kitchen pouch back into the mix, at least that is considered a dinner rather than a dessert. I mean if I am going to lose out here, please let it at least be to a dinner.

 

But no, the champ has won, Mummy gives consent for the fruit pot to be opened and Nana administers it. Before that lid is even halfway off the waterworks are finished and he’s smiling. I knew he was faking. I am sat there plotting ways to get revenge on him whilst he wolfs this fruit pot down when I hear a request being made of me from his Mum.

 

“Can you just make him up some marmite and toast?”

‘You bloody what??’ I can’t help but think. Two hours in the kitchen, making a loving, caring, affectionate, healthy, CHILD FRIENDLY chicken curry, and you want me to make him Marmite and flipping toast instead?? Outrageous. Obviously as any husband would though, I just do as I’m told and make it. I was confident that he wouldn’t eat it anyway, I mean the lads clearly off savoury flavours hence why he didn’t like my curry. So we slot the toast in front of him with a thin spread of marmite. It’s gone. Quicker than the fruit pot. It went so quick I’m pretty sure he snorted some up his nose whilst he had a mouthful just got get it into his belly as quick as possible.

 

Well that’s the final nail in the coffin for the curry really isn’t it. I couldn’t help but ponder what the headline would be if he was writing a trip advisor review on my cooking “Chef can’t cook to save his life but they do a good fruit pot”

 

So right there and then, we are done. No more football training for him. No more golf practice. No more park time and don’t expect me to push you around in your little tykes’ car ever again young man. I’m retiring. It briefly dawns on me that resigning from daddy day-care probably isn’t the best plan given I’ve just resigned from my job as a finance manager too, but I was feeling pretty beaten up.

 

Then though, as will always happen when you have a low moment with your children, they bring you up onto a massive high. We’ve moved into the living room and we are all having a little chat whilst Reuben pushes some toy cars about. Then Anna mentions he was trying to jump earlier. Reuben here’s the word ‘jump’ and realises it’s time for him to be centre stage again. He stands up and can’t wait to show his Nanny his new ‘jump’.

 

Now the definition of jump reads like this “push oneself off a surface and into the air by using the muscles in one's legs and feet.” Now in what can only be described as the most adorable jump that wasn’t actually a jump anyone will ever see, Reuben wasn’t quite pushing himself off a surface. Instead he was launching his body into the air with his arms up and lifting one leg off the ground, but making sure that the big toe of his other foot remained in touch with the carpet. The smile every time he thought he had nailed a jump was incredible though. The three adults were cheering like he had just won the Olympic high jump gold every time he did it, so he did about 30 jumps with his highly infectious laugh inserted between each one.

 

It was a truly magical moment, so I was sat in my chair and decided to let the curry be forgiven. If he didn’t eat sausages and chips I was going to cook for him the next day though, I may well go back to resigning from Daddy day-care!