Do You Hide Food?

I do — here's the what, why, when, and how.

Pop-Tarts in a shoe drawer.

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Do you hide food? I do.

A while back, I was slowly making my way home from dropping Holden off at school; I was on a work call, so I couldn’t take the subway. Zabar’s called to me; I decided to make an impromptu stop. It was an alternate-side parking day (if you know, you know), and Nick was working from home; it was his turn to handle it. I was, at nine in the morning, thinking about lunch.

I went into Zabar’s, still on the Zoom call but with my phone muted, and picked up a few little things. It’s next to impossible for me to go there and not stop at the smoked fish section. I got some whitefish salad, which both Nick and I love, went home, and made us green salads with avocado and the whitefish. He was happy.

Of course, everyone is happy to have lunch brought to them, especially during a workday. But Nick in particular might be even more appreciative, because I am, to go easy on myself, kind of nuts when it comes to what food we have in the house and who eats it. (There are so many emojis I want to insert here.)

To be specific: I hide food. Not just from Nick, but also from Holden. (Who, let’s be clear, is ten.)

I know that this is some weird childhood shit. My sister and I have both had bizarre issues when it comes to “our stuff” since we were little. (THANKS, MOM! You know it’s you.)

Poor Nick. He is 6’6 and probably skinnier now than when he was an actual teenage boy, and he doesn’t eat nearly enough. He’s WASPy as hell, though, and doesn’t get hangry the way people in my family do (does any WASP? Please introduce me so I can conduct a social experiment.). When he does get hungry, he heads to the kitchen and leans, pensively, on the refrigerator or cabinet doors, expecting something (what?) to magically appear.

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I’m sending this as a free post for all, so everyone can get a good look at the inside of my head and how bizarre it is. But we’d love it if you’d join us as a paid subscriber. If you already are a paid subscriber, thank you and we love you!

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Naturally, when he’s working from home and I see him heading towards food, my fight or flight turns on as if some monster was after my precious sustenance. (Who’s the real monster here, I ask you?)

What do I hide? Weird shit, honestly. The above-mentioned whitefish salad, for one thing. (Yes, I shared it when I made the salads, but there have been many other times that I’ve hidden it.) “My” yogurts (I’m partial to Icelandic Provisions’ coffee). Cheese from the farmers’ market. Singing Pastures meat sticks. The refrigerated stuff I can just push to the back of the fridge and Nick won’t notice it. The shelf stable stuff goes in our bedroom, various places. I’m pretty sure Nick knows (and if he didn’t before, he certainly will now) and just chalks it up to another one of my — many — quirks, quirks which somehow, bless his heart, he genuinely enjoys.

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Bread tasting, anyone? We’re running our first Bittman’s pop-up!

Come join us at the Glynwood Farm Store in Cold Spring this Friday, July 24, from 2–7pm. We’ll have samples of all our breads (and there will also be some available for purchase). And don’t worry — we’ll have our butter, too!

Address:
Glynwood Farm Store
362 Glynwood Rd
Cold Spring, NY 10516

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Leftovers are tricky; I’ve bared my teeth. Most dinners I make are probably good for four servings. Nick and Holden are both fully capable of eating at least two servings each; I’m good for one. Yeah, you did the math correctly — sometimes Nick leaves the table still hungry. (I do recognize that it’s time to start upping the dinner portion quantities. Holden is turning into a giant like his dad, which is so cute.) Once in a while, there are leftovers. I consider them mine. Every time. Again, yes, I know I’ve got some issues.

Another thing: I often do the grocery shopping, and I buy what’s on the list but I also get things that look good to me personally: Again, yogurts, especially coffee; protein-rich snacking things that I can have a handful of before a call and won’t put me to sleep; anything work-from-home-lunch-related. I get home, it gets put away, and it very unfairly becomes fair game. Since I bought it, and usually buy it for specific purposes — once again — I consider that stuff mine. (You can’t even call me an asshole, here, because I’m doing it for you!)

Okay, just one more thing: Nick grew up with bountiful junk food, and so he doesn’t put it on a pedestal like I do (I grew up with practically zero junk food). That doesn’t mean he doesn’t like it, though; he likes it as much as anyone else. As parents, we’ve landed pretty squarely in the middle when it comes to Holden, right between the no-junk-in-the-house and the very lenient policies. But I do — surprise, surprise — like to buy myself secret junk, and that’s when the real hiding magic happens.

Here are some more foods I’ve hidden from my husband and child lately:

• Abovementioned meat sticks;

• Frosted Brown Sugar Cinnamon Pop-Tarts;

• Cheetos: I hid them so well a few months back that when I found them they were comically stale;

• Whole Foods chicken salad — I “hid” this in the back of the refrigerator;

• Fruity Pebbles and Froot Loops.

So random, and it also really makes me laugh — especially when Holden inevitably sees the signature orange of the Cheetos bag and I have to make excuses. (Pretty sure that Holden already understands that his mom has lots of quirks.) I don’t want my kid eating fluorescent orange food!

I was curious to hear about other people’s hiding habits, so I asked in my Instagram stories about it, and so many people wrote back. Here are some of my favorite answers.

• “Yes, Jesus. Most glaringly seltzers. [My family] open cans of seltzers and leave them half-drunk, wounded soldiers all over the house. So I hide my seltzers under the bed — out of sight, out of mind.”

• “My mom has my dad hide the peanut butter from her.”

• “Yes, but because [my husband] tells me to! I can have one cookie/treat a day — no problem. He will eat a whole sleeve of cookies at a time, so I have to hide them per his request and then if he asks for one, I make him close his eyes or go in the other room to get one out, like he’s a toddler.”

• “Lifesaver gummy rings. As to why I hide them, that’s a question for my therapist. But I look at it like my ‘little treat’ for doing the grocery shopping.”

• “100%, and unfortunately, because I have ADHD, I once accidentally hid the stuff from myself and found it months later with mouse poop in it.”

Finally, before I end this diary entry: I sent my therapist an early draft and asked her what she thought about it. Is my hiding affliction common, or was she surprised to read it? Are there deep-set childhood issues here, or am I just not a sharer?

She responded with a question: “Are there things you can think of that might be contributing to these behaviors, or are you not either interested or concerned about them?”

Yes, yes, and yes.