Looks can be deceiving. Many of us have been surprised to discover that the petite young woman who is our Au Pair is actually a bottomless pit or a fledgling linebacker, in terms of how much she can eat.
Obviously, no one wants to starve her au pair– part of what we provide for our au pairs, to the best of our ability, is nutritious food offered in the spirit of family and generosity.
And yet, if you are watching your grocery bills (and who isn’t these days) that extra two servings at dinnertime, the loss of leftovers for later meals, the expectation that meat be available for lunches and for dinners, can all add up.
From AZ HM:
Our aupair rarely asks for special foods. However, my husband and I are regularly in awe of the amount of food she eats. We typically eat dinner at home as a family and she always joins us. I’ve had to adjust my cooking to include at least two extra servings for each meal. Where we would nearly always have leftovers for another meal or lunch, we rarely do now.
She typically eats a hot lunch with meat (the limited leftovers or cooks a full meal), where we all eat sandwiches.
Our issue is how much our grocery budget has increased. I just don’t feel like I can tell her "you can’t eat that much." Any suggestions on how to handle an aupair with an appetite that is so much greater than the other adults in the family?
From Jane:
This year I had a similar experience to AZ HM–a tiny, petite au pair who eats way more food than even my husband. I knew it wasn’t just me when my Mom–who always cooks way too much food– commented on au pair’s impressive appetite and joked with me about how I could afford to keep feeding her.
It was a difficult adjustment at first becuase our original au pair ate about the same amount as me and we always had leftovers for lunch.
TIP I accepted that I would need to cook more, and TIP gradually the au pair curbed a little bit of her eating habits when she saw she was gaining a lot of weight. She still eats a larger portion than me, but she’s no longer out eating my husband.
TIP She also cut back a little after going on a few trips with me to the grocery store and seeing how I spend twice the amount of her weekly stipend on the family’s food for the week. Letting au pairs see how much things cost does help I think.
Home Economic$ education
I like Jane’s idea of starting with a little bit of Home Economic$ education… which is something that our au pairs often learn from us.
Show your au pair the process that you go through to purchase groceries. In my house, I start with a vague menu of entrees — 2 nights of chicken, one night of beef, one meatless meal, and yes pizza (often homemade) or fish when the good stuff is on sale. Although I already know what the costs are b/c I but the groceries, I write down approximately how much I want to spend on each meal (pretty much my dinner budget is $15 for the entree– the veggies I don’t worry about.) Already I’m at $75. Then, I add a pound each of deli turkey and roast beef. Toss in the yogurts for breakfast, cheese for snacks, and Oreos … and that’s the main food of the week. (Again, veggies don’t count.) Add this all up on scratch paper, and you can show her how much things cost.
Talk about serving sizes and about cost per serving. When I’m imagining whether I can afford the lamb chops whether I can fit lamb chops in the weekly budget, I think about how many chops each adult would eat, how many come in a package, and how much the package costs. If I can buy it under $15 (on sale) then I do.
So, as you plan your grocery lost, ask your au pair to estimate in advance how many portions she’ll need/want :
"One hamburger or two?" "
"3 lamb chops or 4? I’d plan on about 6 lamb chops for the two of us, since I’d eat 3 myself, but what about you?"
"Is there anything planned for dinner that you want to have as leftovers "encore presentations" for lunch the next day? I’m planning on having some of the leftover lasagna for the kids’ lunches… and you?"
Talk about how you try to economize on food. In my house, to economize means to save on both TIME and MONEY by making more than enough for one meal and to using the extra portions for lunches (usually mine and the au pair’s). Talk about what happens when food is discarded or when what’s planned for a second meal is eaten at the first.
Help your au pair plan her own week of eating. Ask her to tell you what she wants for lunch and how much of whatever she needs. Ask her to write it down… not only to make it easier for you to remember these items when shopping, but also to get her to be a bit more intentional about what she eats. This is good not only for the budget, but also for the body & soul.
I know that my own kids have been surprised when I talk to them about grocery budgeting and menu planning, and tell them that I’ll buy those snack pack pudding that they like but only when on sale b/c I think that $.75 per pudding is too much money and we can make it at home instead.
Don’t use the term "leftovers"- – it implies that the remaining portions of food are "extra" rather than intended to be eaten. I know I’ll sound crazy in saying this, but in my house we call these "Encore Presentations ", as in "Tonight is an Encore Presentation of vegetarian lasagna, this time with extra broccoli! Whoo hooo!"
I recognize that all of these strategies I mention are cognitive — they take the ‘let’s think about it and plan for it’ approach. But I’m more comfortable with this than with an emotional approach. In fact I can’t even think of how you’d take an approach that wasn’t cognitive/rational…. so I hope you other parents have ideas…!!
Female Football Player by tragicx01 on Flickr
Nathan’s Hotdog eating contest -7 4 2006 by jkgreenstein12
{ 9 comments… read them below or add one }
I think you have excellent advice, however it won’t work with my au pair. Money means nothing to her. She continues to comment about how cheap I am with the kids. She thinks nothing about buying a Coach purse every week and designer clothes. Going to the movies four nights a week and clubing on the weekends is fine too. She gets a manicure, pedicure and massage once a week. She claims that you must have a facial at least twice a month. I couldn’t afford her life style. She bought a large box of Godiva chocolates with our “fund” for stuff. When that happened, I must admit, I lost it. Then she complained that the chocolate wasn’t any good and she had to find a better one. I have stopped asking what she would like. I tell her what we have and what to feed the kids. If she isn’t happy with the selection, then she can buy what she wants to eat. I guess sometimes you have to be really firm or they will see how much they can take. I think I will ask her to make a list of items that matches what she plans to feed the kids. It would be interesting to see what she puts on the list. Can you believe that I buy the store brand and look for items on sale?
Kerry
What country is this au pair from? I had a very similar experience. I love the ideas from CV. I am going to try them out on my kids. I have been trying to teach them the value of money and my au pair hasn’t been setting the right example. I guess what she buys is none of my business, but it is hard to tell my kids that they have to earn and save their money if they want to go to the movies or get ice cream, etc.
One thing I would say about cv’s suggested approach is that it’s important to realize that Americans are pretty open with talk about money, whereas it’s a taboo subject with other cultures. I learned this the hard way. The AP and I were talking about her getting a license, and I casually mentioned that it would cost HD and I a lot more money when she did, because we’d have to pay for insurance, car repairs, etc. She was cold to me for a month and I couldn’t figure out what was going on.. finally one day she came to me in tears and said that it really bothered her, and was a mean thing to say. It’s the only time she’s ever reacted this way to anything I said, and I do know that her culture (European) does not talk about money, ever, so I’m sure that was it. It just seemed like such an innocent remark to me. So, although I’d love to take the approach cv mentioned, and it makes complete and utter sense to me, I bet my au pair would be completely blown away by it and it would cause a lot more problems than it would solve.
I’m not sure how else to approach this, because it truly is important for the AP to have an understanding that food isn’t free, and has to come from somewhere….
Kerry, your post made me uncomfortable. Sounds to me like you have a “fit” and shared values problem, and you have to decide if you are going to address the parts of it you can change, lump it or find someone else who can talk with her about it (counselor). You’re clearly not happy with this match. Doesn’t sound fun at all to have such a shallow person around your kids all the time, not to mention having to hear it from her directly!
Thanks for the attention to this topic and for ALL the helpful advice. I feel optimistic that we’ll have a new aupair to start fresh with in just a bit over a month. During our interviews, our aupair-to-be was telling me she’d love to teach me how to cook food from her country and I told her I’d love teach her some of our favorite dishes. We even talked about cooking together. We’ll see how all this pans out…but at this point I’m feeling good. She explained that she shares cooking responsibilities with her mom (she cooks when her mom works and her mom cooks when she works)…this sounds like more/different experience than our current aupair, who told us that she regularly cooks for the kids she cares for, which we took as she likes to cook and knows how to cook. In retrospect though, cooking for kids is a lot different than cooking with/for Mom. During our interviews, we did ask the new aupair about what she liked to eat for breakfast, lunch and dinner…and I didn’t hear any red flags (i.e. junk food or 3 hot meals with meat — like our current aupair). We’ll see once she gets here….but I’m glad we did ask about these things in the interview process.
I really appreciate the suggestions about having the aupair involved with meal planning and budgeting. Yes, it is time-consuming…but I do think it could help solve some of the misunderstandings we’ve had with our current aupair, who I’m quite sure really has no idea about how much groceries cost (and doesn’t seem to care when I’m buying)…but who ironically skimps on the rare occasion she is buying meals (like traveling to the coast and not getting any seafood, even though she loves it and asks me to buy it). Perhaps we could start this sort of conversation by saying…”I understand that open talk about money might be uncomfortable, or not typical in your homeland, but while you are here I think it is important to show/teach you about some of the decisions that we make as a family with regards to spending on groceries”….or something like that. I think if I would have engaged my current aupair earlier in the process of meal planning, budgeting and grocery shopping she might have been more sensitive to more of my concerns, i.e. what and how much she eats (perhaps not, but I’d like to hope so). Thanks again for the suggestions!
My au pair ate more than my husband and I combined. Our grocery bills doubled. The first week she she arrived we went through $16 of juice alone…she had never drank water before. We went through 1-2 jars of my good-quality jams each week. In order to cut costs I had to adjust. I started buying cheaper brands (including generic Nutella and jam, yogurt and cheese). I bought bread and pasta in bulk, I made a lot of vegetarian meals. I had to teach my au pair about the concept of grocery store sales…the phenonomen of food going on sale certain weeks was completely foreign to her. I couldn’t always buy her favorite juice or cereal unless it was on sale. I bought sale items in bulk (including diet coke and mustard and ketchup)…this was also completely foreign to her as well, in her home country they buy as they need because storage space is small and food never goes on sale.
The previous post about eating out really bothered me about parents including their au pairs when they ate out in rstaurants…we did that in the beginning to be polite and inclusionary but then we had to limit the amount of eating in restaurants (from our pre-AP days) because it started to get too expensive and quite honestly we had to stop inviting her when we did go (usually on a weekend when she was off). She could easily eat 2/3 of deep dish pizza without blinking an eye.
Per the advice of my AP coordinator I also told her after 2 months of staying here she can choose two special items per week, but anything special or if she doen’t like the food at home she has pocket money to buy that for herself. Ironically she started to gain weight and at that point she started to consciously eat less, but I think she struggled with it.
We have been fortunate in terms of APs quantity – I find I usually have to remind them to eat something so they are not starving by dinner time. But I have had cultural differences – like bottled water versus tap water. One AP (German) was used to bottled Italian water every day because she bought it inexpensively. When she saw the price of even a case of Pelligrino from Costco (a treat I purchased for her) – she switched to tap water. Our Swedish AP liked treats from IKEA – but then so did we and enjoyed the new foods – so worthwhile. She lost weight (no alcohol because of her age) and I worried she wasn’t eating enough. But she was fond of meat and eggs so I think with each AP you have to expect some adjustment to the food buying profile. One may be nuts for PB, another for fresh veggies (which can be as expensive as meat if you are buying yellow peppers and English cukes), and one for imported Chutney. In the end, it’s not be exorbinant and since I cook a lot – it’s still tons cheaper than those families that order in a lot or like to eat out. I agree that leftovers can disappear but if you say – please don’t eat that because today because it will be dinner on Thursday and it usually works. Especially if coupled with – and if you do eat it then you’re cooking and reasonable for Thursday night’s menu. Ah work avoidance – a great motivator
I have 10 people in our family that I feed, 6 kids and 2 in dipers, plus one still on formula which is 17.00 a can. My husband, Myself and two au-pairs. I hear alot of people struggle with the cost of food! My last au-pair ate like a hog, I think she gained like 15- 20 lbs in a matter of 3 months, it was nothing for her to sit and eat a bowl of goldfish crackers, dump a huge heaping bowl of cereal each morning and go back for 2 helping at dinner time. And juice OMG! like the woman stated above, she hog that down too and never drank any water. ( She would NEVER buy anything from the store to share) I use to buy alot of name brand products but switched to some off brands and even started to buy frozen juice in which you have to add water. I now mark the bags of snacks with marker for the smaller children only. I quite buying name brand cereal to off brands and I will only buy a few bags a weeks. What helps me is that I have a smaller dorm refrig in my office area, and if I buy something for myself or husband that I dont want them to eat, I put in in that refrig. If it something I bought to make for a meal, I mark what meal it’s for right on the bag! My other au-pair is always willing to makes breads and often cook uo something with rice and peppers, so her eating habits are pretty good! She has no problem with buying a pack of cookies and sharing them. I personally think it’s all in how the au-pair was raised, not so much from which country! It’s a matter of her values and respect for your family in which she was taught.
There was a Soviet saying, “In Russia there is food on the table and nothing in the pantry, in America there is food in the pantry and nothing on the table.”
In my house, food is meant to be eaten. Having to throw away spoiled food because no one ate the leftovers, or didn’t eat the food fast enough drives me nuts. While I cook with the anticipation that there will be leftovers, I also plan an extra meal every week that I can throw together quickly, in case there aren’t enough.
Most of my APs have actually lost substantial amounts of weight in their first weeks, because American food was too different, they were nervous about helping themselves, etc. I don’t mind if an AP takes seconds – to me that says “I like this dish and I won’t mind it if you make it again.” (I usually make notations in my cookbooks about which AP likes which dish, and also DH and children). I have found that once they are comfortable with us, they do tend to gain weight, in part because they’ve been starving, most start self-regulating after that initial weight gain.
I menu plan, which cuts costs because we only purchase the foods we intend to use that week. Those APs who like my cooking will request specific dishes, those who don’t will request specific foods for which they may cook for themselves. Most AP requests have been limited to vegetables, a particular yogurt, or for the meat-eaters – a small portion of meat (I don’t cook with meat, but don’t mind if they make a meat lunch, as long as it is cleaned up by the time I get home).
I would give up my extra glass of wine with dinner before I would tell an AP she couldn’t eat. However, we tend to buy pre-cooked dinners for our special needs child, to make it easier on non-cooking APs to feed her. One starting dipping into those dinners once, and I told her, “At $4 a box, I’m going to stop buying them altogether and you can cook for my girl.” She started eating leftovers.
I think it is a shock when you first have an AP, especially if she is on the younger side. They are young women whose bodies are still developing. If they work out in a gym, then they are often ravenous. Our food shopping patterns change with each one, as we accommodate food preferences. We hosted an AP’s younger brother once – he could pack it away, and instead of cooking 5 meals a week, I was cooking 7! That put everything in perspective!