Top Your Own...

[sharon]

So one of the solutions I've found to dinners that please all 3 of us is "Top Your Own..." I am a Vegetarian and my wife is a meat-and-potatoes Iowan. Our son is picky in his own way although he loves many healthy things. He is sometimes a Vegetarian and sometimes eats a little bit of meat. We don't allow any pork or shellfish in the house for religious reason. My wife and son each have a short list of vegetables they eat and I eat any vegetables and love a lot of variety. I insist we eat a healthy, whole grain, mostly organic diet.

So one solution to all our various requirements has been to find something we all eat and then provide a salad bar style collection of things people can pick from to top their own. For example, tonight we did rice bowls, each of us having a bowl of brown rice and then the choice of many toppings - chicken sausage, black beans, chopped tomatoes, chopped peppers, lettuce, cheddar cheese, avocado, two types of salsa, lime juice, sour cream and scallions. Everyone was happy.

We do this with:

Rice
Pasta
Baked Potatoes
Salad
Nachos (with whole grain high protein chips)
Asian noodles

So what am I missing? Are there other things we can top our own?

[bunsy]

Brilliant idea! No ideas for though as I would eat very few of those toppings.

[dara1012]

We do a build your own pizza (using either small pre-made crusts or french/italian bread) with a variety of toppings (similar situation, I eat only poultry/fish and DH likes pork, red meat) or build your own tacos w/ soft shells and have a variety of toppings.

My mom has done a top your own chili and provides the base that has no meat in it (does have beans) and then she has ground beef, cheese, sour cream, noodles, crackers for people to add what they want.

[kristin8888]

You could do pizzas. Use whole grain tortillas put your toppings on and bake them so the tortilla gets crispy

[sharon]

Pizza sounds good. Tina makes it from scratch to order sometimes on weekends, but if we did it on premade crusts it would be an easy weeknight thing.

Chili's a pain b/c they don't like beans. I do it sometimes, but end up just making 2 separate pots. Sigh.

[dara1012]

I feel your pain Sharon....it's hard when 3 people have very different tastes. I have expanded some of DH's meals and we still make DS try foods, but a lot of times during the week we make 3 separate easy things.

[sarahisis]

You could do the same for sandwiches... grain rolls or wraps and a variety of things to make it!

[doeeyedgirl]

Or make your own quesadilla. My boys just like cheese, generally. But you can get real imaginitive with your ingredients.

[apryllraye87]

Quesadilla's are great for 'topping your own' we love making home made quesadillas

[ReneeW]

Love these ideas! We also do lettuce wraps. Start off with a large Romaine lettuce leaf and fill it with Asian-inspired ingredients. I do a seasoned ground turkey filling but you could do a lot of other ones. (Mine is ground turkey, sweet chili sauce, hoisin sauce, ginger, soy sauce, water chestnuts, pine nuts, sesame oil, green onions ...)

[doeeyedgirl]

That sounds super delicious, Renee!

[lilmermaid]

Scrambled Eggs!
DH likes his eggs all full of "stuff"and the DDs and I just like cheese. Sometimes we will add meat.

[sharon]

This is the weird pickiness - neither Tina nor Ian eats scrambled eggs.

[sarahisis]

We also do add ins for Mac n cheese... bacon pieces, olives, grilled chicken or ground beef, corn or carrots...and I like chow mein noodles

[sharon]

Oh that's great idea! We would all like that. Thanks!