Tag Archives: Tillie

So, what happened?

A conversation between you and a friend, or even just with yourself:

“Hey, what happened to that blog Van started about getting his daughter Tillie to try new foods? That sure was a great idea!”

“Yeah, the writing was just oh-so witty: And that daughter of his, what a cutie!”

“What was it called again? Will Tillie Like It?”

“No, no, it was called Lunchtime With Tillie Part 2”

“Wait, that’s not it, it was ‘But Will Tillie Eat That,’ right?”

“But Will Tillie Eat It? That’s it! I wonder what happened…”

Well, let me tell you what happened so you can cease your inner/outer dialoguing.

Summer happened. Yep, that most wonderful of seasons threw us out of whack with the scheduling around camp and all. Then the school year started, and our schedules became a little more crowded in the evenings. And then there was that time I cooked something and Tillie said, “No way dude: this is no good.” I went upstairs to my room and cried till I couldn’t cry anymore, vowing to never cook her a different meal again.

But after 49 black bean quesadillas and seeing her go through a case of Kraft Mac and Cheese, I decided, “No more!”

And here we are.

So I’m ready to get back in the swing of things and hopefully tell you of more exploits because really, there should be more to her meal requests of me than just burgers. I have a couple of dishes/tales in the queue: It’s just a matter of putting them to WordPress.

Let’s hope you check them out, but more importantly, let’s hope you’re not left to wonder again what happened to “But Will Tillie Eat It?” I wouldn’t be able to handle the stress of you going around not knowing what’s going on!

A (c)love story

It’s only been a few days since my introductory post, but in case you forgot, let me repeat something from it:

“Let it be known now: I feel I can hang some in the kitchen, but by no way am I an expert in any dish.”

In other words, there’s bound to be some mishaps as Tillie and I go along. And I’d like to share one of those with you now, on our first food adventure.

So, I figured I’d take things light this go-around and instead of dropping something brand new on her, I decided to take a stab at making hummus, one of her all-time favorites. And I’d get her to help, too, especially in the tasting department because of my lack of experience with it, which, if you don’t mind, sets up for an important segue going forward with this blog.

I, Van Sias, aka Tillie’s dad, am the original fussy eater. You may have been a fussy eater as a kid, but I’m pretty sure I have you beat. Like, the only way I can eat any type of cold cut cold is if it’s been fried in a skillet beforehand. I don’t eat ketchup, mustard or mayo. I’ve been known to give my lunch salad a quick microwave treatment if it’s just out of the fridge.

I’m way, way, way better than I used to be, but I do have issues with condiments and various dips, which has made me resistant to trying such things as hummus.

Where Tillie downs it on the regular and has for most of her life, I only had my first bite of it a year ago at a kid’s birthday party. And I have to say, it wasn’t that bad. But that was the last time I tried it. I wanted to give it another go, but it’d be some that I made as opposed to the containers that are usually inhabiting our fridge.

I found a recipe on a website, Inspired Taste, for simple hummus–“simple” being a main attraction. I had my chickpeas, olive oil, lemon, tahini and garlic all set, plus the recipe came with a video to even walk me and Tillie through. I broke out the food processor and was ready to begin.

But simultaneously, I had to make dinner: and for some reason, I decided to be extra industrious that night and grill burgers. On a school night when my wife was coming home later. No worries at the time: I got this!

However, it ended up being a lot to handle. The asparagus I was grilling for myself to accompany my food ended up burnt to a crisp. The burgers came out great, though: Props to me. Meanwhile, over in the food processor…

I had tahini and Tillie-squeezed lemon juice just sitting there. I did manage to get it going and make it creamy. Then came the next step, or misstep:

The garlic.

I usually just buy garlic already minced and go from there, but this time I decided to use fresh garlic. And here’s where semantics kind of got me.

The above recipe calls for half a large clove, which, to me, seemed like a ton, so I only put in three of those little dudes, less than half.

See what I did there?

I thought the whole thing was called a clove and the things inside were just … things inside, or little dudes.

Anyway, I got everything blended up eventually while Nancy finished getting Tillie ready for bed. When they were all done, I let Tillie take the first bite, since she is the resident hummus expert.

And this is what I got, with a little dance accompanying it, and her saying “spicy, spicy, spicy!”

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I thought she was referring to the cumin, but when Nancy tasted it, she said it was pretty garlicky. And I said I put in less than half a clove. Then I thought about it and asked her, “Wait, are those little dudes the cloves? Oops!”

I took a bite, and yep, it was garlicky–like ultra-garlicky. Enough to give me weird dreams about garlic garlicky.

Tillie finished getting ready for bed–with an emphasis on teeth-brushing–and that was that.

The first bites were rough, but I lemon-juiced the heck out of it and I made a recovery.

In fact, when I came home from work the next evening, Tillie was actually snacking on it with vim and vigor while Nancy cooked dinner.

So our first rodeo wasn’t too bad, and I even got to learn something: There is no food actually called a “little dude.” It should have a real name, like clove, for instance.

Tillie handled that softball I threw her pretty well: It’ll be interesting to see how she responds as I start stepping it up some!

 

 

I thought she’d be eating everything by now

Thai, Indian, Cuban, American, South African: It didn’t matter. My former almost-two-year-old was like the United Nations of eaters.

Then she went to daycare. Then I got busy with other stuff. Then she turned 3. Then 4. Then 5.

And before you knew it, Tillie (aka the Tillie of “But Will Tillie Eat It?”) had forgotten about her prior culinary forays and became mired in a cycle of black beans and rice and Kraft macaroni and cheese.

Now don’t get me wrong: that’s not all she eats. She’s a champ when it comes to downing the veggies, for instance. But the aforementioned black beans and rice and macaroni and cheese are definitely staples—as to where she might have one or the other at least 4 to 6 times a week.

That’s a far cry from her “Lunchtime With Tillie” days.

What’s that, you might ask? You see, that was a weekly feature I used to write for the much-loved Clinton Hill Blog, where I—a newly laid-off guy thrust into the stay-at-home dad role—would take my infant/toddler daughter out to different restaurants in the Fort Greene/Clinton Hill/Bed-Stuy parts of Brooklyn and write about the food and experience. I also made pains to expose her to all different types of cuisine and I have to say, she really took to it.

But as life changes, I guess so do the tastes of your average kindergartner. And we don’t get out to nearly as many restaurants as we used to with our days being so hectic.

So that’s where this new, hot off the WordPress blog comes in, because I’d like to expose Tillie to a variety of food again, but with a bit of a twist. It’ll be meals I make at home.

Back in the day when I was home with Tillie Bear, I really got into cooking. Now I find myself always saving recipes I find online (primarily on Twitter), but I never set aside time to make different things, which contributes to how the kid goes about her dining.

The goal, though, is for that to change: I’ll be making pancake bars for breakfast. Or instead of mac & cheese from a box, I’ll be making individual cups in a muffin tin. Crab pilaf? Caramelized onion & cheese squares? Yes and yes.

I’ll try to get Tillie involved in the cooking process, too, as I’ll probably need the help. Let it be known now: I feel I can hang some in the kitchen, but by no way am I an expert in any dish. Even my Cheerios can end up too soggy from time to time! But it’ll be fun and if anything, the family (including my lovely and amazing wife Nancy) will be trying some new meals or new twists on old favorites (more on that in my next post).

And I plan on writing here at tilliemeals.com as frequently as possible, with Tweets and Facebook posts to come.

So welcome to But Will Tillie Eat It? As things go on, feel free to comment and share your getting-kid-to-eat experiences, too. Maybe we’ll all be able to turn the tide on these kids and their stubborn ways!