Dining Out, Brats Included! - Mariana

Dining Out, Brats Included!


I know. On Saturday night they rightfully belong lumped at Nanna’s or with some pimply teenager who spends the evening texting her boyfriend and picking out her blackheads while they watch TV. Or, if they’ve really earned the treat, Saturday night might even find them buried under a pile of crisp, golden chicken nuggets at MacDonald’s.  But some of us are actually even pig-headed enough to insist on taking the brats out with us when dining out.........

And you have to score pretty high on pigheadedness to do that because most restaurants’ idea of being child friendly is a nappy changer which no one dares use, three tolerably clean high-chairs and a Kids’ Menu (printed on A4 paper) of pizza with sausages and chicken nuggets or fish fingers with fries.  The backside (excuse me) of this Kids’ Menu is usually printed with  ‘activities’  which are chucked at all kids between toddling and quasi-teen age but never, momentarily, occupy any of them.  To add insult to injury, four second-rate - sometimes second-hand - crayons may also be dumped in front of your kid with a complacent "Ara x'ġibtilha....." which always reminds me of the kids in Oliver getting their gruel ration. So there’s your child -no Oliver - looking at the lot thinking, "Ah, it’s the four fucken' crayons routine again....now listen to Mummy’s falsetto asking me to say thank you". Right on cue: "Ara x’tatek il-lejdi, għidilha tenkju!", while you cross the fingers on both hands behind your back, desperately hoping your offspring haven’t learnt how to express themselves with a "stuff them up your backside" since their last restaurant venture. 

In short, most restaurants provide poor support, culinary or otherwise, for the Herculean task of keeping brats civilly sitting at their tables. Granted, some do provide "animation", but if you’re dumping the kids on someone else anyway it’s still not a family evening out is it? Still, let’s face it, they’re your kids and, what’s more, it was your pigheadedness that dragged them there in the first place, so really it’s entirely up to you to turn up prepared - that is, if you have any good sense to go with that pigheadedness.

With practice the "preparation" becomes quite effortless.  To avoid guilt trips, and if they don’t eat much in the evening, you should make sure they eat a nutritious lunch.  Ideally they should be starved before dinner itself (you can also opt to give them breakfast before 7.30am. Both options work just as well. Starvation, however, is cheaper.)  

By two they should be ready for their nap.  You should allow them three hours of sleep, during which you prepare "the bag" (more on that later), wash, do your nails, hair and most of your face.  Then you roll them out of bed and into the bath where you scrub them well, so that even if the sight of them in the restaurant will offend many, at least their smell won’t.  

If you’re sane you should know to dress them reasonably:  I mean, if your child’s idea of a meal is Spaghetti Bolognaise, white tops are out.  And even then, the red outfit goes on the bolognaise-loving child at the last minute possible  - but of course before you put your tights on, as in any pantyhose vs struggling child encounter it is usually the former that ends up in the bin, even if the latter deserves it better.  Also, beware of other rips and tears. By the time you’ve put on your tights, the kids may have taken off their shoes and thrown them under the bed which will necessitate you going on all-fours to fetch the shoes, with the cute little slit in your cute little skirt, revealing just the tasteful amount of leg to be sexy without bordering on trashy, extending with a resounding splaaaat. Well, it will now look…torn…so off it will have to come together with the whole outfit.

Back to "the bag".  Forget the cute clutch: you’re not Paris Hilton. You’re Mum: get a sack. Of course you may force-feed the brats before going out, but you should still take a little lunch box with bread sticks, sliced fruit, cereal and a treat - nothing messy!  You will also need the usual, important essentials: water beakers, forks, spoons, favourite plates, wipes, bibs, dummies, nappies, creams for their nether regions, extra trousers for freak nappy accidents, nappy bags, tissue (the list goes on). More importantly you will need to give some serious thought to entertainment (unless you’re thinking of trying your luck with the back of the menu): activity books, colours, puzzles, playing cards.  In time, and with every major expedition to a restaurant, you should have assembled an arsenal of these aids so that, when going out, you just need to grab a few before you scram.  

"The bag" is your survival kit and throughout the meal you will use it with the strategy worthy of Gary Kasparov. Eventually you’ll learn to pace everything so that when you whip out your last resort you are waiting for the bill.  In between courses the kids get your full attention: you entertain or feed them.  Meanwhile you have something up your sleeve to occupy them when the next course lands - if they are not eating.  In all events, it helps if you’ve invested in teaching your kids the basics of table manners. You know the sort of thing: "Macaroni does not go up your nose!", "It’s not cool to blow bubbles in your milkshake!"  and "No one leaves the dinner table before dinner is over!"

Occasionally, restaurants surprise you by doing their bit better than expected.  It is refreshing when the person explaining the day’s specialties offers to whip up something especially for the little ones: some plain red sauce with that pasta?  And you know you’ve landed in the right place when the person taking the orders asks whether you’d like the kids’ main course with your starters or your second course, or when the kids are brought separate bowls of complementary prawn crackers, apart from the table’s bowl, to share and keep them occupied.  Little things - but they make all the difference.

Of course it will also, sometimes, come to pass that in the middle of this dream situation, with one kid enjoying her spaghetti and the other gurgling over a book, and as you yourself tuck into the most succulent of steaks, catching your partner’s eye and feeling a warm sense of gratitude to the universe for granting you all this perfection, that you will be interrupted by a  "Pipì, Mama!’’.  With the brats around, a toilet visit is as much on the menu as your cappuccino.  But, what the heck - it’s also on the menu of pregnant women and most people taking treatment for hypertension (read that half the island).  And no one raises an eyebrow when a dame strung on Moduretic gets up for her second pee do they?

In short, yes it is way easier to rent a kid's DVD and dump the kids at the Nanna’s, to spend the evening eating all the junk food you usually prohibit and jumping on the sofa, which you were prohibited when young.  But the truth is that if you put some thought into it, eating out with the kids is likely to be fun (Important note: "likely", not "guaranteed" - shit happens, and with kids that can happen quite literally more often than you think). It does take some preparation, but, in the end, it pays off.  For because they’re your brats and you love them to pieces, having them around is part of your idea of fun - not incompatible with it.....  

....Which is, of course, the reason you drag them along to restaurant - hang on, it’s why you had them in the first place - and also why, when after all your efforts and hours of impeccable behaviour on their part, the kids drop a bit of chicken or need a second pee, and Mr Stiff-Upper-Lip turns to you with a slightly raised eyebrow, you thank God that you are more articulate than your kids in telling him exactly where to stuff both upper lip and eyebrow!