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On a recent summer day, my teenage son walked into the kitchen to hunt for food.
“I can’t find anything to eat,” he announced.
Ah, that old summer chestnut.
When I had a house full of kids, summer mealtimes were a production. Now, with just one child at home, a near-adult, he is often left scavenging.
I pointed him to the pears and bananas on the counter. He peered into the fridge, hoping for other options.
“There’s yogurt,” I offered. “Or … carrots?”
“You know, this isn’t really food,” he said, his mouth full of banana. “These are ingredients. Why do we have to be an ingredient family?”
My son is a robust eater and rarely complains, but this moniker was new to me, so I did a little investigating.
An ingredient family, as defined by the Urban Dictionary, is a family that has no fun at all!
There is no party in the pantry, only a jar of coconut oil. No Goldfish crackers on the counter, just a whole wheat loaf from Great Harvest Bread Co.
Now that I know the term, I can trace my own gastronomic history back to childhood. I grew up in an ingredient household before the term existed. I have five siblings, and every meal was survival of the fastest. Grab the bagels before they all get eaten. Drain the pitcher of orange juice. Make sure to scoop up the last serving of casserole.
On the rare occasion that my parents bought a box of granola bars, it was gone in less than five minutes.
Like most teenage girls in the ’90s, I did a lot of babysitting. I thought it would be just like “The Baby-Sitters Club.” It was not. I did not have Claudia’s impeccable style or Dawn’s way with children. I was there for the cold, hard cash, but there were other perks. Other families had cable television — and well-stocked pantries.
“Help yourself!” the parents would call over their shoulder as they left for a dinner date.
That’s when I discovered that other pantries did not look like my pantry. They had Ritz sandwiches crackers! Double Stuf Oreos! Gushers, Hostess Ding Dongs and Nutter Butters!
I was like Aladdin tearing through the Cave of Wonders.
Of course, now the world is discovering what my mother must have known all along: that junk is trash for the body and does very little to stave off hunger. Still, as a teenager who just wanted her very own box of Swiss Rolls, I understand the allure of processed food.
So when my son begs for snacks, I quote from the myriad books I’ve read, from “Ultra-Processed People” to “The Omnivore’s Dilemma.” Then I apologize.
“I’m sorry,” I tell him. “But I know too much. Have an apple instead.”
As I’ve tried to do with all my kids, I’ve been inviting him into the kitchen to cook alongside me. Skill is power. Turning ingredients into a meal is an ability worth cultivating.
I’m teaching him how to make a killer deli sandwich. A great chocolate chip cookie. No-bake granola bars. How to scramble eggs (low and slow), flip pancakes, boil pasta, grill chicken and whip up a fresh fruit smoothie.
These are not complicated recipes. We are not going for “America’s Test Kitchen” here, just the Kitchen of Life. It’s a way of saying, “Look what you can do with ingredients! Doesn’t this beat a tube of pizza-flavored Pringles?”
To be clear, I am no foodie saint. I still buy snacks. I have a weakness for peanut butter M&Ms, and if I ever get stranded on a desert island, all I want is really good black licorice.
Speaking of desert island, someday I want to write a chapter book about a kid who gets lost in the wilderness, and all he can think about is his pantry back home, stocked with rice, flour, beans, quinoa and dried pasta.
As his stomach growls under a starry sky, he thinks back to the time he told his mother that there was nothing to eat.
I don’t know if kids are going to appreciate my book, but parents are going to love it.
