English meal time annoyance

I came to realize too late that  it was just  my in-laws and not all of England  that were  so  weird  and  'off"  at mealtimes...  they NEVER  had  napkins available...or salt at the table  or bread... I'm Italian American...maybe it was  my high expectations...  I also did not grow up  with brussel sprouts  and let's be honest  "in general"  the Brits  don't  'do' veggies very well..  so I  never liked  sprouts  in the UK because  they were  over  boiled and  gray and tasteless.. Now that i'm trying to lose weight and eat healthy i never knew how YUM they could  be if you  cut them and roasted   them  (as  someone  else  mentioned)  yay!!  My MIL was the  serving Nazi...they NEVER  had  family style  serving...That is how I grew up..where you put everything in the middle  and  serve  yourself.. she  served you     then at 'pudding" time she had the  dessert in front of her  and would  dole out slices  and  of course  you felt bad asking for  more.. she would  let you know if you could have more...  and at first i hated  having to tell them ahead of time how I  liked  my  coffee"...now it's just easy...  My DH  just  'does it"..    you couldn't do that yourself  either.. and they used one spoon  to stir it all.. and you had the same  mug  every time  all the time  as long as you went there..

Umm....  I'm speechless.

Do you think she has OCD?

Umm....  I'm speechless.

Do you think she has OCD?

Doesn't sound OCD to me - that's the same way my family does it.

My parents cook everything ahead of time, store it in the fridge and then just dish out a plate of food for each person and heat it in the microwave... so for meals, everyone just says what they want, it gets dished out and heated and then put on the table a plate at a time. For desserts, one person dishes out a slice or a bowl for everyone else and it's handed around the table; and then for tea and coffee everyone 'gives their order', so to speak, and one person makes all of them... oh, and generally we all have our own mug.

We all eat sprouts and cauliflower.  Just steamed.  Even my 20 month old kid eats sprouts and cauliflower with glee.  Are we weird?   

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm!!!!!! Not weird! Tasty!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

Any meal at my in-laws is dished out in advance, (and if it's an occasion where puddings are warranted, these are too. Not every meal gets a pudding).  from the kitchen and then brought to the dining room table.    Sometimes, the veggies are dished family style, but this is very rare.  My MIL is quite a good cook, but she has a limited repertoire, so I can usually predict what we may have for a meal when we go over.  Luckily, his family loves veggies, so I know whenever I eat over there, it will be healthy. 

In my family growing up, everything was family style. I personally don't like family style, because that means there is way more washing up to do. I think everyone should serve themselves from the pan directly    So this means, day to day, J and I dish up from the stove and bring it with us to the table, or shock-horror in front of the TV .
I will say that when we have guests, 98% of the time, we will serve it family style.  The in-laws coped okay with family style when I hosted Christmas.   

I think everyone should serve themselves from the pan directly   

I do like this logic....a lot of times I just eat straight from the pot.

Shoot, if it's feasible I eat straight from the package/can/container.

Shoot, if it's feasible I eat straight from the package/can/container.

Why use packages/cans/containers when we have very usable hands that can hold things! Scoop straight from a producers vat!